Could Ireland survive without importing anything?

A lot of NORAs oil is stored in the UK who will absolutely just seize it off us when we need it.

There's only so much seaweed for fertiliser; and there used to be actual killings over access to beaches and ownership of the seaweed thereon back in the old days (Victorian era mostly).

Plenty of the agri co-ops around the country started not as dairies, but as group buying schemes for artificial fertiliser due to the supply problems for natural fertilisers.

There's a reason why the potato was the staple crop in pre-famine Ireland — it's incredibly nutritious. Provided you eat the whole spud, skin and all, then with relatively modest quantities of bacon, salt and some leafy green such as cabbage you're got a pretty good diet. Plus, it stores well without refrigeration, so as long as you grow enough of them you can eat potatoes year-round.

Pre-famine, the Irish peasantry were noted for being surprisingly healthy and well-nourished, given their dire poverty. So, yeah, in the scenario painted by the OP we would likely default to a potato-dominated diet. Boiled potatoes, since that's the most fuel-efficient way of preparing them, and fuel would be at a premium. Pig-meat would be the dominant meat, since you can feed pigs on practically anything and they don't take up a lot of grazing land that could otherwise be used to grow potatoes. Plus, it cures well, which helps with storage. We'd be rearing sheep for wool (we won't be wearing cotton any more, obviously, and in this climate we can hardly go in the nip) and that would mean some lamb meat as well, but that would be mostly seasonal — lamb with the new potatoes. Various greens when in season. A smattering of other root vegetables for variety, and a modest amount of grain production for bread. Salt can be reclaimed from the sea but, alas, no pepper.

One factor not already mentioned is that, if we can't import anything, we have no use for foreign currency — ultimately, all you can do with foreign currency is buy stuff in foreign-land. And if we've no use for foreign currency then our export industries fold, because what's the point? This will free up a large workforce to weed the spud drills, which is good because it's all going to have to be done by hand.

I did not know that, that would be a problem alright

Actually it seems to have changed - they have none in GB anymore; some in NI and other storage locations in Denmark, Spain, Sweden and the Netherlands

Used to be extensively in Wales; I'm guessing Brexit has been an issue.

But the stuff in NI is even shaky - during the extremely hard frosts in ~2010, the UK stopped us getting road salt from the NI salt mines despite pre-existing contracts to do so.

And stuff in Scandinavia or Spain may as well not exist if we aren't allowed access it.

Not too difficult to fix. The reason it stops working is a safety measure to ensure ESB technicians are not at risk from electricity going back to the grid when they're working on the lines. If you install a switch to take you off the grid or isolate a circuit, solar can work in a domestic setting when the grid goes down. Most people don't bother as it's not a major issue and when the power goes, it's generally for a couple of hours.

Does Ireland produce these switches in this hypothetical?

I was only giving a reason as to why most systems go offline when the grid is down, as some people might think it isn't fixable or it's a serious flaw. Obviously, you have an understanding of how solar works, but many people don't.

I already stated in a previous post that components would be a huge issue. Could we produce a switch? I think we could, or we could devise a rudimentary manual switching process. I have seen YouTube videos with very rudimentary switches that work - they're not as safe as would be required with current standards, but beggars can't be choosers. However, with components being an issue, once the inverters start to fail, having the ability to switch would be a moot point.

Cuba is about 36% larger than Ireland (109,880 km² v 70,280 km²) and its population is around double that of Ireland - in 1990 during the fall of the USSR, the population was 10.63 million versus 3.514 million in Ireland at that time.

I agree that it would be very difficult and you are spot on about a couple of bad harvests - with global warming, this is a very real possibility as proven by the last few summers.

I'm just hypothesising about a scenario, and I gave a very broad opinion that didn't take into account a lot of variables. I mentioned Cuba and NK as they have managed albeit with a lot of difficulty. One thing I have learned is that people usually adapt and figure out how to survive.

Whats that saying -we're all just meals from revolution..

When there were fuel truck strikes in the UK a few years back the big fear was no fuel -no trucks -and the supermarkets shut down , no business carries stocks anymore , so you need to get grain to the flour mills , flour to the bakeries, bread to the supermarkets, and all staff need transport, as well as each business needing power ..

Fortunately we don't have as many ambient firearms as in the US.

This is the most interesting thread After Hours has had for about 3 years.

To answer the OP,

Of course we'd survive.

It'd be utter sh*te and a miserable existence, but we'd survive.

There's a vast difference between survive and thrive.