Electricity prices could soar up to 50% more because of the war, while petrol and diesel could also hit €2.50 a litre in the coming weeks.
Experts say Ireland depends heavily on gas for many of its power stations, meaning lighting bills are tied to wholesale gas market.
On Monday, gas hit £8 per therm - the unit in which it was sold - on London markets. This is almost twice the rate usually paid by electricity firms here.
Dr Paul Deane, a research fellow at the Centre for Marine and Renewable Energy at UCC, said the market has responded with “nervousness” to the ongoing conflict.
Gas prices have gone up which has led to implications for households in Ireland.
Deane said: “We generate about half of our electricity from natural gas. And we’re seeing that unfortunately reflected into our energy bills and into our heating bills.”
He told RTE: “What the market is doing in terms of natural gas, they are keeping an eye on two things: They’re keeping an eye on the war in Ukraine, but they’re also keeping an eye on the weather.
“The weather is fundamentally important also for influencing gas prices. If we get a mild, windy spring, that would help renewable generation, it will reduce the heating demand.
“That could be very beneficial for us here in Ireland.
“What it will tend to do is reduce international gas prices a little bit and hopefully a rest to the increase in gas prices.
“But you’re dealing with two things that are fundamentally challenging to predict there - war and weather.”
Expert Deane also told how the prices of fuel in petrol stations at the moment - which are hitting €2 a litre - could increase to €2.50 in the coming weeks.
Meanwhile, oil prices also peaked at around $140 a barrel on Monday, but that could rise to $200 in the coming weeks.
Deane said: “What that would mean for us in Ireland over the next month or so realistically seeing petrol and diesel prices climb anything up to €2.50 a litre which is really into new territory, completely unchartered waters for us in Ireland and right across Europe.”
Elsewhere new survey has revealed that 81 per cent of people in Ireland think the EU should consider boycotting Russian gas as part of the sanctions to oppose Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.
This is according to an opinion poll carried out by Ireland Thinks for Friends of the Earth.
Asked what the EU should prioritise to replace Russian gas, a majority, over 60 per cent said develop more renewable energy compared to only a small minority who supported building liquid natural gas terminals in Ireland to import gas by ship.
Jerry Mac Evilly, Head of Policy at Friends of the Earth said: “We already knew that our continued reliance on oil and gas has been driving the climate crisis and hurting the most vulnerable. Now we know it’s also funding the Russian war machine.
“For years campaigners have said it would take a mix of a moonshot approach and a war-effort to get us off polluting, expensive fossil fuels. We didn’t expect it would take an actual war in Europe to drive that point home.”
