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Irish Times
5 days ago
- Business
- Irish Times
Commitment to climate action hard to find in Government
The programme for government by this Fianna Fáil - Fine Gael Coalition may have been written this year but, from a climate perspective, it could be a document from a decade ago. A simple comparison with the 2020 document gives a striking contrast. Cycling and bikes were mentioned in that document almost 50 times; this time it's down to 11 and most of them relate to tourist greenways or the bike-to-work scheme, both long-established policies. The references to forestry , woodlands and afforestation have fallen from 50 to 11; there are absolutely no mentions of peatlands, bogs and rewetting, compared to 10 in 2020. The word 'sustainable' is used 46 times in the document, compared to 75 five years ago. READ MORE Professor Diarmuid Torney: 'It is hard to see how these targets are going to be met' 'There is a lot of aspiration but little by way of concrete details of how we are going to meet our targets,' said Professor Diarmuid Torney, director of the DCU Centre for Climate and Society. 'The programme recommits to the big-picture targets, but if you start to drill into the detail of the different areas, it is hard to see how those targets are going to be met. 'And that's against the backdrop of EPA [Environmental Protection Agency] projections that the State is on track to get a little over halfway to the 2030 target,' he said. The EPA report, published last week, made for stark reading. The main conclusion of the report was that, with all existing measures, Ireland is projected to achieve a reduction of up to 23 per cent in total greenhouse gas emissions by 2030, compared to a national target of 51 per cent. [ Ireland has a dismal amount of tree cover but 'wild' is partly between our ears Opens in new window ] Most sectors are on track to reduce emissions, including agriculture, which has reversed years of growing emissions. A reduction in nitrogen fertiliser use, better spreading technologies and liming programmes – to improve the overall health of soil – have contributed. There are some worrying outliers. Total emissions from the land sector are projected to increase by up to 95 per cent, the report found. Ireland's forestry is reaching harvesting age and will move from being a carbon sink to being a carbon source. To counter that there will be a need for increased afforestation, water table management on agricultural organic soils and peatland rehabilitation. But when the programme for government is scanned it is hard to see a tangible commitment to achieve that. To the dismay of environmentalists, Kerry TD Michael Healy-Rae, who wants to allow forestry on peatlands, was appointed Minister of State for Forestry. However, it's too early in his tenure to make any conclusions on what he will, or won't, do. The focus has pivoted to policies that will increase emissions, such as increasing the number of data centres, investing in roads, lifting the passenger cap The programme commits to the overall target of reducing emissions by 51 per cent by 2030 compared to 2018 levels and all the other high-level targets. They include 22 gigawatts (GW) from wind and solar energy: that's enough to power the entire State, accommodate new data centres and generate a surplus. But many of the targets of the 2020 document have disappeared. Unlike the last government, there is no commitment to a two to one ratio for public transport over roads, or a 20 per cent ring-fencing of the total transport capital budget to cycling and walking – some €360 million a year. Rewetting peatlands is gone from the programme for government. Photograph: Getty Images Rewetting peatlands, which stops the decomposition of peat and prevents harmful carbon emissions, is gone. Two pages on forestry in 2020 have been reduced to two paragraphs. However, it's not a total abandonment. The focus has pivoted to policies that will increase emissions, such as increasing the number of data centres, investing in roads, lifting the passenger cap in Dublin Airport, retaining the nitrates directive derogation, and a campaign to remove biogenic methane (emitted from ruminant livestock) from emissions calculations. 'If we were to take our commitments seriously, that would mean a significant ramping up of implementation, but also new policies and measures, and it's hard to find those in the programme for government,' said Torney. 'Reducing transport emissions is probably the most difficult because we have such an ingrained car dominance in our system' Last week, the secretary general of the Department of Environment, Climate and Energy Oonagh Buckley said that given the capacity of the grid, policymakers faced a stark choice between housing and artificial intelligence/data centres. Taoiseach Micheál Martin later took issue with the comments. 'I was at the event where she said that,' said Prof Torney. 'Statistics were shared [at that event] that 50 per cent of electricity generated in the Dublin region is now being consumed by data centres. I'm not sure that the average member of the public knows that.' The base point for the EPA projections is the performance of the last government rather than this one. That government did manage to achieve a 7 per cent reduction in overall emissions in 2023 but it was always known the hard slog would be in the last five years. Former leader of the Green Party Eamon Ryan. Photograph: Alan Betson/The Irish Times For former Green Party leader Eamon Ryan, some of the first gestures of the new Government did not bode well for climate action, such as its decision on a LNG [liquefied natural gas] storage facility, an emphasis on data centres and what he says is the lure of the 'smell of tar'. 'Reducing transport emissions is probably the most difficult because we have such an ingrained car dominance in our system,' said Ryan. 'The Bus Connects project is starting in Dublin but it really needs to accelerate. There's starting with two but we need them to start in groups of four. 'The same in Cork, Galway, Waterford and Limerick. We need them at speed and at scale. I don't see that happening.' Ryan claims the figures show the last government in which he was minister for the environment and climate 'delivered in the last five years'. 'Part of the reason is because the Greens were in government. The difficulty is that political science trumps climate science. 'What we did wasn't [electorally] successful for us ... political science is maybe telling this Government it shouldn't push so hard because of the [electoral] consequences.' Minister for Climate, Environment and Energy, Darragh O'Brien. Photograph: Conor Ó Mearáin/Collins Photo Agency Minister for Environment, Climate and Energy Darragh O'Brien has acknowledged that delivery must be accelerated to meet the 2030 targets. He points to 'significant investment' such as a €2.5 billion grid-upgrade programme, new interconnectors to the UK and France and the expansion of renewables through further support schemes for offshore wind and other renewable energy sources. The 2030 target for electric vehicles (EVs) is 945,000. At present the number is 125,000. O'Brien says after a dip the numbers are back on track with a 23 per cent leap in sales in April. Figures from the Society of the Irish Motor Industry (SIMI) on Tuesday showed this increase was sustained in May with 12,392 new EVs being registered in the first five months of the year. [ EV Q&A: Why doesn't Ireland use roadside furniture for charging electric vehicles? Opens in new window ] 'The first meeting of the new Climate Action Programme Board was held last week, involving senior officials from all the main sectors. Its remit is clear: to focus on accelerated delivery of the actions needed to close the emissions gap,' he said. But objectively, the task facing O'Brien and the Government is daunting and will need radical policy changes if Ireland has any hope of coming close to reaching the targets. Professor Hannah Daly: 'You're talking about an increase in emissions in agriculture and almost a doubling of emissions from land use change by 2030' Hannah Daly, professor in sustainable energy and energy systems modelling at University College Cork, has said that even if all the current measures were implemented the gap could still be much bigger than is commonly spoken about. 'It's really alarming. You're talking about an increase in emissions in agriculture and almost a doubling of emissions from land use change by 2030 with existing, actual implemented policies, rather than the ones that are just spoken about,' she said. The programme for government contains strong language on commitments to phase out fossil fuel use, carbon budgets and the 2030 target, she said. 'But while you have this high-level commitment on paper it does not actually commit to the hard choices that are necessary,' she said. 'There's very little on agriculture as well. What's needed to fill that gap is just far more investment in clean energy transition and a halt in the support for the growth of carbon intensive industries.' This means a focus on dairy farming, flights at Dublin Airport and data centres, she said.
Irish Examiner
27-05-2025
- Business
- Irish Examiner
Ireland won't even get halfway to its carbon emissions reduction target, says EPA
Ireland has "moved backwards" in its goal of reducing its carbon emissions by 51% by 2030 with the latest statistics showing the country is now on course for a maximum reduction of 23%. That percentage, revealed today by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), compares to a predicted reduction of 29% made just 12 months ago. Professor Diarmuid Torney, director of DCU's institute for climate and society, said it is "depressing" that the scale of actions Ireland will need to take to meaningfully reduce its harmful carbon emissions will be far greater than previously thought. 'We seem to have moved backwards,' Professor Torney said, describing the latest projections as representing a 'yawning gap between what we need to do and what we've committed to do'. The report further details that Ireland is set to breach its first and second carbon budgets, which are delivered in five-year tranches, the first between 2020 and 2025 and the second between 2026 and 2030. The latter of these is set to be breached to a massive extent – between 77 and 114 metric tonnes of carbon dioxide – described by Prof. Torney as 'really bad, we are radically missing it'. Likewise, the new figures show that Ireland is set to miss its EU carbon reduction targets by a similarly wide margin, with a maximum reduction of 22% possible against the target of 42%. Missing those commitments, under the EU's climate programme known as the Effort Sharing Regulation, could see Ireland hit with punitive fines amounting to as much as €26bn, according to warnings issued in tandem last March by the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council and the Climate Change Advisory Council. The EPA said that the revised figures had been compiled using updated data from across the range of Government bodies and agencies. 'We are off track for our climate targets, and the distance to the target is increasing,' said one EPA official. Electric vehicles The 23% figure assumes that Ireland both implements the existing reduction measures it has committed to and also a series of additional measures - currently under discussion across Government and which are considered to have 'a realistic chance of implementation' - by 2030, according to the EPA. For example, the 'additional measures' assumption for the number of electric vehicles on Ireland's roads is 641,000 by 2030, versus 564,000 in the 'existing measures' projection. By contrast, the target for the number of EVs on Irish roads of such additional measures included in Ireland's 2024 climate action plan was 945,000 vehicles in the same timeframe. The most recent figure for the number of EVs on the country's roads is just 116,683 at the end of 2024, itself a slight drop on the 2023 figure. Asked if the projected figures for EVs, which were received by the Department of Transport, were realistic, and if they had been evaluated or not, the EPA said that 'yes, the figures are interrogated'. 'But ultimately, these figures come from Government departments. This is what they see as achievable,' they said. Government response Environment Minister Darragh O'Brien said the latest projections from the EPA "are a clear signal that, while we've made real progress, we need to move faster to meet our 2030 climate targets". "The Government is fully aware of the scale of the climate challenge and the importance for Ireland to be a leader in accelerating climate action. He said the EPA projections are not "absolute forecasts" but reflect delivery to date. "The first Climate Action Plan of this Government was delivered last month," he said. "Cross-departmental taskforces are in place. Governance arrangements have been strengthened, with the first meeting of the new Climate Action Programme Board held last week, involving senior officials from all the main sectors – including energy, transport and agriculture. Its remit is clear: to focus on accelerated delivery of the actions needed to close the emissions gap." Read More John Gibbons: East Cork solar farm row shows politicians must get off the fence on renewables
