Martin Kenny (Sligo-Leitrim, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State and his staff for attending the meeting. Emissions from the international aviation and maritime sector are not currently counted within the carbon budget. It is estimated that shipping emissions account for 2.3% of domestic emissions. Most of that is in the international context. Is it the case, as I understand it, that just under 20% of carbon emissions globally are considered to be from aviation? How is that counted? While it is well and good to look at the domestic side of it, and it is only counted for the ceiling, we have to count it in the bigger picture and we must take account of the bigger picture. I assume a proportion of the international greenhouse emissions that come from aviation, shipping and all of that will have to be allocated to different countries. Otherwise, how will we deal with them? I was surprised there is no count of those emissions, or is there such a count somewhere even though it might not be included in the emissions ceiling?

Is green hydrogen the ambition for maritime? Is that the change that is going to happen, with the emissions from shipping changing to green hydrogen? I assume they are mainly diesel at the moment. Is that what is expected to happen and, if so, is there a timescale as to when and how maritime will make that transition?

The Minister of State mentioned SAF and the fact it can be used for existing infrastructure and existing aeroplanes. That is obviously the direction in which we need to go. My colleagues' questions on how soon we will be able to scale this up must be taken into account. The fact we do not produce aviation fuel at all in Ireland at the moment suggests it will be produced somewhere else and imported. Is that what the industry wants to do? While we may have an ambition in this regard, it will be very much driven by what the aviation industry is doing. It is the most mobile industry we have. It can go anywhere in the world to get whatever it wants. Is there really a need for Ireland to be trying to move into production, or should we put our energies into other places?