Mr. Owen Keegan:

On the points that have been raised, I wish to make absolutely clear that I am very concerned and with regard to the escalation of the cost from the predicted €8 million to €30 million, I have sought to explain the factors that gave rise to that.

I have no doubt that the increasing scope and all of the complexities to date contributed, but in giving the Deputy an assurance that we got value for money, this should have gone through the procurement process again - probably twice - but it did not. I accept the view, both of the local government auditor and the Commission, that that is what should have been done. That was wrong and all I can say is I have now put arrangements in place to terminate that expenditure.

Regarding the figure of €500 million, it has to be put up by the PPP company; it is not a charge on the Exchequer or the ratepayer. As part of the PPP, it has to source and finance it. I hope that if the project goes ahead - that may be a big "if" - the additional expenditure on behalf of the local authorities will be very modest, probably less than €4 million or €5 million. That is not a further charge on the Exchequer or the local authorities.

Deputy Mick Wallace mentioned some comments made by Mr. Justice McKechnie. That is water under the bridge and went by some time ago. The fundamental issue is that that judgment was unhelpful to the local authority and we have had to deal with it in a number of ways.

The suggestion was made that we could strengthen the capacity of the local authority instead of relying on consultants. That is not an unreasonable suggestion. It has been difficult in the employment control framework. Our employment numbers and full-time equivalents are down by 19.5% in the past five years; therefore, we have far fewer engineers - far fewer staff of every type - in the city council. I share the general consensus on an over-reliance and a loss of capacity in the city council, but it would be very difficult to address this in the current framework.

On the question of whether the four Dublin local authorities are committed to the project, I do not know. I will not give the committee my position on the project until we emerge from the European Union complaints process and the issue of value for money, which must be independently determined by the National Development Finance Agency, is determined. I will have to put a detailed report, including the project agreement, to the elected members and consider their view. At that stage I will express a view, but it is difficult to say whether we are committed because there are too many uncertainties that have to be resolved.

I apologise to Deputy Kevin Humphreys. I do not have the air quality data with me, but I will be happy to respond to him at some other stage.

On the escalation in the cost of the Hibernian Molasses terminal, I ask Mr. Philips to deal with that issue.