Tom Barry (Cork East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the representatives from Coillte for their highly informative presentation. I am delighted Coillte has put so much stock into its renewable incentive scheme, to which I will turn in a minute. If possible, it would be nice to have sight of Coillte's submission, which is a subject on which I have lobbied the Government extensively. While I believe the future lies there, it is not without its problems. Before returning to this issue, I have a few other questions. First, have the recent storms caused much damage to Coillte's crop? On a small albeit highly relevant housekeeping issue, I farm a lot of land close to Coillte properties and the quantities of wild deer and wild horses are becoming an absolute nightmare. They are damaging produce and are very difficult to remove. Has Coillte a policy to deal with this problem? I ask because with these creatures coming out onto the roads on a regular basis, it will eventually become a public hazard. Do the witnesses have any comment to make on the early plantations from 1995 onwards? Many people, including myself, planted forestry back then and quite simply, we planted for the grant. We did not have the skills of forestry management we should have had and, in hindsight, many of us are disappointed that we did not choose better in respect of tree type. Is there a mechanism whereby this could be considered in the future or does Coillte have ideas in this regard?

As for wind energy, I am not being negative here because I agree with the witnesses that it has great potential and there certainly are highly positive arguments for it. However, I have attended many anti-pylon, anti-transmission line or you-name-it meetings and as the witnesses are aware, certain people hold very strong feelings and have fears in this regard. They do not like wind turbines or transmission cables. Some people make the point that they do not want them, either underground or overground. In fairness to such people, they attend such meetings, where they make highly valid arguments. The problem I perceive is that people such as the representatives from Coillte do not attend such meetings, although they should. They should be giving the counterargument because the public is there to be informed and eventually people will make their own decision. I believe that when they become aggressive, people are losing the argument. I have been attacked physically at these meetings and it is just unbelievable. However, if Coillte intends to make this a major part of its policy, it must attend such meetings and must begin to disseminate the facts because eventually, that is what people will deal with.

On climate change, while everyone has heard about it, most people are not too bothered. They might see a television programme and so on but when getting on with their general daily lives, they do not worry about climate change. They worry about how to pay the bills. I hear people talking about production and recently, one heard that wheat production would fall and no one would have enough wheat for their bread and so on. The facts and the reality in Ireland is that last year, the price of one tonne of wheat fell by €80. That is what it meant to be a wheat farmer in Ireland. Cereal farmers were almost forced out of existence until the crisis in Ukraine arose and introduced instability, thereby leading to the price of wheat rising by €15 per tonne. It is terrible to believe that one's existence is based on some other country having a crisis. However, in respect of climate change, the world still is producing plenty of food and until I see differently and the price increases, that argument will still be there.

On infrastructure, many of the arguments put forward by those who oppose pylons are based on their perception that all these developments are for the benefit of developers collecting money. They argue they receive no benefits themselves from it. As for wood gasification, I bought a wood gasification boiler a few years ago. I apologise to the Chairman but I will be finished in a minute. Of the wood gasification boilers brought in through the SEAI scheme a number of years ago under which one received €2,000 in grant aid, only 30% of them still are in use. The rest of them have been scrapped and that scheme has been closed. The reason that scheme is finished is because there was complete exploitation of people buying boilers. No expertise was available to fit them properly or maintain them. I eventually bought a 75 kW boiler but initially was given a quoted price of €7,000 by one person. I was obliged to travel to Northern Ireland to get a person in the scheme to sell it to me for €3,000. This is unbelievable stuff and one cannot have differences in price of more than 100%. It strikes me that Coillte may need to get into the selling and servicing of such boilers to make them work. Moreover, on the introduction of the renewable heat incentive scheme in England, it was commercially-based at the outset but it then was discovered that 80% of total use was in the private sector. Coillte should become involved in getting it into people's homes.

As for Structural Funds from Europe at present, through the Common Agricultural Policy there is a push for small to medium-sized enterprises to become more carbon-friendly. I believe submissions in that direction would be highly positive.

One aspect I note - I have been involved in this in trying to get one of them off the ground - is that banking is a significant issue. The banks view anything to do with a renewable project, because one must co-fund the Structural Fund, as a problem. They are writing it off and they want full equity brought in. They do not value the equipment because it is novel technology. When one has this equity issue, there will have to be some way to credit-guarantee the investment by private companies. While it is a great idea - so is world peace - the question is how we get to that point. At present, for small businesses, it is difficult to do.