Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Wednesday, 11 February 2015

Committee on Transport and Communications: Select Sub-Committee on Communications, Energy and Natural Resources

Estimates for Public Services 2015
Vote 29 - Communications, Energy and Natural Resources (Revised)

11:30 am

Photo of Alex WhiteAlex White (Dublin South, Labour) | Oireachtas source

There has been a fall this year in the provision for works under the better energy programmes. Last year, under the Government stimulus programme, we got additional funding of the order of €30 million for 2014, which we put to very good use. That one-off stimulus of €30 million is gone, and even though we got an additional €10 million, if I am not mistaken, the provision shows a net drop of €20 million on last year's figures. If the Deputy is asking me whether I think the better energy programmes and all the SEAI project work is important, I can tell him, yes, it is critically important that people's homes, businesses and public building are energy efficient. As public representatives we need to ensure that we render public and private buildings energy efficient so that the cost of energy will decrease in the future. We should not, as the adage goes, be putting the coal up the chimney. We need to ensure we reduce dependence not only on imported fossil fuels but on all energy sources. We should think about reducing energy consumption. The energy companies might not necessarily like to hear us say that. We want a growing economy, but we want to try to ensure we decrease our use of energy where we can.

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