Alex White (Dublin South, Labour) | Oireachtas source

We put a great deal of money into it in recent years, and rightly so. There are huge opportunities there and potential for the future. As a relatively small island country, the best contribution we can make to that sector at the moment is through research. We have excellent people in IMERC in Cork and we are trying to fund that as best we can. We want to bring on bioenergy. Everybody is committed to increasing renewables in our system and we must do that. Wind has been important and very cost-effective, but it is only one contribution. Bioenergy is very important. We published a draft bioenergy plan in 2014, which gives the broader context for the bioenergy sector. We reckon it will contribute half our renewable energy target. That is the objective.