Denis Naughten (Roscommon-Galway, Independent) | Oireachtas source

France and Germany have taken a strong position on the matter, on which I have had bilateral meetings with the German authorities. My officials have been to Paris and Berlin for a number of discussions on it. There is an appreciation and an acknowledgement of the difficulty in which Ireland finds itself. We need to find a mechanism to deal with it and that is what I will be discussing with my colleagues. I have not spoken to my new French counterpart since his appointment as Minister, but I hope to have an opportunity to speak to him about the issue next weekend to explain the nuances of the Irish position.

Deputy Brian Stanley is right in what he says about the issue of charging points which we are examining in the context of the Estimates process for next year and the three-year capital plan. It is an ongoing process.

Senator Joe O'Reilly raised the issue of community microgeneration. In fairness, Deputy Eamon Ryan has on a number of occasions pushed the idea of having an energy community. There is the basis for such an approach. I was asked for my views on the co-operative movement. As a country, we have been wrong to move away from it. The co-operative movement could be very beneficial for many aspects of society in Ireland, including this one. Our policy on sustainable energy communities involves a co-operative approach. The Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland is pushing this through 120 groups in communities across the country and we want that number to increase. A co-operative approach is the best one to take in this context.

The Irish Co-operative Organisation Society, ICOS, is an organisation that could do this. Traditionally the co-operatives were seen very much in the agricultural sphere but we have a very successful co-operative in County Roscommon that organises home help, the Roscommon Home Services, RHS Home Services, which is a thriving business. There are many opportunities for a similar model in the energy area.

In respect of microgeneration, we have an engagement with the stakeholders and people who are interested in this area on 17 October, which is being organised by the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland, SEAI and my Department. I would encourage my colleagues who are present to attend and participate in that event and to encourage other interested groups to get involved in it because we now need to deal with these issues. I am very anxious to support the microgeneration of energy. We had initially included it in the renewable electricity support scheme. There are a number of complexities that will be teased at this event but I want to try to run microgeneration in tandem with that. I think the suggestion that Deputy Ryan has made in the past and Senator Joe O'Reilly has made here today is a way that we can overcome some of the challenges.

On grants, there has been a 50% increase in the funding for energy this year. I got a significant increase in that, some €100 million is available this year. Senator O'Reilly asked whether we are below profile but that comes back to questions from Deputies Ryan and Stanley in regard to older homes. We targeted 500 houses for a deep retrofit, spending somewhere between €20,000 and €30,000 per house, carrying out a deep retrofit on fuel poverty homes in particular and the broader aspect of communities experiencing fuel poverty. It has not taken off as quickly as we had hoped. A great deal of work had to be done in respect of it and we are below profile specifically because of that. Deputy Stanley is correct that we are trying to do far more significant retrofits on older homes. We have done a lot of the low hanging fruit in respect of retrofits. One in five homes in the country has had a retrofit carried out on them, supported in one way or another by the State, but now we need to go back and do deep retrofits of many of those homes. We are also looking at the rental sector and what can be done. That is a particularly challenging area that we need to look at.

Under a well-being scheme, we have done significant deep retrofits on homes in the Dublin area. We established a pilot scheme and we have targeted people with COPD initially. We are now looking at families with children with asthma and we have had very positive anecdotal evidence from the pilot to date that people are more comfortable in their homes, yes their homes are more energy efficient but we are finding that those people are getting sick less, they are presenting at hospital less, their stay in hospital is shorter and there is a significant health benefit in respect of that. I hope we will have empirical evidence by the end of the year on those results which I hope will justify ramping up the capacity. This comes back to the issue I raised earlier in regard to multi-annual budgeting.

Deputy Stanley also raised the issue of agriculture. I am sure many members were in Mount Street yesterday at the discussion on the Mercosur talks. I spoke to Commissioner Phil Hogan on the issue of carbon leakage. We see it in industry. Neighbours of Deputy Dooley in Limerick speak about carbon leakage, but we do not speak about it in relation to agriculture. A far broader debate needs to take place on carbon. We are making progress in the area. We have engaged in the largest genotyping project in the world and have now genotyped 1 million beef animals in the country and that gives us a basis to improve beef production, reduce the overall carbon footprint yet a significant amount of work still remains to be done in the area. We are moving in the right direction.

Senator O'Reilly spoke about France and Deputy Ryan raised the supports we are providing, not just what we are supporting. We are considering solarPV which has not been supported up to now. The SEAI is reviewing all of those grant supports, the current rates, the technologies that are supported and will make an announcement shortly. The objective in the general grant scheme is to grant aid one third of the cost, with two thirds coming from the household. The SEAI is reviewing those costs, if I can secure a multiannual budget, we can build up the capacity in the country which should help to drive down the cost in that area.

I think have addressed most of the questions.