Mr. Koen Verbruggen:

For the benefit of the joint committee, I will provide a little of the background to Geological Survey Ireland, GSI. GSI, Ireland's national geoscience organisation, is a division of the Department of Communications, Climate Action and Environment. It has just under 100 staff, most of whom are geoscientists and technical specialists who operate from offices in the Beggars Bush area of Ballsbridge. It carries out its role as a key knowledge centre and data repository with a library, archives and extensive digital data holdings. It provides an extensive advisory service, particularly for local authorities. It has a statutory role as a national archive and a consultee on planning in areas such as wind farm development, county development plans and foreshore licences. In addition to supporting the Government and the local authorities, it provides data and advice for industry and researchers and acts as a project partner in all aspects of Irish geoscience, especially in European projects.

GSI carries out a number of major initiatives, in addition to the geological mapping of Ireland's bedrock and subsoil. INFOMAR, Ireland’s national seabed survey and marine mapping programme, is on schedule to complete the mapping of all Irish waters by 2026. It is funded by the Department of Communications, Climate Action and Environment, managed by GSI and delivered jointly with the Irish Marine Institute. GSI operates five inshore survey vessels. The data collected are used to update national charting and support maritime policy and Ireland's marine plan, Harnessing our Ocean Wealth. INFOMAR is globally acknowledged as a world class endeavour. It has trained over 100 people in modern, high-tech seabed surveying methods.

Tellus is the national geological and environmental baseline programme which will complete its coverage of the entire island of Ireland by 2028. There are two components to the acquisition of data through Tellus: airborne plane mounted geophysics mapping which records magnetics, electromagnetics and radiometric properties; and ground geochemical sampling of soils, stream sediments and surface waters. The data generated improve our mapping and inform the agriculture sector in areas such as animal and plant health. It underpins radon mapping which is conducted in conjunction with the Environmental Protection Agency, as well as peat mapping and environmental assessments. As the programme involves flying at the low altitude of 60 m and aerial surveying, an extensive communications and outreach programme is carried out in advance. All householders are leafleted and there is extensive direct consultation with owners of sensitive livestock.

Groundwater 3D is a major groundwater resources and protection characterisation project. It is targeting high priority regional complex groundwater systems, including those where there have been pollution incidents or boil notices have been imposed on public or private drinking water supplies. The programme builds on a long history of work in this area. GSI has been instrumental in developing the groundwater protection schemes risk assessment methodology and providing national maps to enable planning and licensing authorities to carry out their functions with respect to groundwater protection. The groundwater programme collaborates with Irish Water, the Environmental Protection Agency, the National Federation of Group Water Schemes, the local authorities, the Office of Public Works and other State and non-governmental organisations. It supports the implementation of the water framework directive, the drinking water regulations and the nitrates directive through the provision of data and expertise.

In addition to the specific programme areas I have mentioned, GSI holds databases and carries out work across a range of geoscience areas, including minerals, aggregates and metals. It is involved in geoheritage, for example, by supporting geoparks. Its work on geohazards includes mapping of landslide susceptibility and ground motion. It provides advice on tsunamis and volcanic ash. It is also involved in geotechnical and urban geology. Its extensive data holdings and maps are made available online for free via a suite of websites and digital platforms. It also supports job creation through a dedicated business cluster programme, Geoscience Ireland, with assistance from Enterprise Ireland and the Departments of Foreign Affairs and Trade and Business, Enterprise and Innovation. GSI also supports research through data, partnership and funding and regularly provides co-funding with Science Foundation Ireland, the Irish Research Council and EU programmes. It helped to set up and is now supporting the Irish Centre for Research in Applied Geoscience which was established recently with support from Science Foundation Ireland and industry.

On groundwater flooding, GSI has developed particular expertise in understanding complex karst systems, including turloughs, which can be important conduits for pollution. The climate change and flooding section of the 2016 programme for Government, under the heading of Turlough Systems, promises to "provide resources to the OPW to commission studies into individual problematic (prone to flooding) Turlough systems, if requested by a local authority or another relevant State agency". GSI has been tasked with gathering historical and new information to deliver on this objective. It has initiated a new dedicated groundwater flooding project in response to it. It is working with and supporting researchers at Trinity College Dublin in the specific area of modelling the behaviour of complex turlough systems such as those in the Gort lowlands, building on previous studies. The primary objectives of the project are to liaise with key stakeholders to provide technical input into proposed flood protection schemes; to install a temporary exploratory network to maximise data collection, with over 60 monitors having been installed to date; to establish permanent monitoring networks to provide long-term quantitative flooding data; to develop a methodology for improving groundwater flood hazard maps and real-time monitoring of groundwater flooding; to develop modelling and analysis methodology for estimating groundwater flood frequency, or the likelihood of flood events; and to assess the likely impact of climate change on groundwater flooding. In 2018 GSI will deliver new groundwater flood maps to the OPW, as required, in the second implementation cycle of the floods directive.

The area of Ballycar affected by flooding is not listed as a turlough and is not one of the areas selected for monitoring by the programme in consultation with the local authorities. GSI was not consulted on the railway development plans. It received reports on the issue from the committee at the end of last week, followed by further updates yesterday. Unfortunately, therefore, we have not had an opportunity to carry out a review of the information. After GSI was contacted for information by the committee last month, it was able to download satellite data from the European Space Agency and create a visualisation of flood extents in the area in the time period of interest to the committee. It has been provided. My colleagues have put together a short presentation which provides some more details of our work in the areas of turlough flooding and the Ballycar visualisation. They will go through it briefly.