Professor John Sweeney:

Deputy Dooley asked for further clarification on aspects of stranded assets and divestment. For the record, the idea of stranded assets emerged initially from a growing movement for divestment which started with Professor Bill McKibben in Vermont in 2010. Since then, the universities have taken up the challenge, including Stanford and Georgetown. The first UK university was Glasgow and the first Irish university was Maynooth, which has now been followed by Trinity College.

I point also to the foundations. The Norwegian sovereign wealth fund is divesting. Given what we have heard about the investment of oil revenues in Norway, that is very significant. Of the total divestment, 26% has come from faith-based groups. The Church of Ireland announced a divestment policy recently while the Catholic Church is also undertaking a rigorous investigation and will probably announce a divestment policy in advance of the papal visit. The movement is accelerating and it is being driven by young people who see the writing on the wall in terms of intergenerational equity. They see that if we continue on the path of "drill, baby, drill", we will disenfranchise and disadvantage the next generation. There is an issue of equity which we must recognise in what is proposed in the continuation of a fossil-fuel economy. I agree that we are looking at reductions over time, but those reductions are certainly not happening quickly enough.