Professor John FitzGerald:

We see the evidence that there is no co-ordination of the whole of Government approach. My colleague, Professor Edgar Morgenroth and I had the job of helping to develop the Structural Funds plans for Ireland over a period. That involved co-ordination across Departments. Professor Morgenroth also did the same work for the German Government on the East German plan. He found it very interesting that in Ireland there was no structure for co-ordination but seven or eight people came into the room and it worked very well, whereas in Germany, one had 80 people in the room who had never met each other but they had a structure for doing it. I think we are getting bigger and a structure for co-ordination across Departments will be an issue. The technical research and modelling group, TRAM, does I understand perform this role but we can see evidence that it is not working perfectly. I think the administration needs to do a better job - things that could happen in fact do not happen. I have no great ideas on how to do that.

I will now respond to how we can get the message across. I was watching BBC "Newsnight" a couple of weeks ago when they had a representative from the Met Office and somebody else who for 15 minutes discussed the problem of climate change and how to deal with it. This was informing the wider public on climate change. In Ireland we tend to put on a television discussion programme with a representative who is a denier of and somebody who acknowledges climate change rather than a programme that explains the issues to people.

In a newspaper article in The Guardianlast Friday, the head of the BBC talked about the need to look at the model of balance, and that balance is provided by two people fighting, when climate science has the answer. There is no doubt about that. How we communicate the message is the issue. The expertise in Met Éireann is very important. We need all the help we can get in communicating the message.

The experience in Tipperary was raised. I talked to somebody last week who had a big job done on his house and had a great experience with an agency in Tipperary. A model that works is where the system is rolled out following experiment. The system in Tipperary works because there are good people involved. One needs good people elsewhere so one cannot suddenly go global. Let us build on the good examples we have.

There was a suggestion that Bord na Móna would plant broadleaf trees. When I walk the mountains I find the spruce plantations boring and would prefer to see more variety but that is not an environmental assessment. Bogland is a big issue in terms of sucking carbon out of the atmosphere, but I am told and I have read it in the Financial Times that the British are considering re-wetting the wetlands. The answer may be not to plant trees but to wet the wetlands again. I do not know. This is a scientific issue. We need to do work on how we can make best use of this resource. A best use that provides alternative employment would be a win-win.

The EU has implemented a major reform of the emissions trading system, EMS. It is highly constrained because of the Polish Government and to a lesser extent the German Government obstructing progress in this area. Poland has significant coal mines and the coal miners have a similar view to President Trump on coal. Basically the EU proposes to take permits away which hopefully will raise the price of coal. The research done by our Danish colleagues suggests that it will not produce a decent price for carbon, although it is €20 a tonne today, which is a significant rise with the prospect of this reform. Also Thomson Reuters at a conference in UCC reached a similar conclusion that this would not do enough. Our concern is that we, the Climate Change Advisory Council are recommending that we electrify transport and we electrify heating as the solution but if we do not have in place a system across Europe, an ETS which will decarbonise electricity, we will have locked into the wrong answer.

We are very concerned about it. As a backstop we are recommending a carbon price floor for as many countries as will adopt it, which is a backstop because if the ETS works, it becomes irrelevant. If the ETS price goes to €80 a tonne by 2030, then the ETS will have worked and it becomes irrelevant. The research I have seen suggests that it will be under €30 a tonne, which will be way too low. In that case coal will not close in Europe, Moneypoint will not close and we may be importing electricity produced with coal.

We do not know for certain but it looks as is the EU trading system reform will not be enough and we need a backstop which will guarantee to us that we will decarbonise electricity in Europe over the next 20 to 30 years. The research we have done suggests that a coalition of France, Netherlands, Scandinavia, Ireland and Britain would make a substantial difference. One would see Moneypoint and peat close by at least 2025. That would reduce our emissions by more 5 million tonnes. One twelfth of our emissions would disappear because of that. That is our best recommendation.