Ms Deirdre Hanlon:

I will incorporate those points into my response. Alternative fuel technologies and different types of buses are more expensive than conventional diesel buses at the moment, so they will cost more. The Government is aware of that, and has been aware of that since it made its commitment to move away from diesel-only buses. We have not started to prescribe the precise technologies to be purchased. I was trying to explain that there are horses for courses in this. A number of technologies are available, for example, hybrid electric vehicles, being part electric and part diesel, fully electric, either via battery or by plug-in, hydrogen vehicles and CNG, or compressed natural gas-powered vehicles. A range of buses will be tested in the trials mentioned to see which are suited to particular types of routes. We want to find out whether the technology appropriate for hilly terrain is also appropriate for driving in flat areas or in congested urban areas where one is starting and stopping regularly. This is not the be all and end all. It is only one component of the research we are doing, but I am talking about it because it will be done over the next few weeks. We will run these different types of buses under simulated conditions on real Irish bus routes. We are not talking about bus routes in a foreign city that we are being told about by manufacturers, but rather we will find out for ourselves and actually measure what is coming from the tailpipe.

This is a practical move by the Department which will support the trial and testing of innovative solutions where we just do not know the absolute, definitive best answer, and no one else can give us the answer. Members of the committee are raising very real points about this approach. Considerable experience has been built up internationally, but it is not entirely conclusive. We are trying to add to it with our own analysis and understanding and to help inform decisions so that better purchasing decisions are made over time. Indeed, we expect technologies to develop further as we go into the future, so we do not expect that we will definitively come up with the correct answer at a particular point in time which will forever after be the approach we slavishly taken.