Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees
Tuesday, 9 February 2021
Joint Oireachtas Committee on Transport, Tourism and Sport
National Development Plan: Discussion
Mr. Stephen Kent:
I thank the Deputy and appreciate those comments. On the carbon emissions, as I have said, the biggest contributor to energy emissions we have at the moment is fuel and diesel types. When one adds it all together, 97% of what we contributed goes out in fuel type. As I said, when we start transitioning to modes such as hybrid that will provide around a 30% fuel saving on the current level. Moving to electric will obviously have a huge additional benefit as we will effectively go to zero emissions at that point, and then there is hydrogen. I have mentioned some of the other developments, whereby even where we have to settle for a Euro 6 versus what we used to have back in 2006 or 2008, it will deliver major savings in emissions. We are tracking this. To give the Deputy more confidence, our board has set up a sustainability committee which will commence in the company in March. We are developing a full sustainability plan that will tie into many of the goals that will be set out across the whole business on everything we have to do to achieve the climate action plan. We have started a lot of energy and climate action projects. We will do that in consultation with the people who supply us with goods. While it is a small step, last week we even had a vendor coming in who planted trees on our behalf in and around some of the places.
All of these are small measures but, collectively, the big issue we must address is the transition into more energy-efficient fuel alternatives. That is the path we are taking. I have no problem providing the Deputy with information on our current carbon emissions. We can measure those and return with them. I am delighted to say we are making progress and setting ourselves up to align with the 2030 plan.
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