Mr. Dermot Byrne:

The climate challenge is so big that it can be overwhelming and to be fair, we are dealing with it. We need to break it down. What can we do here in Ireland?

We can manage our contribution to the problem and the opportunity there. We are part of Europe so we can do it as part of a European community. We can play our part in that. Within Ireland, we must break the problem down into its component parts. We must look at electricity, transport and the built environment. The 2019 climate action plan brought us a long way towards breaking it down with 183 different actions across all sectors of society. That has to be reviewed now in the context of the programme for Government targets and the net zero by 2050 target.

More importantly, it is getting the buy-in, the community and leadership at all levels in society that will drive this forward. If that determination and leadership are there across all sectors and if we apply the right resources, brain power and people to figure out the details of how we are going to get this done, as I said earlier in respect of the 40% target, we can do it. The 40% target was deemed to be unattainable at the time but once that was set, the likes of ESB, EirGrid, the regulator and all the developers out there rolled up their sleeves and we got there. These organisations are doing tremendous work in facilitating renewable electricity on the system, which people would have thought was impossible. It is a big challenge but with the right leadership at every level and the right people and brainpower assigned to it, I am confident we will get there.