Mr. Leslie Carberry:

My understanding is that an anaerobic digestion would primarily be dealt with under the bioeconomy policy. The bioeconomy is recognised in the strategy as an important subset of the circular economy. The national bioeconomy policy statement states that the Irish bioeconomy as it develops should be sustainable and circular. There is already a recognition that there should be close co-operation between those two policy areas and further opportunities for co-operation identified.

On the question of funding anaerobic digestion from the circular economy fund, the fund funds specific proposals and everything would come down to the merits of those proposals. I am not aware of any statutory blockage at the moment to such funding being provided to an anaerobic digestion scheme.