Professor John Sweeney:

I welcome the opportunity to talk a little about LULUCF because it is one of the underpinning assumptions that gives rise to most concern in the CCAC. The chairperson, Ms Marie Donnelly, said yesterday that meeting targets in this regard would be challenging. I would go further and say that its feasibility is highly questionable. The most recent projections in respect of LULUCF show that Irish land use produces net emissions of approximately 4.5 million tonnes per year and that this will increase to 7.1 million tonnes per year. As we know, we face a problem in respect of falling afforestation rates and the continuing draining of grassland soils. The assumption made by the CCAC is that these emissions would fall by 51% in line with the overall budget. That would mean that it would fall to 2.4 million tonnes per year by 2030. That is a very unrealistic assumption.

Over the past 30 years, we have not managed to achieve the kind of land use changes that would imply. It would imply huge swathes of forestry. We have to ask where these huge swathes of forestry will go. We can be sure they will not go on the very rich farms of southern and eastern Ireland. Some of those farms are making €500,000 and more in profit per year. In a 30-year cycle, forestry will not provide a return those farmers would welcome. These swathes will also not go on peaty soils west of the Shannon because that would undermine the carbon budget in our wetland areas. There are therefore very limited areas where this forestry can go. I would hate to see it go on drier soils west of the Shannon, where many farmers are dependent on Pillar 2 aspects of the Common Agricultural Policy, that is, environmental management aspects, for their income. There is a big question as to the feasibility of that.

Even if we assume that we will not achieve that 51% and will maintain the status quoin respect of land use for the next ten years, that means adding 45 million tonnes to our carbon budgets for the next ten years. That again brings into question the viability of the kind of division we have seen in respect of our carbon budgets. It also raises biodiversity issues, which we have not really taken on board. The CCAC has run three models, one each in agriculture, forestry and energy, but they have not joined up. Integrated modelling strategies have been available in Europe for the past ten years through which you can look at the trade-offs between different models in these areas and build in social and economic aspects. That has not been done here. That would have been very welcome had it been done. It would have enabled us to take on board issues of biodiversity, which has been largely left out of the equation thus far. There are many aspects which give cause for concern in the way the budget has been formulated and in the strength of those divisions between the first and second five-year periods.