Christopher O'Sullivan (Cork South West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank Professor McMullin for his responses so far. This is certainly a debate worth having. It is fair to say it is a tricky one. I am certain I am not speaking on behalf of all committee members but this committee has had the general approach and ethos that fossil fuels should be left in the ground. It has been an overarching theme within the committee membership. As a committee we have done more than others to promote clean, renewable generation of electricity. We have come at it from that approach. To that end, I would have thought at the outset of this debate the issue would have been pretty black and white that we leave fossil fuels in the ground and completely move away from a reliance on gas, etc. However, there was the emergence of potential blackouts, which we did not see this winter but certainly saw the previous winter. The reliance on UK gas, the two interconnectors and how reliant we are on that single source has also been highlighted. These factors mean it is not so black and white and perhaps a debate should be had on this. In that context, I have two questions.

Incidentally, I very much like the idea of opening up storage at the Old Head of Kinsale field.

In respect of what we are already getting through the UK, 35% of total gas demand in the UK comes from liquefied natural gas, LNG, according to a recent government report. Some 80% of Ireland's gas, as I have already said, is coming from the UK. That means therefore roughly 25% of gas is already coming from LNG. Would Professor McMullin agree with that assessment in the first instance?

On fracked gas, Ireland’s position is we want to ban it, but considering the fact that 25% of LNG, from my assessment, already comes from the UK, are we already importing fracked gas? Therefore, to avoid importing fracked gas, would a better scenario be one of the preferred options Professor McMullin mentioned, which was to consider the floating storage regasification unit, FSRU, or floating LNG option? Would Professor McMullin consider that perhaps to be a better way to ensure 100% we were not importing fracked gas?

Professor McMullin mentioned that if a geopolitical scenario were to emerge where there were attacks on our interconnectors, such attacks would be just as likely to occur on an LNG terminal. Surely infrastructure that is laid in the depths of the ocean is more of a target than, for example, a floating LNG ship in a harbour in Ireland?