Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I completely accept that. The scale of the challenge should not be underestimated. It is not an easy one. There are two or three things which will help. First, the governance structures we have are serving us. I refer to the CCAC, with its recommendations and review, and the back-up information provided by the EPA, SEAI and other entities that do the modelling for us. We have a good governance structure. We will see how this works in really making corrective action but I would not change those systems. The CCAC’s review and work is very helpful in this regard.

Then there is where I see some of the significant changes that might see a further leap or jump. I was speaking on this in Dáil questions this morning. This is not to blame our planning system or legal system but we clearly have a problem in our legal system and planning system that leads to delivery of projects in a time line that is not compatible with meeting our climate targets. It is not just planning; it is administrative as well. Between the three, we have a system that takes ten years to deliver a bus lane. The Deputy would have been involved. BusConnects started 2016. We are waiting almost two years to get some of the BusConnects projects through An Bord Pleanála. That is due to very specific projects and issues in An Bord Pleanála over the past two years. That is not to blame it but it is a reality that we in the Department of Transport have been waiting. I do not want to get into that too much, but the same applies to other things.

Take wind farms. With the meeting of our renewables target, our biggest challenge is that we have a whole load of wind and solar projects in planning. When they come through the planning process, they tend to be subject to judicial review. That involves an incredibly elongated and expensive process that does not necessarily serve the public, particularly because it is so expensive and protracted. The Planning and Development Bill, the Second Stage debate on which will taken in the House next week, is critical. We can do all we can on the administrative side but if matters are completely and endlessly jammed up in the courts, then that becomes an issue. That is the constitutional separation of powers and you cannot easily turn that but I think that is our biggest problem.

Second, one thing we have been doing to try to accelerate change is developing these six task forces which we have established to deliver on the climate action plan within central government. We recognise that the latter works best when you break out of silos and bring in outside agencies. The six that I see as critical are the offshore wind, sustainable mobility, heat and the built environment, just transition, climate communications and the land use review.

I can go into the details of any one of those. I will give an example of how it can work. I have just come from a meeting of the task force on heat and built environment in the SEAI offices. It was an opportunity to bring everyone together. We made decisions this morning on our public buildings and on district heating. We had a long discussion on the issue of anaerobic digestion. Those are examples of complex projects that have taken too long.

Regarding district heating, the Poolbeg incinerator has been pumping out waste heat inefficiently for about eight years. Five or six years ago, Dublin City Council was given €20 million to try to rectify that. That was not progressing but it will now. I am confident that we will go to the procurement stage and we will see it delivered. The task force approach, where we are not just working in individual Department silos but putting together government, outside agencies and other representatives, is a key evolution or advancement since last year. Most of those task forces were not in place when we drafted the Climate Action Plan 2023 and they are all up and running now. That is a key mechanism.