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

I think I have sufficient information from my officials to not have to go into private session but we can come back on any of the details at a later stage as well.

First, on how the country is doing, I said some areas were doing well. Historically, where we have been poorest was in the heat area. We were good at renewable electricity. We were not as good in renewable heat and in meeting our heat targets.

That heat policy will be now, unfortunately, a couple of months later. It will be the end of quarter 1. It will be informed by the heat study, which has been concluded. That work now has to be translated into policy but it will be delivered by the end of quarter 1 next years.

The issue in terms of ending fossil fuel in all new buildings will be, in particular, informed by the energy performance of buildings directive, which, as I recall, has just completed trilogue. We are going to have to look at that. The reality is 92% of new buildings are not using fossil-fuel heating. We need to get rid of that remaining 8% but we will be very much informed by the European Union policy direction on that because it is best to operate in conjunction with the wider economy - supply chains are variable. It is the way to go.

There are a couple of things I would say in terms of heat. I see electrification of everything being the real key, particularly in heat. Sometimes one hears people, for example, our neighbours, talk of hydrogen being a heat solution for a domestic or a smaller scale and I do not see that happening for a variety of reasons. Similarly, there is much debate on and consideration of whether we could use hydrogenated vegetable oil, HVO, and in a sense maintain a boiler system using that. There, I would urge real caution because we know in the transport sector, which is the biggest challenge, as I said. We will make real progress on heat because the economic efficiencies and benefits of the alteratives are so much better but transport is really tricky. There is only a limited amount of HVO available from waste sources or absolutely cast-iron certain sustainable, not land use destructive, sources and that limited supply is best deployed in transport rather than in heat.

The last thing I would say, and to go back to what gives me a certain confidence we can make a change, is that I was at an industrial event yesterday, the eHeat conference. Much of the industrial heat we use, not intense 200°C plus for furnaces or really intense manufacturing systems, for any temperatures below 120°C, for example, for steam cleaning, drying, the dairying industry or cleansing systems for the food or pharma industry, etc., where one has heat temperatures of anything under 150°C, I see switching to heat pump. I see that as an inevitability. We will further support that. We will be developing grant supports and really incentivising and supporting the SSRH - the scheme to deploy commercial heat solutions. It is not only about the homes. It is also about the factories and the larger public buildings. It is all three we need to address.