Malcolm Noonan (Green Party)

This has been a really useful session. I have a quick question on AD. The biomethane strategy seems to be very much based on using grass rather than secondary farm slurries or food waste, with which we could actually deliver greater benefits in addressing emissions. One of the early AD plants in this country, in Kilkenny, my home county, has been using secondary farm slurries consistently for the past 20 years. It is a farm-scale plant. It has also been taking in food waste. Why has the thrust of the biomethane strategy been based around grassland?

We are still awaiting the publication of the land use plan, but from a land use perspective it seems to be far more carbon intensive to use grass as a feedstock rather than secondary slurries and, say, food waste from the services sector.