Dr. Peter Heffernan:

The fish are of the sea and belong in the sea. Their waste products are natural in an natural environment. The key is that the quantity is in tandem with the movement and scale of the water. There are very strict monitoring programmes to ensure there is no build up of fish waste beneath a fish farm that would degrade the locality. This is monitored independently. The disease and lice situation is monitored. It is right that rigorous, exacting monitoring programmes are imposed in the licensing conditions for those who are granted a licence to cultivate in the sea. It is done sustainably.

I will return to the test site in dealing with Senator Ó Clochartaigh's material. Ireland, bar no place on the planet, has the best combined advantage of wave energy, offshore wind energy and, to a lesser degree, tidal energy. The published projections by the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland give testament to this. The sequence of what is likely to be commercially viable is: first, tidal; second, offshore wind; and third, wave. This week, an Irish company is deploying a tidal turbine system which is potentially the most advanced in the world, in the Bay of Fundy in Nova Scotia, which has the largest tidal surge on the planet. There is an Irish company at the forefront. The Senator has rightly pointed out that the Orkney Islands are enjoying a potential leadership role in their wave energy test site. However, it is on an offshore island. Ireland will be increasingly competitive with the integrated package from the university based system in Cork, the quarter scale system in Galway Bay and the full scale system off Belmullet in Mayo. We will be able to compete for those technology developers. Only in the past week, an Irish based company is developing a quarter scale prototype in Galway Bay on the quarter scale test site, having taken it through the whole development system from Cork. It was manufactured in Shannon Foynes and deployed locally.

I may be corrected if I am wrong, but I think the estimates are €1.5 to €2 million circulated within the Irish economy with each prototype that gets to the quarter scale.

On the seaweed industry, the issue of rights and protection is a licensing issue and beyond the scope of the Marine Institute. We have invested, continue to invest and will continue to invest in the science around sustainability and harvesting techniques alone and in partnership with other agencies. We look at the added value and biotechnology potential of seaweeds, which is very strong. It is not only seaweeds, but a lot of other deep water ocean organisms and there is a significant body of research funded in Ireland to compete internationally in that arena. We partner with other funding entities nationally and internationally on that. I think I have hit the Senator Ó Clochartaigh's questions there.