Mr. Kevin Brady:

Yes, he has corrected me once or twice already. In response to Senator Mulherin, in terms of the working relationship with the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine, I have only been with the Department of Communications, Climate Action and Environment less than two years but in my experience we have an excellent working relationship. In terms of the renewable heat incentive, RHI, biofuels and the bioenergy steering group, we have had a great period working together. If there were issues there in the past, I see no evidence of them there now.

The climate piece, the emissions reduction etc. are obviously a core part of this. We are here talking about renewable energy, but I refer to the secondary part in terms of emissions reduction. That is the key driver of this. It is a climate and energy package. That is what is driving the whole piece.

The directives and regulations coming from the European Commission are very much from an energy policy point of view. They are trying to drive national policy on energy, and how we translate them nationally is our competence.

In terms of transport, we will meet the transport decarbonisation target by putting an obligation on fuel suppliers. That is our key lever. We are also moving into electric vehicles, EVs. That could be described that as Exchequer-funded subsidies.

In terms of the heat sector, we have spoken about the RHI. That also is an Exchequer-funded subsidy. In terms of the RHI, it is important to distinguish between supply-side and demand-side measures. The RHI is a demand-side measure. It will stimulate demand for bioenergy. Undoubtedly, that will require supply. Deputy Fitzmaurice mentioned farmers who have planted certain crops and have found there is no market for them. It is clear we need to put the demand side in place first and then develop the supply lines. As set out in the draft bioenergy plan, as I stated earlier, there are both demand-side and supply-side measures. The demand side is very much the RHI. It is not alluding to something beyond that, but we do need to put that demand in place. In the Senator's example, if there are businesses, factories or industry that would like to convert from fossil fuel to a renewable alternative and at present that barrier is more expensive, if that gap can be filled through the renewable heat incentive, that can be made happen and then that provides a local demand for biomass, which is the key element.

The palm oil question opens up the question of sustainability. In fairness, that would be part of the indirect land use change, be it in Europe or beyond, that if one is demanding something, there is something else shifting. There are sustainability requirements in the renewable energy directive currently and they increase with time. Renewable energy produced from existing installations is at a certain percentage. As for energy produced from new installations, any installation that starts operation after 1 January 2021 will have to ensure a 70% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions for the fuels that are produced. There are sustainability requirements in the renewable energy directive that ensure we are moving towards a path where there is not a gap in the arithmetic and we are not reducing emissions where they are increasing elsewhere. Those sustainability conditions are in there.

On Deputy Fitzmaurice's point about the proposed renewable heat incentive, I would make two points. The first is that the incentive would be paid to heat users, not suppliers or importers of biomass. The factory owner who converts his fossil fuel boiler to a renewable energy boiler would receive the tariff and then buy the bioenergy. It would be very much for the heat user as opposed to the heat importer.