Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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I welcome all the guests. I know some of them but others I have not met before. It is good to meet everybody now. All the witnesses are putting a strong case for this country to boldly go in the direction of producing significant quantities of biomethane. This is their role and they are very convincing. We have it locked into the climate action plan as well. I think 5.7 TWh is the target in this regard.

However, I wish to turn the conversation around because the witnesses are probably the best people to talk about another issue. I refer to the concerns, threats and risks of going in this direction. Not least, I refer to the environmental ones, because these probably exist. I note the witnesses use the word "sustainable" and I know they do not do so lightly. I refer to the threats to farming as well and changing how farming happens in this country, for good or for ill. Land use and slurry use would be linked to this, as the Cathaoirleach alluded to. I wish to discuss these aspects.

What is happening now is a fast-track approach. It is perhaps a process to catch up with other European countries. The plan is to have 200 AD plants in the country by the end of this decade. It is a significant ramping up in this regard. When there is any kind of ramping-up endeavour like this, it is necessary to be very careful to ensure there are no unintended consequences. I am interested, therefore, in hearing a little more about what the witnesses perceive to be the key characteristics of this growth that will have to be managed to allow us to get this initiative right. I refer to ensuring we will not find ourselves in seven to ten years trying to fix problems that may have been created by this fast growth.

Today is an opportunity to air some of these risks, threats and concerns on the environmental side and on the agricultural side. The members of this committee will be interested to hear about how land use will be changed and the associated impacts, perhaps not on dairy farming, because it is high-value farming, but on the lower-value farming sectors, such as beef and horticulture. Will these sectors come under great pressure to produce the feedstock required for the anaerobic digesters? If we have this open conversation, then perhaps we will be able to manage all this a little better and create a successful industry that will be, economically, socially and environmentally, as benign as possible.

Turning to Mr. McCarthy, on the 7 tonnes, it is a stark figure. I presume this is a comparison of digestate with artificial fertiliser. It would not necessarily be 7 tonnes. If that fertiliser has been made somewhere else, primarily in parts of central and eastern Europe - and Russia as well, until recently - those tonnes would already be accounted for. It is a positive aspect but those tonnes would not be accounted for in our national inventory I think, because the fossil fuels being displaced are those that would be burned in some other country to create that fertiliser. Am I correct in saying that? That is a question on the accounting side of things.