Mr. Sean Downey:

We are talking about three main streams of materials, namely, timber, light-gauge steel and concrete. Millions of cubic yards of timber are standing in Irish forests. They have been grown with Irish supports for the past 30 years. As a country, we need to decide what we are going to do with it. I know Enterprise Ireland has been working with the timber sector on that specific value stream in recent years to get ready. One of the challenges is Part B of the building regulations, which relates to fire regulations and the restrictions on the height at which combustible materials can be used. We need a more technical approach to provide a technical solution, whether an active or passive means of fire suppression. If they can do it in other countries with similar codes to ours, there is no reason we cannot be using a lot more timber. That will go a long way to solving a lot of the issues of embodied carbon.

Light-gauge steel manufacturers would say they are almost better than timber. It may not look like it on the face of it, but at the level of the circular economy, on which Mr. Stevens is doing a lot of work, that steel can be reused at the end of life. In many circumstances, it may be more beneficial than its timber counterpart.

In respect of cement, the industry has, in recent years, started to look at alternative and sustainable ground granulate blast-furnace slag, GGBS, supply chains. The sector is already working on that. However, we are going to have to move in a graduated way towards hybrid systems before we can say we do not need cement or concrete any more.