Mr. Glenn Carr:

Engagement has been great cross-departmentally. We had all of our foreshore licences delivered within 11 months. I thank all those involved in putting us in that position. The next engagement will involve consultation, including public consultation and consultation as we enter the planning phase.

Regarding finance, we have appointed financial people to support us in identifying funding. Corporate debt, project debt, project equity, shareholder equity, EU funding and Exchequer funding are all being considered. We are analysing all these. We are talking to all the major players, including the European Investment Bank and the Ireland Strategic Investment Fund. We are also having talks in respect of possible developer investment. There is a multitude of possibilities, but, as has been mentioned, we have to build and cannot wait for developers to come through their planning permission processes. If we do, we will be two years too late. We have to build and will have to take a strategic approach that I would say is low risk because we know all the opportunities that are coming. Once the Rosslare facility is built, it will have been designed to be multimodal after heavy construction. We all know about the constraints at Dublin Port and the need in the south east for additional capacity. Rosslare is a port that can easily be developed, with open-sea access and available land. We are going to reclaim up to 50 additional acres and have two additional ports that can be easily converted for lift-on, lift-off, con-ro and ro-ro and that can easily take anywhere from 300,000 to 450,000 units out of Dublin Port. We must do this anyway. With the road and rail connections serving Rosslare, it is a no-brainer at strategic level to make a strategic investment of the magnitude of €200 million. Obviously, CIÉ will be coming to the table. Potentially, we are looking for a funding injection of around €170 million. It is a lot of money in one sense but we are talking about a multibillion-euro industry and something that will be of strategic importance nationally if we really are to switch from fossil fuels to new, green energy. It just has to happen.