Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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The purpose of the meeting is to have a discussion on a very important piece of work, Ireland's climate change assessment report. On behalf of the committee, I welcome the witnesses, all of whom are authors of the report. I think we have broken the record for the number of witnesses before the committee today. We have eight witnesses here in person and we are very grateful they have come to Leinster House today to engage with us. We are also grateful to their colleagues who are joining us remotely.

In person, we have Professor Hanna Daly, University College Cork; Professor Brian Ó Gallachóir, University College Cork; Professor Jennifer McElwain, Trinity College Dublin; Dr. Agnieszka Stefaniec, Trinity College Dublin; Dr. Diarmuid Torney, Dublin City University; Professor Brian Caulfield, Trinity College Dublin; Dr. Liam Heaphy, Irish Centre for High-End Computing; and Dr. Tara Quinn, Maynooth University. They are all very welcome. Joining us remotely are Dr. Róisín Moriarty, University College Cork; Dr. Paul Deane, University College Cork; Dr. Clare Noone, Maynooth University; and Dr. Deirdre McClean, Trinity College Dublin. Dr. Danielle Gallagher is also listed and she may join us at some point.

I remind witnesses of the long-standing parliamentary practice that they should not criticise or make charges against any person or entity by name or in such a way as to make him or her or it identifiable, or otherwise engage in speech that may be regarded as damaging to the good name of the person or entity. If their statements are potentially defamatory in relation to an identifiable person or entity, they will be directed to discontinue their remarks. It is imperative they comply with any such direction.

Members are reminded of the long-standing parliamentary practice to the effect that they should not comment on, criticise or make charges against any person outside the Houses or an official either by name or in such a way as to make him or her identifiable. I remind members that they are only allowed to participate in this meeting if they are physically located in the Leinster House complex. In this regard, I ask those members who are joining us remotely to confirm, prior to making their contributions, that they are on the grounds of the Leinster House campus. I see there are a few members joining us from their offices.

I call Professor Daly to commence the opening statement, which, I understand, will be shared among a number of the witnesses.

Professor Hannah Daly:

On behalf of all the authors, I will introduce the assessment. I express our gratitude for the invitation to discuss this important report with the committee. We look forward to the exchange.

The publication of Ireland’s climate change assessment, ICCA, is a landmark occasion and a significant outcome of collaborative and interdisciplinary work across Irish academia, as can be seen from the people in this room. It represents a substantial step forward in making actionable information available not just to policymakers but every Irish citizen. It has assessed a wealth of national and international research to provide a rigorous scientific assessment of all aspects of the climate crisis with an Irish focus. The team of authors has provided valuable and complementary insights arising from its broad range of specialisations and wealth of expertise.

The ICCA report consists of four underlying volumes, each drafted by a dedicated author team. It looks at the following: Volume 1, Climate Science - Ireland in a Changing World; Volume 2, Achieving Climate Neutrality by 2050; Volume 3, Being Prepared for Ireland’s Climate Future; and Volume 4, Realising the Benefits of Transition and Transformation. The synthesis report ties these all together to present an accessible summary and it is the synthesis report which we are focusing on today.

Before we present our findings, on behalf of the author team, I acknowledge the vision and commitment of the Environmental Protection Agency, EPA, in conceiving this endeavour and its funding and support in bringing it to fruition. I thank the many members of the overarching and volume steering committees, drawn from a number of Government Departments and public bodies, who provided extensive constructive feedback on earlier drafts throughout the writing. We are also deeply indebted to the additional contributing authors of each volume, and to the wider research community in Ireland, from whose work we have drawn and who have shaped our own understanding. We will now provide a summary of our most important findings. I will hand over to my colleague, Professor Jennifer McElwain.

Professor Jennifer McElwain:

We are living in and experiencing a changing climate. Human activity has resulted in widespread and rapid changes in climate which are already impacting us all today. Climate changes arising from our emissions of heat trapping greenhouse gases are not simply a future problem; rather, they are already our current reality. We have warmed the global climate by over 1°C and all that warming has been attributed to our activities. Put bluntly, we as a global society are not responsible simply for a proportion of the warming; rather, we are responsible for all of the warming members can see on the chart in front of them.

The changes we have seen are without precedent in both the rate of change and the present state of many components of the climate system globally for centuries to millions of years. We have now definitively shifted the climate system away from a safe operating space that enabled us to develop from hunter-gatherers through to our modern society. Human-induced climate change is modifying climatic extremes globally, with robust evidence that it is increasing the frequency and intensity of heatwaves and extreme precipitation events. Some of those are illustrated on the map. These changes are having real consequences already for societies and nature across the globe.

One of the major scientific innovations of the past decade has been our ability to link individual events to human-caused climate change. We are undoubtedly priming the climate system. While extremes have always occurred, we have now shifted the odds of these events happening and their magnitude in important and consequential ways.

Over Ireland, annual average temperatures are now approximately 1°C higher than they were in the early 20th century, with 16 of the 20 warmest years occurring since 1990 and 2022 being the hottest year on record up until the finalisation of this report. It has since been usurped by 2023. This is not the last time that the warmest year on record nationally will fall. Overall, when aggregated, there has been an increase in heavy precipitation extremes over Ireland across a range of indicators. This has led to impacts already being felt, including, likely, the recent examples of flooding across the island last summer. These recent events highlight the vulnerability of individuals, communities, sectors and ecosystems to climate change and indicate an adaptation deficit, which is a subject my colleagues shall return to later in this presentation.

The future climate is in our collective hands. Every action matters. With every additional increment of warming, impacts for Ireland will increase substantially. Deep, rapid, immediate and sustained emission reductions are required to keep global warming in line with the key Paris Agreement temperature goals, which are illustrated on the charts. To stabilise the global climate requires global carbon dioxide emissions to reach at least net-zero, with emissions of other greenhouse gases, including methane, substantially reduced on a sustained basis. If we can reach net-zero global carbon dioxide emissions by mid-century, then components such as temperature and precipitation, which react within years to decades to changes in radiative forcing, would stabilise within the lifetime of many of today’s younger citizens. However, it is critical to recognise that sea level, which is considered the great integrator, will continue to rise and will take thousands of years to stabilise, even once net-zero emissions are reached.

Early and rapid global action on emission reductions would likely leave an Irish climate at the end of the century that would be still broadly recognisable in comparison to today, whereas delayed action would likely leave an Irish climate that would be increasingly unrecognisable as the century progresses.

Under early action scenarios, illustrated by the paler yellow top panel of future predictions, the temperature increases averaged across the island of Ireland relative to the recent past would probably warm by just under 1°C by mid-century before falling back slightly towards the end of the century. Under late action scenarios, illustrated by the bottom three panels in dark red, by the end of the century it is projected that the temperature increase in Ireland could be almost 3°C warmer than the recent past.

Intense precipitation extremes will become more frequent and extreme in most regions of Ireland across a range of extreme precipitation indices. Critically, how much more frequent and extreme depends upon the degree of warming. It will depend on whether we will be in the light yellow or dark red scenarios. Storm surges and extreme waves will pose an ever-increasing threat to Ireland as sea levels continue to rise. Again, this threat will increase the more the planet warms.

Dr. Liam Heaphy:

Future changes in climate will impact all aspects of Irish society, the environment and economy. In Volume 3 we assessed impacts across eight key sectors indicated in the slide. Significant impacts on biodiversity, both on land and in the ocean, are projected with additional warming. Climate change is likely to see an increase in the occurrence and spread of invasive species and competitive pressures faced by Ireland's native species. Climate change will impact all aspects of Irish agriculture and forestry.

With all major cities and many regional towns located close to the coast, Ireland is highly exposed to sea level rise, storm surges and coastal erosion, especially in softer sediment coastal zones. Increases in extremes of floods and droughts are expected. Impacts on water resources, water quality and floods are likely to cascade across other sectors. Ireland’s built environment is exposed to flood risks from rivers, the sea and rainfall extremes.

Ireland depends heavily on critical infrastructure for delivering public services, economic development and a sustainable environment. Critical infrastructure is exposed to a range of climate extremes. Climate change impacts will directly and indirectly affect health and well-being, while vulnerability is likely to increase as Ireland's population ages in the coming decades.

Tourism is highly exposed and vulnerable to climate change and often reliant on sensitive ecosystems. As a small, open economy in an increasingly interconnected world, business and finance in Ireland are exposed and vulnerable to climate change impacts and policy responses in other parts of the world. Transboundary risks can flow through pathways such as trade and finance links which affect critical supply chains. Clear from the assessment of Volume 3 is that impacts of climate change and extreme events can cascade from one sector to another. A siloed sectoral focus on impacts and adaptation raises the prospect of underestimating cascading risks and requires more integrative assessment.

Interlinkages are also important beyond our borders. Ireland, given our shared island status and reliance on imports and exports, is highly exposed to transboundary climate risks. These are the impacts of, and responses to, climate change experienced elsewhere in the world. These remain under assessed. Understanding transmission pathways of transboundary risks is an important knowledge gap. Such understanding is important for assessing impacts, but also adaptation responses. For example, the fodder crisis in 2018 was amplified as typical import markets in nearby countries were also impacted by drought.

Climate system tipping points are assessed by the Volume 1 team and represent thresholds beyond which components of the Earth system permanently switch to new states. Several potential tipping points would have significant implications for Ireland, with collapse of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation being the most immediately important, given the importance of the north Atlantic in determining our climate and agricultural productivity. The risks, impacts and adaptation implications of such events remain to be assessed.

Professor Brian ? Gallach?ir:

We have presented some of the reasons we need to achieve deep, rapid and sustained reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. I will share some highlights from section C of the Irish Climate Change Assessment Synthesis Report, which, in turn, draws from the Volume 2 report that focuses on how we do this, and especifically how we can deliver a climate neutral Ireland.

The good news is that we have already started. We also have a legal basis for deep sustained national emissions cuts and we have the technical solutions available to us. The bad news is that our emissions are too high, at 50% higher than the EU average on a per capita basis. In addition, we do not have sufficient policies or actions to get us to climate neutrality in the timeframe we need to.

Reflecting on what has happened to date, after significant growth in the 1990s Ireland’s total greenhouse gas emissions peaked in 2001 and have reduced by 15% since then. Ireland has made limited progress over the past 20 years. We have done better in some sectors, for example, electricity and heating, than we have in others, including agriculture and transport. Our emissions per person are 10 tonnes of CO2 equivalent per annum, which is 50% higher than the EU average.

More recently, in 2021 we put in place a legal basis for deep, rapid and sustained greenhouse gas emissions reductions through the climate Act. Ireland legislated for five-yearly carbon budgets and sectoral emissions ceilings that set a limit on the amount of greenhouse gas emissions that can be released over defined periods. These budgets are consistent with a target for a 51% reduction in total greenhouse gas emissions, including the land use, land-use change and forestry, LULUCF, sector by 2030, compared with 2018, and a long-term national climate objective of climate neutrality by 2050 at the latest. However, based on data for 2021 and 2022, early estimates for 2023 and projections to 2030, Ireland is not on track to meet these statutory targets. Current policies and actions are not sufficient.

We know from climate mitigation science that we have well-established no-regret options that need to happen now, which can get us most of the way to net zero carbon dioxide emissions. We do have clearer pathways for the energy transition to net zero emissions than we do for agriculture. As shown in the graphic, these include energy efficiency, renewable energy, electrification and carbon dioxide removal. The transition to a climate-neutral society is an urgent challenge for all sectors but also an opportunity to build a resilient future for all. Among the many additional societal co-benefits are those for human health and air quality.

Dr. Tara Quinn:

I will give an overview of the section of the report that focuses on adaptation to climate change in Ireland. Ireland needs to be resilient to ongoing and future climate change impacts. This will require extensive adaptation, which is the process of adjusting to actual or expected climate and its effects. Successful adaptation depends on effectiveness of governance and decision-making processes. Current implementation of adaptation is too slow and fragmented. Doing better will require financing, working with people and nature, monitoring and evaluating outcomes and increasing public and private sector involvement.

What is clear is that climate change is happening now and that we need to adapt.

Key to adaptation are the interrelated concepts of risk, exposure and vulnerability, as members can see on the diagram on the screen, which features quite strongly in the IPCC report. Climate change risks emerge from the interactions between hazards such as floods, storms and heatwaves, and the exposure and vulnerability of populations and infrastructure. Risk is therefore not static but evolves as the frequency and intensity of hazards increase and as exposure and vulnerabilities change over time. Adaptation, therefore, can be thought of as ongoing risk management, focusing on processes of assessment, action, monitoring, evaluation, learning and improvement.

Mitigation and adaptation are inherently linked. The more warming experienced, the greater the challenge of adaptation. Even if the world is successful in meeting the temperature goal of the Paris Agreement, adaptation to a changed climate will still be required. Adaptation action taken today to reduce vulnerabilities and exposure, and to increase resilience, will have benefits now while also shaping the future and should be seen as an investment rather than a short-term cost.

We are not starting from an ideal position for adaptation because of aging infrastructures, declining quality of the built environment, and significant and ongoing environmental deterioration, including declines in water quality, biodiversity and ecosystem quality. Many natural and human systems upon which well-being depend have become less resilient. Foundations for adaptation are being laid, and there are reasons for optimism. However, there are challenges that need to be confronted and improvements made. Volume 3 highlights key actions necessary to build momentum and develop a pathway to a climate-resilient Ireland. Key among these are the seven points members can see on the screen.

First is defining objectives. Successful adaptation is dependent on collectively negotiating and defining goals around what success looks like. Second, ensuring just adaptation and resilience will require careful consideration of how the benefits and burdens of adaptations are distributed, taking fair participation and decision-making seriously, and making sure that decision-making processes reflect diverse values and perspectives. Third is monitoring and evaluation. Greater focus needs to be placed on monitoring and evaluating adaptation processes and outcomes rather than simply just focusing on implementation. This information will be key for learning and doing adaptation better in the future.

Fourth is understanding the social dimensions of adaptation. Adaptation is not just about technical solutions. Successful adaptation depends on reducing vulnerability, which requires a better understanding of the spatial, temporal and socioeconomic nature of vulnerability. Fifth is working with people and nature. Widening adaptation actions to include nature-based approaches opens opportunities for realising co-benefits for people and nature, with potentially positive outcomes for environmental quality, biodiversity and health and well-being, as well as improved resilience to climate change.

Sixth is integrating climate uncertainty into decision making, particularly where adaptation concerns critical infrastructure or where exposure or vulnerability is high. Frameworks for decision making under uncertainty are needed to support adaptation in Ireland. Finally, we must avoid lock-in and maintain flexibility. Climate resilience requires integrating flexibility and diversity of options into climate adaptation planning. Adaptation decisions should not lock us into resource allocations and decision pathways that limit the choices of future generations.

I will now hand over to Professor Hannah Daly to give an overview of the next section.

Professor Hannah Daly:

I thank Dr. Quinn. I will start with the section on driving transformation forward.

Effective and just transformative actions will have mitigation and adaptation benefits and bring broader benefits for health, well-being, nature and sustainable economic development. The State has a central role to play, supported through actions across society.

A national vision and long-term integrated strategy can enable systemic change and maximise opportunities in all sectors benefiting people today and in future generations. The decisions made and actions taken this decade will have long-term consequences affecting many generations into the future. Ireland’s current policy direction predominantly emphasises technology transitions rather than wider systemic transformations. Immediate and sustained transformative mitigation and adaptation actions are likely to yield substantial benefits for health, well-being and biodiversity in Ireland, while reducing vulnerability to the adverse impacts of climate change.

Taking action to address the direct drivers of emissions may challenge vested interests that have a strong interest in maintaining the status quo. To enact this transformation, it is essential to broaden the scope of measures aimed at accelerating emissions reductions, including by addressing indirect drivers of emissions such as institutions, economic models, settlement and infrastructure, governance, demographics and sociocultural factors. Transitions and transformations are a strategic opportunity. The transformative approach of shifting development paths offers extensive economic opportunities for Ireland.

Fairer and more equal societies are more resilient to impacts and are more likely to adopt progressive transformative policies. Prioritisation of well-being and equity in development and climate policy could bolster the democratic social contract in support of transformation, including improved quality of life, decent work and the value of care. Emissions-intensive activities are likely to face growing pressures to change or contract, which increases the need for just transition, and to enable opportunities for economic diversification.

The State has a central role to play in transformative change. That role can involve stimulating new policy, co-ordinating actors, mediating interests and shaping outcomes. Transition and transformation can be enabled through adopting holistic and systemic ways of thinking to maximise win–win outcomes, developing an integrated long-term vision, addressing fragmented governance, developing integrative policy approaches, capacity building and broad stakeholder engagement, and enabling a strong social contract with citizens and communities.

Finance is an important enabler of transitions and transformations, and public policy can set the conditions to steer investment in socially-agreed directions. Public engagement and participation in development and implementation of transition management is essential. Research is needed to identify effective strategies and interventions to effectively engage with citizens and communities, build societal capacity, and mobilise society-wide climate action.

As the ICCA process has demonstrated clearly, climate change presents new challenges, and our collective success will depend on capacity in research, training, upskilling and retention of existing and new professionals, together with engagement with and learning from communities. Irish research takes a leading role internationally but further investment is needed to grow the enduring human capacity, skills and infrastructure necessary to consolidate and sustain this contribution, and to address core gaps in knowledge, which was also assessed by this synthesis report. This will require investing in and leveraging knowledge from all disciplines and the local knowledge held by communities themselves.

In closing, Ireland’s climate change assessment has given us unprecedented insights into the climate crisis and how we can collectively address it. The future climate is in our collective hands. Every action matters.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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I thank Professor Daly and all who contributed to the opening statement. As agreed, members will have five minutes for their questions. I will allow latitude if I think it is an important line of questioning. Members might indicate if they wish to ask questions, and the clerk will take a list.

To begin, I might ask a straightforward question to any and all of the witnesses. It is about the political challenge of climate action. The witnesses represent different areas of academic research in the broader climate area. Our challenge as politicians is policy, and getting policy across the line. While I think there is certainly a general acceptance in this committee, and perhaps less so in the broader Oireachtas, generally in Ireland there is a strong acceptance of the climate change challenge. There is strong acceptance that we need to tackle it. However, where we really struggle is the detail and any policies that we might try to advance become very difficult politically. Did the witnesses look at that political challenge? Was that part of the work of the report?

A lot of that is communication. It is about presenting evidence. It is about presenting the benefits of a lot of the policy proposals as well. If any of our witnesses want to speak to that, I am sure they have thoughts and ideas. It would certainly be relevant to our work as politicians.

Dr. Diarmuid Torney:

I thank the committee for the invitation. In response to the Cathaoirleach's remarks, we do not envy the position the committee is in and we commend it on its work.

I draw particular attention to two aspects of volume 4, that is, realising the benefits of transition and transformation. One is on the synergies and the co-benefits. In volume 4 we draw attention to the many co-benefits in tackling climate change in conjunction with our response to the biodiversity crisis. We draw attention to the range of benefits across health, well-being and so forth. If it is of interest to the committee, we can provide further detail on the specific parts of volume 4 that go into that. Linked to this is the idea of creating a shared positive vision of the future. That is one element within volume 4 I draw attention to.

The other is on the enabling factors. Throughout volume 4, we draw attention to the ways in which the enabling environment can be strengthened. That is the role of the Government, the civil and public service and the role of factors such as education, communication and media. The role of media could be strengthened.

On a broader note, they are the mechanisms by which we engage with society. We draw attention to things such as citizens' assemblies or the Children and Young People's Assembly on Biodiversity Loss, for example. This committee met some of those representatives. We also call for more research in those areas to help members of this committee do the important job they do in bringing their constituents and voters along with them and bringing their party colleagues along with them.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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I thank Dr. Tormey. Now we will hear from Professor Brian Ó Gallachóir.

Professor Brian ? Gallach?ir:

I thank the Chair and wish to add to Dr. Tormey's contribution. In volume 2 we explored the question of achieving climate neutrality by 2050 and looked at the legislation and policy changes that have been achieved. It is quite remarkable when we trace what has happened in Ireland regarding the discussions of climate change at a political level from ten years ago to more recently. One of the things we refer to in volume 2 is the passing of the legislation in 2021 and the agreement in the Oireachtas on carbon budgets and sectoral emission ceilings without the need for a vote. It shows a strong level of party political consensus at that higher level.

It does not diminish the challenges of implementing individual policies at a more local level. It does indicate a highly promising level of party political support for climate action. Tracing this change over a number of years has been significant. Look at the level of polarisation around climate policy which can happen elsewhere such as, for example, in the US. It is a very promising position but it does not take away from the fact we need more policies and measures and the challenge is to deliver on those.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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Dr. Quinn wishes to contribute.

Dr. Tara Quinn:

I can provide a brief insight from some recent research, that is, a survey called Climate Change in the Irish Mind. There was a first wave a few years ago and a second wave of results was published recently. It shows a significant percentage of the Irish population is aware of climate change impacts and is worried about them. It is quite a large-scale survey. In terms of getting an understanding of how the general population is thinking about climate change and the appetite there, there are some interesting insights as to potential areas for inroads and engagement with populations on the aspects of climate change relevant for them because the way we will experience climate change will be highly contextual and place-based. There will be particular dimensions relevant for communities in coastal areas, rural communities and cities. Surveys such as the one produced by the EPA can give some useful guidance on points of engagement with communities.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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What was the name of the survey?

Dr. Tara Quinn:

It is called Climate Change in the Irish Mind.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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It reminds me of the National Transport Authority. Perhaps Professor Caulfield will speak to it later. It recently did a survey of the regional cities and in my home city of Limerick, it found 76% of people agreed with reallocating road space in favour of active travel, which is completely contrary to what the media, and certainly social media, would tell us. This kind of research is hugely important so we will certainly look at the EPA research Dr. Quinn referenced. I thank Dr. Quinn and call Dr. Deane.

Dr. Paul Deane:

Go raibh maith agat, a Chathaoirligh. I have a short, quick personal reflection on the question asked on the political perspective. We tend to focus on the negative consequences of inaction rather than the positive consequences of doing something. This tends to be a challenge across society. Were we to look at the positive consequences for Ireland and what we explain to the public, schools and people we meet, at present we are one of the most fossil-fuel reliant economies in Europe and are the most fossil-fuel reliant economy in north-western Europe. The price of this reliance is the huge cost we pay to heat our homes and fuel our cars. If you walk into town today, look at the forecourts and the price of petrol and diesel. The price is high, not because of decisions we have taken in Ireland but because of decisions taken by others outside of Ireland. When you outsource your energy supply in terms of fossil fuels, you outsource decision-making and the ability to make positive benefits.

Moving away from fossil fuels in Ireland is a win-win situation in many ways. When we reduce greenhouse gas pollution, you tend to increase other things such as jobs, well-being, access to nature and opportunities for farmers. Focusing on the positive benefits tends to be an easier way in for people than is focusing on the negatives. Our reliance on fossil fuels is costing us a fortune in Ireland. I have spoken to previous committees on this issue highlighting that in 2022, we were spending €1 million every hour importing oil and gas into Ireland. We have a wealth of natural resources which we can access ourselves. We have a great story to tell about the future. We do not do enough of a service to ourselves in terms of promoting the benefits. It is not just about reducing pollution, it is about increasing our resilience and making Ireland a better place. That was a quick short personal reflection on the messaging and the political stance around this report. I thank the committee.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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I thank Dr. Deane. I will not use any more of the committee's time but the idea has been suggested to the committee before - I do not know whether the witnesses worked on it - of a future generations commission, which other countries have established to look at the long-term benefits, how we shape our society in a few decades' time and the necessary action to tackle climate change. If anyone wants to speak about this at some later point, I would certainly be interested to hear their thoughts.

Jennifer Whitmore (Wicklow, Social Democrats)
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I thank the witnesses for coming in today and for all of their work on this really important piece of work. It is great to see it come to fruition. I am trying to get a sense of where we are at the moment. It sometimes can be difficult to have that full picture. We try to get the balance right and do not wish to be overly negative as positive things are happening, such as very worthwhile policy initiatives. Sometimes, however, individual policy initiatives can mask the overall problem we are facing. They will not be enough to meet or to do what we need done. I am looking at the graph provided on the carbon budgets. It specifies that in 2021 and 2022, we were above the carbon budgets and indicative estimates for 2023 suggest that we will be again, but I am trying to equate that with the average cuts that we said we would need to meet those budgets when we were proceeding with the legislation . For the first five years, the carbon budget was 4.8% and the second one was 8.3%, which obviously was going to be much harder. Does Professor Ó Gallachóir have the figures on what we are tracking at the moment on a percentage basis? He may not. We have not been meeting the 4.8% and with those two carbon budgets, we were above it. We reduced our carbon emissions slightly last year but what percentage reduction do we need to see between now and the end of the first budget to meet that budget? What impact will that have on the second budget?

Professor Brian ? Gallach?ir:

I thank Deputy Whitmore. As the Deputy correctly points out and as can be seen from the graph we showed, the trajectory is correct but we are not on track in terms of meeting our carbon budgets. The focus of the report - that part of volume 2 - was achieving climate neutrality by 2050. It was taking a longer-term time horizon and we felt it was important to do that in this report rather than focus on the here and now. In answer to the Deputy's question, the estimate from 2023 is a very early estimate and some parts of the data are clearer than others. We know, for example, in the electricity sector that we reduced emissions by 25% last year, which was a significant reduction that really set us on a positive trajectory whereas in areas such as agriculture, the picture is less clear at the moment. We know there are positive changes in terms of fertiliser use being down and reducing nitrous oxide but in respect of methane emissions, that is less clear.

The EPA is due to produce a set of provisional data for 2023 towards the end of June. What we have shown is a rough estimate. Some of those areas are where we know we are doing well and then we are making crude assumptions on other sectors. It is looking like a 5% reduction of last year's emissions. As the Deputy mentioned, our annual trajectory that was required for the first five years was 4.8%. There was an increase in emissions in 2021 and a decrease in 2022. We are off track at the moment. I can do a quick calculation before the end of the meeting or later and come back to Deputy Whitmore with a more precise answer to her question which is what is now the level of emissions reductions that we would need to achieve in the next period. As I said, our focus in the report was deliberately on taking a longer-term view on this and the big picture changes that we need to make. We are not ignoring the short term but are focusing on climate neutrality by 2050.

Jennifer Whitmore (Wicklow, Social Democrats)
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The difficulty is if we do not make those short-term changes, the impact will be much greater. It will be much harder to do at a later point. We backloaded a lot of the measures. When we are talking about the different pathways what I have the greatest difficulty with is that it is very difficult for those in the agricultural sector, for example, to see what changes they need to make because those pathways are not set out for them. Looking at the climate action plan for 2024, I have added up the abatement potential and it is far below what we expect and need to see from the sector. Professor Ó Gallachóir mentioned that the current policies and actions are not sufficient. What additional things could be done to make sure that we are ambitious enough? It is highly problematic that our climate action plan, which is meant to be setting out this pathway, is not ambitious enough to meet our targets. Are there additional things that he thinks we could be putting in that would give us those wins?

Professor Brian ? Gallach?ir:

The short answer is "Yes", there are additional things that could be added. We were very conscious in this report not to be policy-prescriptive in the sense of laying out the science on climate change, the science on climate change mitigation and science on climate change adaptation. This additional piece went beyond what the IPCC community does in that it would normally have a focus on those three alone but we had this additional volume and additional team working on the opportunities associated with transformation. We were not policy-prescriptive but we did try to make the synthesis report in particular policy-relevant. That is the first point. The second is that one of the positive things in the Act was to make the climate action plan an iterative annual living document exactly for the purposes the Deputy pointed out. Essentially, if we are not on track we need to make changes.

It was clear from the EPA emission projections that the previous climate action plan was not leading us on track to a 51% reduction, it was closer to half of that. That gives impetus for the next iteration of the climate action plan to look at what else is required. Certainly in respect of the climate action plan, there are new policies and measures introduced in the one that was published before Christmas, relative to before. The EPA is doing a new set of climate projections that will give an indication as to how far or how off-track it is relative to our carbon budgets and indeed our sectorial emission ceilings. In many sectors, we know what we have to do. We know what emission reductions we have to achieve. Some of the pathways have more options. In some areas, there are difficult choices to be made around the speed at which some of the technical solutions are available. Take methane, for example. There are changes in cattle breeding, etc. that will take time to transfer into farming practice versus the need for strong emissions reductions. We see that in a similar way in transport with cars, for example, the electric vehicle penetration of the fleet versus active travel versus public transport. There is a lot of focus on those elements but we are seeing fossil fuel cars growing. There are significant challenges in terms of trying to respond on an iterative basis to the emissions as they are happening and as new information and new drivers are coming in, like economic growth, which in some respects is driving data centres for example. That is a particular one in the area of the growth equation.

The iterative nature of the climate action plan, as in the annual task of reviewing, reflecting and reintroducing new policies, is a very useful political mechanism to actually do that, but it is very challenging. This goes back to the earlier question about the challenge of actually ensuring the implementation of policies achieves the goals it is setting out to achieve. We made the point in volume 2 very clearly that we are undergoing the energy transition and the transition across society, but it is not happening at the correct pace. This is a challenge not just facing Ireland, but many countries internationally. The challenge that Deputy Whitmore raises is the key one and a collective effort is required to actually answer that challenge.

In the context of this report, we had a focus on presenting the science and the knowledge that is available. We avoided, deliberately, being policy prescriptive. I hope that answers, at least in part, the Deputy's question.

Jennifer Whitmore (Wicklow, Social Democrats)
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Yes, absolutely. The policy side is where we come in.

Professor Brian ? Gallach?ir:

That is the hard bit.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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I thank Deputy Whitmore. Did Professor Daly indicate that she wishes to speak?

Professor Hannah Daly:

Is it okay for me to briefly come in on that?

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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Yes, of course.

Professor Hannah Daly:

To add to what Professor Ó Gallachóir said, there are three areas I suggest focusing on in the climate action plan, not necessarily looking at new mitigation measures but accelerating the ones in place.

In the energy system, which is my area of expertise, the measures largely are renewables, solar, wind and the grid, which bring approximately one third of the emission savings in the energy system, electrifying transport and heating in industry, which brings another large proportion, and then efficiency. Bringing forward and accelerating the clean energy deployment targets are essential.

The second area is to concentrate not just on deploying additional clean energy measures but to explicitly cut fossil fuel demand. The climate action plan does not actually set out pathways for fossil fuel consumption that are consistent with carbon budgets. Carbon budgets are really fossil fuel budgets for the energy systems that work for agriculture and therefore, to know whether we are on track, we need to know much fossil fuel we have, that is, the budget of oil, gas, coal and peat. As Mr. Ó Gallachóir said, while electric vehicle sales are growing, so are fossil fuel car sales and therefore, petrol and diesel sales are not falling.

The third area that needs to be looked at in more detail is demand reduction, which includes a focus on data centres. The indirect drivers of our high energy demand growth, including our spatial settlement patterns, are the infrastructure that drives demand, inefficiency in our homes and broader consumption patterns, including data centres, aligned with our industry.

Professor Brian Caulfield:

It is a good question. In transport, which is my area of expertise, we do have a pathway. We have a lot of modelling that shows how to get to where we need to be by 2030. The big issue is, to go back to the Cathaoirleach's first question, the political acceptability of it. Getting to where we need to be by 2030 means very draconian measures. Parking charges, congestion charges and all of those types of things need to happen. We need to invest in public transport a lot more than we currently are. In the city we are currently in, the most recent piece of new rail infrastructure was opened in 2017. We are in a climate crisis and it does not look like there will be any construction of new rail in this city for five or six years. The slow delivery of that has become a big issue.

In volume 4, we point to the reorganisation of our built environment and the giving up of streets to traffic. The point was put out there that 75% of people want this to happen, but it is the same percentage of people who are driving and causing these emissions. As we have seen in all cities and towns across the country, when we try to introduce traffic calming, the removal of traffic or parking charges, it is, politically, a hot potato and it is very difficult to achieve.

As I have said, I am not an expert in agriculture and I will defer to my colleagues in UCC in this regard, but in transport, we have a plan and that plan is going very slowly.

Jennifer Whitmore (Wicklow, Social Democrats)
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In the likes of transport, is part of the problem that we are bringing in the stick before the carrot? We have not invested in public transport, yet we are saying to people to get out of their cars. We have that balance wrong and we need to switch that around. We need to put in the public transport and have as many buses, even if they are not full because if the buses are provided, demand will be created. Does Professor Caulfield think that part of the problem is we are coming at it the wrong way?

Professor Brian Caulfield:

For example, in this city, the Pathfinder Project is going to free up a lot of space in the city centre that needs to be freed up to enable buses to be competitive with the car. We need to have the BusConnects corridors. A total of 23 of them are now through planning and have permission and they need to start construction. When they come online, that type of priority needs to be put in place. We, in transport, need to do everything really quickly.

We need to do electric vehicles. That will lock us in to car ownership into the future and we will end up with a lot more problems that we have not seen, but that is maybe where 60% of the emissions reduction are planned to come from, that is, from selling more cars.

Jennifer Whitmore (Wicklow, Social Democrats)
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That in itself will have an impact on the grid.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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I wish to come in on this idea that we need to provide the public transport before we apply the stick. Is that not a very dangerous message? There is public transport that people can use but they are not using. If we say that we are not going to do all these really hard things until we have these ideal public transport systems, we are never going to get there.

Professor Brian Caulfield:

I agree. For our transport plans in Dublin with the metro and in Cork with light rail, we cannot hold those cities to ransom while we wait for these big infrastructure projects to be delivered. In all cities, BusConnects can deliver a lot of change, but it needs to be rolled out with the kind of stick approach as well. The stick is to basically give these modes of transport the space they require in order for them to be competitive with the car. Once the modes are competitive, what we have seen internationally is that the mode change starts to occur.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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That is a very important point; the idealised system, or even a better system, cannot actually be provided unless the stick is applied. It is simply not possible to get this excellent public transport because of limited street space for the different modes.

Professor Brian Caulfield:

Yes, precisely. We have seen it across the country where we have been able to take away space from the private vehicle to public transport. Over the decades, that has been successful and we have never really reverted any of that type of intervention that we have done. We just need to do it at much greater pace now.

Jennifer Whitmore (Wicklow, Social Democrats)
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We are far from an excellent public transport system. It may be good in some pockets but the majority of people do not have that. Even where there is public transport, people find that the bus does not show up. They have been ghosted. There is a reliability issue. Until we get to the point where people know that if they want to get a bus, it will show up and that they are not going to be left in the dark by themselves on a road waiting for a bus, we are never going to get people out of their cars and that is-----

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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I counter that the buses are unreliable because they are stuck in the traffic and the lanes are not allocated for the buses.

Jennifer Whitmore (Wicklow, Social Democrats)
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I do not think that is wholly the case. A lot of the time, night-time buses are not showing up. It is not a traffic issue, but a reliability issue.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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Of course, there is a reliability issue. The principal point I am making is that these excellent systems cannot be produced unless some really difficult policies are applied. It is an either-or. It is about, certainly in the urban areas, how we allocate the limited space that we have. Anyway, we will have this debate outside of here, for sure.

Dr. Diarmuid Torney:

Deputy Bruton is being very patient and I will not dwell too long. I wish to return to the Cathaoirleach's question about the future generations commissioner that he mentioned earlier. While it is not covered within the scope of volume 4, I recall that the report of this committee in response to the recommendations of the Citizens' Assembly on Biodiversity Loss made such a proposal. I wish to bring to the attention of the committee that at our annual climate and society conference in DCU last week, we had a speaker, Ella Saltmarshe, who lives in Bristol and who works a lot on the idea of future thinking and future generations and incorporating the perspectives of future generations into the decisions we make today. It is a very interesting and innovative space.

There is the Future Generations Commissioner for Wales and other examples in Europe and the world. I am happy to send on further material.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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We would certainly appreciate it. What is the name of the researcher?

Dr. Diarmuid Torney:

Ella Saltmarche. We will be putting the video of her keynote address on YouTube and I can send on the link.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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I thank Dr. Torney.

Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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I thank the witnesses for their presentation. The overall picture is encouraging in my view as they are saying this is necessary, achievable and worthwhile. The key missing ingredient is for us to be able to make it something like a question of national pride that we deliver this. This is where we are struggling. It is getting everyone on the same page to understand that all of our futures, no matter what business we are in, depend on sustainability. This is the central challenge.

I do not know whether academics and scientists can help us in engendering this spark, which is so important. For my ha'penny's worth, I think a sectoral circular economy strategy in every sector would have the potential to shift the dial. It would embrace all environmental damage and not only climate and biodiversity. It would focus on consumption as well as production. Having cars sitting in our driveways that are idle 98% of the time is a symptom of excessive use and emissions; however, they do not fall in our inventory as they fall in those of Germany, Japan or Korea. It is very much about having a problem-solving framework.

In light of the discussion between Deputy Whitmore and Professor Caulfield, it is not always a question of rationing or charging. There can be more creative solutions and the circular economy breeds this. An example is sharing vehicles. We do not need 3 million vehicles that are idle 98% of the time. We could do with far fewer vehicles and people could still have the freedom of some sort of choice. It would not be a very negative story about not having a bus outside people's door. It is about bringing in other options, becoming more creative and redesigning what we are trying to do.

Another element is that it is not so much about pointing the finger at data centres, which are the core of our ICT sector, or at farmers who are the core of our food sector, and saying they are the ones who must do all of the adjustment. Everyone is in the arena together and we must look at each sector. We need something like this to change the conversation so that we focus on mobilisation and implementation and show people there is a credible future. There is a future for a thriving ICT sector in this country. When we have offshore energy, data centres will be very productive users of it. They will be located in a country delivering renewable energy to fire them instead of being in other countries.

We need to think more creatively. The debate is often too channelled into a narrow "Yes" or "No", whereas really we need to be able to sketch futures where people can still meet their travel needs and various sectors can meet their needs. This is the missing piece in this to some degree. We have the framework. The climate Act is good but Ministers will come in here with one arm as long as the other saying they have not been able to mobilise the change they thought they could. That is the reality. We need to find something. As well as delving into the scientific dimension, is it possible for academia to look at the psychology of how we move people into another way of looking creatively at these challenges, which are so real?

Professor Brian ? Gallach?ir:

I thank Deputy Bruton. It is a very good point with regard to how we make it an issue of national pride. In many ways it is Volume 4 that mostly covers this. One of the projects referred to in it is one in which I have been involved. It is based on the Dingle Peninsula and I believe the committee has heard from the Dingle Hub on it. The question of psychology is correct but it is also about sociology in terms of mobilising a community and a region to take pride and develop and grow something. The role of the academic institution in this project was to make ourselves available for the community, which wanted to embark on a low-energy transition. We made available our skills and the technological aspects of our knowledge, as well as our societal knowledge through sociology and other social science disciplines, to help with the organisation and facilitate the structuring of working groups and partnerships, bringing together industry and the public and private sectors, to mobilise around a common goal.

Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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If we had a circular strategy for food we would be inviting everyone in, and farmers, producers and retailers would be sitting around the table. We would be looking at the entire food chain and food waste. Would this be an environment in which we could get a more collective collaborative approach? I feel it would be but perhaps I am naive.

Professor Brian ? Gallach?ir:

I was going to comment on this with regard to one of the offshoots of the initial initiative. What was interesting about the example I have given is that initially we had a very narrow focus in many ways. It was about electric vehicles, heat pumps and solar panels, and trying to see how the community could become familiar with these and what technological adoption and acceleration could arise from it.

Initially it was structured as individual-to-individual mobilisation. What we saw emerging was a range of initiatives around sustainability. Farmers came together to set up a sustainable energy community, as did the tourism and hospitality sector. We saw a flourishing in the emergence of various activities going in different directions. One or two of these do focus on the circular economy but it is bottom-up initiatives that are emerging from the enabling support which we provide and engage with through the partnership. It is a very interesting example of how we see something evolve.

From our perspective, it was important to make ourselves available to the community. Rather than going in and saying we need a circular economy approach we went in to respond to the community's request for support with how it could transition to a low-carbon future. A number of questions have been asked as to whether this can be scaled up. We have seen that it has scaled deep through the emergence of more and more initiatives blossoming. It is a very interesting case study. Certainly what we see is a lot of regional pride. It is not quite the national pride Deputy Bruton spoke about but we are seeing a lot of regional pride in the focus on sustainability.

Professor Hannah Daly:

I agree that Volume 4 is all about the question of how to mobilise society in order to realise mitigation and adaptation in a way that improves people's lives. Collectively, it is very rewarding but it has been a very complex and difficult task to bring this together. We have to draw from many different academic disciplines, including sociology, political science, engineering and health science. This type of report does not have an analogy globally. It is trying to bring all of these things together to figure out how to mobilise leadership.

It is instructive to read the top of the summary for policymakers in Volume 4 where we define transformative change as being "a fundamental, system wide reorganisation across technological, economic and social factors, including paradigms and goals, and valuing the climate, the environment, equity and wellbeing within decision making". This gets to the question with a different lens. Right now, the decisions we make regarding owning a particular car or using a particular bus route in the context of the linear economy we have now reflect the fact that we are not valuing the environment or climate in decision-making as individuals, at institutional level or within our legal frameworks.

One thing that comes across in Volume 4 is how integrated the underpinning and indirect drivers of unsustainability are. These drivers are similar to those impacting other issues in Irish society, including unfairness, economic opportunity and biodiversity loss. Taking an approach that integrates climate action with prosperity and jobs, in respect of addressing biodiversity loss and so on, is really necessary to bring forth these opportunities and this transformative change. It is, though, very difficult to do.

The research highlights the role of leadership in driving transformative change and the role of individual action as being the other side of the coin of collective action. The collective action of individuals is an enabler of transformative change. There is also the importance of fairness in climate and environmental policy in getting social acceptance of the level of change. Using it as a lever to make society more fair is an important goal in its own right. We also point out many research gaps. Our research tends to be done in a siloed way and there are many research gaps in respect of the social and transformative aspects of the transition. We have a detailed annexe with information on the various elements involved in this regard.

Professor Brian Caulfield:

I thank Deputy Bruton. He asked a very good question. One of the things we encountered when we were going through this process was the large number of stakeholder reviews, meetings and interviews. The analogy that kept coming back up, especially in Volume 4, was about Covid. The response we as a nation had to the Covid pandemic is the kind of level of response we need for climate action. Regarding how we sell this to everyone, obviously Covid was a clear and present danger. Determining how we can sell this climate action message to the public in a way that can ensure we get everybody working together in this was an aspect that came across clearly. We talked in Volume 4 about changing the social contract around this new vision that we see. It is not all doom and gloom. Volume 4, in particular, looks at the ways in which we can have benefits from this transition happening.

On the point the Deputy made about the vehicles, he is right. Our vehicles spend about 95% of the time idle outside our houses. There is definitely a market and potential here for this circular economy. Research that we conducted in Trinity showed that every shared car that goes into a city, Dublin especially, would get rid of ten other cars. That kind of thinking is very important.

With that in mind, one of the things again addressed in Volume 4 is the just transition around these vehicles. We had a fairly brutal, one-size-fits-all tax break for people to purchase electric vehicles. This resulted in a large degree of inequity, where those in wealthy parts of Ireland ended up with electric vehicles and were able to reap the benefits. This is outside the contents of the volume, but what we see in other countries is that they are starting to focus more on people in rural areas. In Scotland especially, this is being done quite a bit. It is also happening in France. They are looking at ways in which they can incentivise those who cannot afford to purchase electric cars to enable them to do so. The just transition aspect was very important in the car context.

There is then the question of selling it to people and telling them they would be saving about €13,000 annually, which is the figure the AA gives as the cost of owning a vehicle. If we can sell the economic benefits of the just transition to people, particularly concerning transport, because it is my area, including the benefits of going without a car and going towards a shared car, that will also be part of the mix.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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Just before I bring in Dr. Heaphy on the question of shared cars, if one shared vehicle displaces ten privately-owned vehicles, does it also have a similar impact on the number of kilometres driven and, therefore, the emissions associated with the ten vehicles?

Professor Brian Caulfield:

The research we did basically showed the shared vehicle was suppressing the need to purchase a vehicle. The people using the shared vehicles were using public transport much more, while the shared vehicle was used just for specific trips where they could not find an alternative.

Dr. Liam Heaphy:

Just on that point, I found the reciprocity between systems and organisational systems and then actual engagement on the one side interesting. I find it quite interesting in the context of the built environment, for example, where a circular economy process is becoming more and more embedded. We are seeing this level of detail coming in, where life-cycle analysis for new buildings, for retrofitting existing buildings and other aspects are just becoming normalised. These systems are coming online and becoming mandated as well. We have European legislation in this regard. Products used in buildings must have a product declaration detailing the construction processes and the carbon cost of that material. All these aspects are interesting.

Once we have many of these systems in place, online and resourced, it will then be interesting to see how this can facilitate better and deeper engagement with different stakeholders. Where we get this deeper engagement is when people feel they have the means and resources to make changes they can see are making a difference, and a relatively large difference. These are not just measures that might feel more tokenistic, but ones that are clearly all part of the larger plan for our climate goals and other linked environment goals.

Professor Jennifer McElwain:

I thank Deputy Bruton for the question. I wish to come in on the importance of pride in nature and biodiversity, and a collective national pride. We know that at least one third of all global carbon emissions have been taken up by the oceans and land. Ireland stands out in being quite unusual in a European context because our land is a net emitter of carbon. We have huge potential in this regard. If you have pride in nature and knowledge of it, with high biodiversity farming, you enhance biodiversity and also increase the carbon sink of land in Ireland. This is definitely a win-win for biodiversity and climate.

I think the Deputy asked what academics can do. Beyond this report, we are realising the importance of breaking down disciplinary boundaries in our teaching. Many new courses have developed across the universities in Ireland that break down this disciplinary boundary because we realise that someone studying to be a scientist needs to have modules in psychology, sociology and economics, while somebody studying creative arts also needs to have knowledge of the foundational science of climate change. That is really important for future generations. I am very hopeful that our new students graduating from universities will be multidisciplinary in ways we have never been before.

Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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One thing surprised me when we had scientists before the committee talking about rewetting land and various things that would improve the biodiversity of land and its capacity to absorb carbon. They could not give us a relatively simple matrix that would allow us to say that if we paid farmers to do X, there would be a certain benefit on the other side of the equation from which the farmers would be able to get a yield. It ended up with them saying this was too vague and not accurate enough and it was not possible to measure what a hectare would save in terms of sequestration. We do not seem to be getting close to carbon farming, or whatever we would like to call it.

Professor Jennifer McElwain:

As soon as biology is evolved, it becomes very complex. That is basically an active area of research.

Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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Could we not make an act of faith on it? The worst that can happen is that we will have overpaid a few farmers, while we would have got the benefit anyway. Can science not give us a rule of thumb to go and apply?

Professor Jennifer McElwain:

Unfortunately, no.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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Perhaps we politicians can come up with a rule of thumb.

Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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We do so every day.

Darren O'Rourke (Meath East, Sinn Fein)
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I thank the witnesses for their engagement with the committee. I am interested in their reflections on the climate action ecosystem, of which they are an essential element. For us here in the Oireachtas, we have had the climate legislation, we have been finding our way through the process of carbon budgets and sectoral emission ceilings, and we have been holding Departments to account in that regard. A whole new architecture has been built up that involves a number of pillars, including the witnesses in the research sector, the political institutions, civic society, the media, business and the general public. Will the witnesses comment on their experience of the changes in recent years? What do they see as potential opportunities and areas needing improvement?

The important work we are discussing today is a case in point. How did it come about and will it be repeated in the future? Is it now a standing feature of the climate action environment in Ireland? I am interested in our guests' perspective on that.

My third question touches on a number of points that have already been made. Professor Daly stated in her opening remarks:

Prioritisation of well-being and equity in development and climate policy could bolster the democratic social contract in support of transformation, including improved quality of life, decent work and the value of care.

This relates to the principles of just transition, equity and fairness in policy. Instinctively, my sense is that this approach is not only really important in policy terms and the fair and proper thing to do, but it also is a really effective tool to beat down the arguments of vested interests and those who, for whatever reason, are in opposition to what we are trying to do. I agree with the statement but I wonder whether there a research basis for it or room for further investigation.

Dr. Diarmuid Torney:

I thank the Deputy for his questions. I could talk all day about all of this but I will try to limit my remarks. On the point about the climate action ecosystem, as he described it, we have come a long way. The committee members are at the coalface of these efforts. One of the pieces of research we reflected on in volume 4 was a benchmarking study I undertook that looked at the Climate Action and Low Carbon Development (Amendment) Act 2021 in comparative perspective. The key message from the study was that our climate legislation is very strong by international standards. The role of this committee is particularly important. It plays a kind of anchoring role by way of both holding the Government to account and bringing in external expertise. The annual transition statement process under the 2015 Act really did not provide as strong an accountability mechanism as what we have now. That is where we are doing very well.

Another important development is the creation of climate action teams across all Departments. Professor Ó Gallachóir and I were reflecting earlier this morning that, five or ten years ago, the then equivalent of the Department of the Environment, Climate and Communications had a very small number of staff working on climate. There are now many multiples of that number engaged in this work. That is reflected across other Departments and at local authority level. It is a very strong development.

Where there is perhaps more to be done is in the wider apparatus of the State, including State agencies and non-departmental public bodies. More could be done by them both in terms of scaling and expertise and also in reorienting their mandates.

The Deputy's second question about whether this whole ICCA process will be repeated is really a question for the Environmental Protection Agency. My understanding is that there is an appetite to repeat it. However, that is a question for the agency rather than for us.

The Deputy's final question was on the importance of equity, well-being and fairness in climate change policy. Those themes come out very strongly in volume 4. We can share the details of that with the committee. There is a strong evidence base to say that taking such an approach is not only the right thing to do, but that bolstering the just transition and striving for more equal societies delivers stronger climate action.

Professor Brian Caulfield:

I thank the Deputy for his questions. My colleague from DCU has answered all of them remarkably well. I will focus on just one, which is the question regarding a climate action ecosystem. The key issue I see in this regard is one of capacity, as mentioned by my Trinity College colleague. I refer to our capacity to graduate students who can do all the work that is required. In my role as head of civil engineering at Trinity College, I see the numbers coming into civil engineering decreasing. The salaries being offered in the sector are competing against what is on offer from the likes of Google, Meta and all those places. When I talk to our graduates, I tell them that the challenge is to try to save the planet. We are asking them to go out there and build the wind turbines, metro systems and all the large projects that are needed. The capacity we are producing is not enough to deliver those projects. In Trinity College and across the whole university sector, as my colleague mentioned, we are looking at new ways of merging different disciplines to answer this really difficult question. Capacity will be the key issue for us to solve in order to deliver what is needed.

Professor Brian ? Gallach?ir:

I thank Deputy O'Rourke for his questions. I have two points to make regarding the climate action ecosystem. The first has probably been discussed in meetings of one of the other Oireachtas committees. I refer to how universities are struggling financially. They are not receiving the funding that was promised and, in addition, they are dealing with cost overruns. There is a two-sided problem that needs to be addressed. It reflects a wider challenge in terms of public sector funding. As Dr. Torney mentioned, while we have seen Departments build up capacity on climate action, there are significant capacity deficits in places like An Bord Pleanála, for example. In that case, the deficit is affecting the timing of planning decisions on certain infrastructure projects that are necessary for accelerating the transition. An Bord Pleanála is just one example. There are other areas across the public sector where the same issue arises.

The second point is that I really like the idea of a climate action ecosystem. There is a framing that can be used that involves looking at the issues from the top down. The Deputy referred to the governance that has been introduced over recent years, which we have already discussed. Then there are the bottom-up pressures, which relate to people's attitudes, as reflected in the Climate Change in the Irish Mind research, Fridays for Future and other initiatives that are engaging actively on climate action. Of course, neither a top-down nor bottom-up approach will achieve the change we need without there being something in the middle. The public sector is part of that middle piece.

The Deputy may be interested to hear that we have done some work on the role of intermediaries, which is an approach that is starting to be increasingly highlighted. More needs to be done in this area. I refer to organisations like the GAA, for instance, and the work it is doing on climate action. Work is also being done by the LEADER groups and community development organisations. There is a whole network of untapped potential in the organisations that are already active and taking action on climate. It is about mapping the ecosystem more clearly, first, and then trying to connect the dots. That links strongly to Deputy Bruton's point about needing to build from that ecosystem towards a national pride in sustainability. I really like the term "climate action ecosystem". There is a lot that could be developed from it.

Martin Kenny (Sligo-Leitrim, Sinn Fein)
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I thank the witnesses for the work they did on the ICCA report.

Clearly, the report will be an addition to the volumes of work we have to support our reliance on science to get movement on all of this. In general, there is agreement and consensus in these Houses that the climate crisis is real, must be dealt with and worked on. We may disagree sometimes on the details but in general everybody is faced in the right direction and want to make things happen.

During our discussion I realised that all of us in politics are out on doorsteps during these times meeting people and talking to them about local elections, etc. I am quite alarmed and surprised by the number of people who will say that the climate crisis is all nonsense or farmers who believe that the agenda is to get rid of farmers. Of course, politicians try to appeal to people's intellect and talk to them about various issues. However, we have a body of work to ensure we keep on track because the reality is, which we see across Europe and many other countries, there is a resistance to science that is based on people taking their information from the Internet and multiplying that into an argument that, in most cases, is founded on very soft ground or on nothing at all. Clearly, we can stand over the volumes of work done as part of the report and will prove very useful in the context of all of that. How can we convey a message in simple and clear language in order that people understand we have an opportunity? I realised there is an opportunity when volume 4 of this work was mentioned. People continually see climate change as something that will punish them and their lives, and it is going to be a negative. How can we show people the positives that can come from all of this?

Professor Caulfield talked about restricting parking, etc. All of that conveys the message that combating climate change is negative and people will have terrible hardship in the future. When the rewetting of land is suggested, people immediately think that it is not just one farmer's land will be rewetted because the land is connected to every other surrounding farm. In addition, say that farmer is fine, how does we pay all the other people who will be impacted by the measure? People view all of those issues as a negative. It is an uphill task to convince people that there are positives in all of this and our future can be bright. That is the challenge that us, in politics, certainly have but academics face a challenge in respect of that. I welcome any comments by the witnesses in that context.

Professor Jennifer McElwain:

I agree with the Deputy that it is a challenge. Volume 1 contains the scientific basis of climate change and we highlight the co-benefits. One example is methane, on which there is a very important debate in the agricultural sector. Methane causes global warning but it also causes ozone at ground level and ozone leads to hundreds of thousands of deaths from asthma-related health causes. By addressing the mitigation measures to reduce climate change, there will be a very positive co-benefit to improve the well-being of human health in terms of atmospheric pollution. I have given one example from volume 1. However, I am sure that all of my colleagues have many examples of those positive messages that we have tried to highlight all the way throughout the volumes because it is much more palatable to take the positive than hit the negative all the time.

Professor Hannah Daly:

As the Deputy said, we have provided the evidence in the four volumes both the urgency to act on climate change, the evidence as it exists and the co-benefits that climate action can bring. There is limited research on how to bring all that evidence to the public to mobilise support.

I share the Deputy's alarm at how people, especially on social media, and how it is tied up with national movements across Europe, oppose immigration or view climate change as a conspiracy. The evidence shows that the vast majority of Irish people believe that climate change is real, has been caused by human activities and they say at least that they support climate action. The big challenge is to counter the narratives that climate actions are costly and miserable by bringing all the evidence to the public and mainstreaming it everywhere. I say that because for every Facebook post that shows how bad EVs are, there is no counter to say how beneficial they are. It is framed in the media largely as a political issue and, therefore, a division between political parties, rather than something that affects every aspect of life.

I will give another example, although the research on it is limited. If we had taken these energy transition measures before the invasion of Ukraine, the energy crisis and the cost-of-living crisis then people would have been far more insulated from the cost-of-living crisis. If houses had been insulated, if we had a good public transport network and if we had more renewables on the system, we would not have had the same cost-of-living crisis and suffered all the associated negative consequences. Those indirect complexities are not linked in people's minds because energy and greenhouse gas pollution are invisible.

My last reflection is on what we can draw from previous successful campaigns. Personal testimonies of the people who were affected played a very important role in the success of the repeal the eighth campaign and, therefore, it would be important to bring to bear the testimony of people who are affected by climate change or benefited from climate action measures.

Martin Kenny (Sligo-Leitrim, Sinn Fein)
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Yesterday evening I was canvassing. I was in a new build house with an air-to-water heat system. The occupants said they are in the house two years and they cannot believe it. Their cost of heating is lower than when they lived in a rented house, although the rented house was probably not as well insulated, etc. They had a really positive story to tell but many people only hear that such development is hugely expensive, nobody can afford it and the grants are not large enough. That is the general narrative that people hear and that all of this stuff is about punishing or pushing down on people. All of us share the responsibility of showing the opportunities, positives and benefits.

Professor Caulfield earlier mentioned the grants available. For a lot of people, while there is a grant available, there must be an affordability element. They can get a grant to get an EV or get their house done but they must have a certain amount themselves. The people who need assistance most do not have that because they have already have a mortgage, loans or teenagers in college. They already have the other pressures of life so we need to find some way of front-loading more of the assistance so people can make the changes thus enabling them to experience the benefits and then we can, hopefully, turn that messaging around. That is one of the critical issues to overcome all of this.

Professor Brian ? Gallach?ir:

It is a challenging topic and I do not envy politicians in the next number of months as we have seen an increase in toxicity. What has been on screens has been effectively a form of home invasion and it is a hugely challenging time. Sometimes what we does see with some of the more toxic elements of social media is that the louder voices rise to the top and do not reflect at all what is happening across wider society.

As was mentioned, the surveys show clearly where people stand on climate change in Ireland. That does not reflect what we might see on social media or, indeed, what we might here on some of the doorsteps but one might not hear the positive elements on the other doorsteps.

I agree that shining a light on those examples such as people living in warmer, more comfortable and healthier homes is a key part of the communication challenge.

For our part, in terms of this work the project is finished. We had a meeting with the EPA and we meet regularly among ourselves to discuss how we can help to get the message out. An example of that is bringing this to the committee today. We plan over the next while to provide more opportunities to communicate the good news and, indeed, all the news that we found and speak to the opportunities because that often does not get the airtime it should.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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On the cause and message being so important, and on Professor Daly's point about selling the good stories or even the personal stories of people who have been adversely affected by climate change, we are ahead of target on retrofitting and electric vehicle numbers. If we wanted to do more, we could not do so because we are maxed out in terms of retrofitting homes and providing electric vehicles. How we ramp up the capacity of the State to do more was mentioned. We are effectively at full employment now. I do not know if the witnesses addressed that in their research. If everybody in Leitrim decided that to get their house retrofitted because Deputy Kenny is, they would struggle to find somebody to do it, even if they had the money. This is an important question that needs to be addressed.

Dr. Liam Heaphy:

Deputy Kenny's point was very interesting. Under one aspect, there is a discussion of scientific literacy and that would link to misinformation and debates on that topic in the Dáil recently. That starts early with explaining in school, as is done now, climate science, its history and how it is evolving in relation to our goals. With regard to the other aspect of the political goals, while it is our task as citizens to be involved in that, that does not necessarily emerge from the science itself. Perhaps there is not any clear and distinct domain of science that is separate from society and politics. They work together and influence each other.

There are also broader goals that come into discussions with individuals about what changes they can make. These go into wider debates on resource security in the future, multilateralism, global development, and greater outreach and effectiveness of our programmes abroad in trying to bring the rest of the world through the processes we are going through, struggling at times but also having relative success at times. It is about trying to ensure it is a collective process and a big part of that is relying on all the rest of the world to be on the same page. Of course there is also well-being and biodiversity.

The point on outreach was addressed already. It is a job for all of us as citizens to be involved in outreach. Perhaps in certain aspects, such as retrofitting, which is an area my colleagues looked at a lot, it is about scale, for example, the Dingle Peninsula, and also national scale. It is about trying to move from appealing to homeowners or individuals to looking at places, areas, urban blocks and streets. We could probably deliver a lot more and advance a lot further by reaching out at multiple scales, rather than just strings that one pulls down to get certain changes done to the house, the car or a lifestyle. These are things that happen across a community.

Dr. R?is?n Moriarty:

I thank the members for all their questions. In Volume 4 we tried very hard to communicate that climate action is really urgent and we need really far-reaching change to happen quickly. This is not the only challenge facing Ireland. There is housing, healthcare, inequality and other environmental issues, all of which also require action. In our report we focus on transformative change because if actions on climate change or biodiversity loss conflict with these other objectives, we will not get people to come on board with the rapid and far-reaching change we need.

There is a flip side. In Volume 4 we tried most of all to look at all the benefits and opportunities that come from addressing all of these problems together in a systematic way with an integrated and strategic plan. In that way, we can show people that taking action on climate and biodiversity also leads to better lives for people in Ireland now, with warmer and more comfortable homes, better transport options and being able to live closer to nature. This is not just for future generations; we could have these benefits today and also start addressing some of those other challenges at the same time. That is the context. We really tried to put out the message that we need to make transformative change - big, rapid changes - to start getting to a better Ireland that is better for everybody. It is to help people understand that by taking action, things improve for everybody, including communities, farmers and people living in cities.

It is worth looking at the summary for policymakers in Volume 4 because a lot of that context is in there. We have not been able to bring it across today in the time we have.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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I thank Dr. Moriarty. We will certainly look at Volume 4 and the detail in it.

Dr. Agnieszka Stefaniec:

I will add an example for Deputy Kenny about the initial reflection of non-believers in climate change. Even the people who do not believe in climate change see the changes that are happening around them. For example, with place making, how places change and how it feels pleasant to walk in their neighbourhoods, they will support climate action because it works for them. That echoes what Dr. Moriarty said. We found in Volume 4 that most of the actions related to addressing climate change work well for people so when we highlight this other people will also be on board. That is my understanding.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE)
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I thank the witnesses for all their work and their presentations, which were sobering. I take the point about people having better lives now. I agree with that and it is very important that climate action is part and parcel of transforming people's lives for the better. The point that we are not on track to meet our statutory targets and that current policies and actions are not sufficient was also made clear.

Sometimes climate action or climate catastrophe is spoken about as if we are all equally responsible. I do not believe that is helpful because people do not have equal amounts of political or economic power. People also do not have equal amounts of emissions, either directly from their personal consumption or from companies they own, control and make decisions about. Professor Daly said "Taking action to address the direct drivers of emissions may challenge vested interests that have a strong interest in maintaining the status quo." I am interested in who the witnesses identify as the vested interests in Ireland. Globally, fossil fuel companies are probably the most powerful and most entrenched and they keep clear and obvious vested interests but actually they are not a major factor in this country. I am interested in who the top three or five vested interests are here who have an interest in blocking action that the rest of society needs.

Dr. Diarmuid Torney:

Before answering the question about vested interests, I will come back to the Deputy's first point about equity. In the summary for policymakers in Volume 4 we have a section on equity, social inclusion and just transition. We call out those points the Deputy is making about the unequal contributions nationally and globally.

One of the key messages is "The wealthiest generate far more emissions than the average person and have the potential to significantly curtail these emissions without compromising their living standards". That very much emphasises the point the Deputy was making. Also, at a global level, a climate justice lens looking at what Ireland does does not just mean giving more climate finance to developing countries. Our biggest contribution to climate justice globally would be reducing our emissions here. I wanted to make those two points.

On the question of vested interests, the Deputy will be disappointed, perhaps, to hear we do not have a top three or a top five in the report. One can look at Ireland's greenhouse gas inventories and see which sectors are responsible and derive from that a view on which organisations are responsible. We do not call them out specifically. We say we need more research on vested interests. If we look internationally, there is more research on the role of vested interests in blocking climate action. There has been very little of that kind of research here.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE)
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I have one other question that relates to Dr. Torney's indirect answer there. According to the opening statement, "We have done better in some sectors, for example, electricity and heating, than we have in others, including agriculture and transport." It is unfortunate that agriculture and transport are the biggest emitting sectors in which we are not doing well. Homing in on the question of agriculture, why do the witnesses think we are not doing well at reducing our emissions from agriculture? Despite being the biggest sector for emissions, it has the lowest emissions reduction target. Is the target for agriculture high enough and why are we missing it? Do the witnesses agree with the decision to rule out any voluntary reduction and exit scheme for dairy farmers? Is it possible to even meet what I consider to be inadequate targets without reducing the size of the so-called national herd?

Dr. Diarmuid Torney:

I defer to my colleagues who focus more on the agriculture sector. I make the general point that we were not policy-prescriptive. Across the board, we were not trying to be policy-prescriptive.

Professor Brian ? Gallach?ir:

The Deputy asked a very good question. Those extracts come from Volume 2. I must declare I am not an agricultural expert, but I and my co-authors were responsible for gathering the evidence in agriculture and indeed the other sectors. There are a number of reasons agriculture is where it is in terms of emissions, in an Irish context, and also why it has a lower target and is finding challenges. I will give a few of those.

An unusually high proportion of our emissions come from agriculture. It is not necessarily the case that we are doing anything much worse than others. We generate a lot of agricultural activity to export. About 90% of the beef and dairy product is exported, but the emissions occur here. In the same way, we import a lot of cars and the emissions associated with car manufacturing happen elsewhere. That gives one of the starting points for why our emissions would be higher than in many other parts of the world as a share of our overall emissions.

As for some of the challenges in agriculture, we have seen in recent times reductions in fertiliser usage. Part of that was driven by the availability of options like multi-species sward, clover and different things that can be introduced. There was also the impact of the Russian invasion of Ukraine on fertiliser prices, making it a case of making do with less due to the high costs. Consequently, we have seen some progress there. We have seen less progress with methane emissions. There is a lot of research available on how to reduce the methane associated with the production in beef and dairy farming, but much of that research has not been adopted here yet. Some of it is because it is at an earlier stage than, say, the development of wind turbines or electric vehicles.

In addition, if we look at age and socioeconomic profile of farming families in Ireland there are challenges there with the adoption of significant change in a short space of time. Those challenges in part explain why the target would be less than in other sectors. We talk about the need to diversify and to include more diversification in discussions around agriculture. In some respects, the challenge in the agriculture sector is the emissions, not the farmers, and the question is whether there are possibilities for alternative livelihoods and schemes to support them. Those are areas that have not been developed much. We do not have much research on those. There is a sense of some system inertia, as in all sectors. To a certain extent, some of the voices speaking on behalf of the agricultural sector have not served their members well with respect to that question of inertia. This is a dynamic we see across other sectors. That gives a snapshot of what we found and called out in Volume 2. I hope it answers the Deputy's question.

Professor Hannah Daly:

I might add that research on mitigation options in agriculture focuses on technological solutions. The research on a holistic, transformative approach that meets climate and biodiversity as well as economic and social goals is much more limited in volume. In Volume 4, in the summary for policymakers, we stated: "Sustainable diets, reducing food waste and rebalancing land use, including a managed reduction in the number of ruminants, can reduce methane and nitrous oxide emissions and make land available for forestry, wetland restoration and nature". I return to the definition of transformative change, which includes valuing climate and the environment within decision-making. Farmers do not get paid for services they give to climate or biodiversity. All the economic incentives are for production and removing biodiversity features. This is certainly not blaming farmers, and that narrative is not helpful in getting the action we need. It is economic signals and the economic paradigm we are in, which promote production over climate and biodiversity, that is causing that.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE)
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I was struck by the statement that "Ireland’s current policy direction predominantly emphasises technology transitions rather than wider systemic transformations." I thought of agriculture when that statement was made. I agree we have incentivised farmers to engage in unsustainable farming. It is not the farmers' fault. The whole system is set up such that they get paid for farming in an intensive, industrialised way.

The answer is quite simple in a way, in that one needs to then incentivise farmers to farm in a very different way, with regenerative farming, and so on.

I have a separate question, in that both Professors Daly and Caulfield made the point earlier about the sale of fossil fuel cars where last year four times as many fossil fuel cars and sport utility vehicles, SUVs, were sold compared to electric vehicles. I listened Claire Byrne's radio show this morning where they were talking about the increasing car sizes. It was interesting. They spoke about it on the radio as if people wanted to have bigger cars without any real sense that it is the car manufacturers which are deciding that people will have bigger cars. A Golf car of today compared with a Golf of ten or 20 years ago is substantially bigger. Cars have gotten bigger and it is not the consumers who have driven that but it is the car manufacturers. The increase in size, weight, the SUVs and so on are then undermining any efficiency gains being made. There is the role of advertising and sponsorship by the fossil fuel industry and car manufacturers, in particular, in shaping some of that illusion of consumer choices. Do our guest speakers have any ideas on what can be done to tackle this because, clearly, a fossil fuel car bought today is still going to be on the road in ten years’ time when we are very much going to be at an even worse point than, unfortunately, we are at today? Do our witnesses have any ideas about what can be done to rapidly impact on this issue?

Professor Brian Caulfield:

I thank the Deputy for the question. I agree with him. He is right on the premise that people think they have a choice because when one goes to purchase a car, it is very difficult to get something that is not termed an SUV. We need a great deal more guidance from national government on what we define as an SUV. Anytime I talk or am in a debate about it, the first thing I am asked is to define an SUV and the argument then descends quite a bit. There are ways and Paris has looked at ways to reduce the number of SUVs which come into that city. There are ways in which we can incentivise and perhaps tax those out.

As the Deputy said, it is the original equipment manufacturers, OEMs, which are choosing these cars for us. If one listens to, for example, Geraldine Herbert from the Irish Independent, she would say that we need to go back to the manufacturers. We need then to go back to Europe to push for changes in the size of these vehicles. We will also see, as these vehicles are getting bigger and having more battery power, that they will also become heavier which will impact our air quality as it produces particular matter which will cause issues in our cities around general health. Europe needs to start looking at that but guidance can be given from national government in the taxing of these vehicles and then, perhaps, by taking non-fiscal approaches where one says that after a certain date, vehicles of a particular weight or size, or whatever it is, are not allowed access into our city centres, particularly where vulnerable people live and who are exposed to these higher levels air quality contaminants.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE)
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I thank our witnesses.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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The advertising piece was mentioned by Deputy Murphy and it is probably not something our witnesses touched in their research. It is something our committee is starting to look at and we have done some work on it as a committee but we will be going back to it in the near future. Does anyone want to comment? I invite Professor Daly to speak?

Professor Hannah Daly:

In volume 4 we did not cover the role of advertising and marketing but if we collectively understand the growing size of cars and fossil fuel cars as something we want to move away from, we can look at how we dealt with similar things in the past. For instance, I would give the example of tobacco and of smoking indoors.

Professor Brian ? Gallach?ir:

Related to that, and which comes out in volume 2, in general we spend a great deal of time looking ahead and do not spend enough time looking back and doing ex-post analysis of policies and measures to try to help explain how we got here in certain areas. This is one example where it would be useful to explore what policies and measures got us to this point and what policies and measures could have been introduced. As Professor Caulfield mentioned, we have policies and measures which are being considered now on weight but if we had introduced those sooner, what would the emissions impact have been? Ex-post analysis in general is an important feature which is too often neglected in how we do things. I thank the Cathaoirleach.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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I thank Professor Ó Gallchóir and Deputy Murphy. I call Senator Higgins to speak.

Alice-Mary Higgins (Independent)
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I thank our guests and all of the researchers very much for this huge contribution. It is important it begins in that first volume with that science and with the planetary boundary piece because we can get caught in particular policies. I will be going back into particular policy areas. We often hear that that we were balancing the economic and the environment whereas, in real terms, the research makes the planetary boundary’s piece very clear. That is the almost the non-negotiable piece. Within that, we have society and the fact we are representatives of society and have our collective values as society. Almost within that, we need economics which serves both that society and operates within the planetary boundaries. Different models were talked about but that tiered piece is very important.

Looking at that first piece on the planetary boundaries, it is first of all very worrying because we know that the carbon budgets mentioned in Ireland are less than 6% of an emission reduction, and are less than the 7% which had been promised or hoped for, and are less than the 7.6% reduction which would be our global fair share. I often find myself thinking in terms of megatonnes. The 495 megatonnes is still where Ireland is using more than it should in the next five years.

When our witnesses come back to me with a reply, can we think about how we can still try to stay within that 495 megatonnes, which is more than our global fair share, as well as thinking about the next carbon budget over the next few years, and then the next five years after that?

This talks about the current policies and actions not being sufficient, and it is there in bold in our witnesses' presentation. With that sense of urgency around the next two carbon budgets, the current and the next, what are some of the examples of the big levers? We talked a good deal about, as I believe did Dr. Heaphy, there perhaps being an over-reliance on individual change. Professor Ó Gallchóir spoke about the role of the public sector. As we talk about the need for systemic change and a shift in institutions and in economic models - these observations do not mean we do not have that shift - rather than perhaps trying to fit climate action into institutions and economic models as they currently operate, we almost need to flip where they are operating.

What would a few ambitious measures look like in that next seven years, for example, on retrofitting, which was mentioned? It seems that quite a good deal has been focused on trying to build within what is there already. It was interesting that our guests mentioned fairness, well-being and equity, which come across very strongly, as the core values. There is almost an unchallenged assumption that maintaining the status quo and profit levels for sectors is how we deliver the fairness, well-being, or equity element. There is almost that sectoral voice piece rather than saying that the way we deliver those outcomes of fairness, equity and well-being may be through radical changes in the status quo.

I will refer to three areas, and one is retrofitting. We have put a huge amount of investment into encouraging individuals to retrofit. Could public retrofitting at scale deliver a bigger change and more quickly in emission reduction?

With regard to public transport, there have been shifts and we have electric vehicles, but it would be far more radical if that change could be on a scale that would be felt earlier and more quickly?

My last point is on land use, which is really important and which we know is the big envelope of mystery emissions. There is a great deal of talk about forestry. I agree with Deputy Bruton on overpayment. If it is an ecological care grant, it need not be framed as carbon farming with measurables. It could be rewetting, for example, with a large focus on forestry and perhaps far less on wet land. In that context, I refer to Coillte. Some 7% of the State's land is owned by that commercial semi-State body, the mandate of which is ultimately the same old cash generative model, as the Ministers' request from it. That means it should deliver cash and operate on a commercial basis. We could have a transformed mandate for those commercial semi-States, which we could do legislatively without the need to persuade anybody. If Coillte was operating under a similar model to Bord na Móna - its number 1 priority is emissions reduction with social sustainability and economic returns - would that make a big difference over the next seven years and to our next emission piece?

I have one last question on research that I will come back to at the end.

Professor Brian Caulfield:

That is a very good question. I will take the transport part and, hopefully, my colleagues will be able to back me up with the other parts. In the next seven years, all we can do is build. I do not believe we will be able to deliver anything at scale that will enable us to reduce our emissions other than selling lots more electric cars. We need to start to build public transport. We need to start to build at the same level of ambition with which we built Ardnacrusha 100 years ago. That is the level of ambition we need in the country. If we add up all of the public transport, the light rail lines we plan to build by the end of 2040, that will be more than 60 km of light rail. So far we have built 25 km since the early 2000s, so that ambition is not there. In the next seven years, it is crucial that we leave transport in such a way that for the following seven years, it becomes much easier for us to reduce our emissions, particularly in public transport. It will take seven years or longer than that, for example, to build the metro. However, we should start to look at expediting light rail in Cork and at light rail in Galway and Limerick as well. We need to start looking at those projects now to get them over the line. Planning has delayed it. I will give an example, in Dublin. A 4 km extension of the green line to Finglas is going to take ten to 12 years to come to fruition. Those levels and those timelines no longer acceptable.

Alice-Mary Higgins (Independent)
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The public buses piece is quicker.

Professor Brian Caulfield:

That will be a quicker win. That goes back to what we spoke about earlier in order to get the public transport and bus services around BusConnects. That is then bringing in the stick as well, where we start to remove right-of-way for private cars in our towns and cities. That will come together with it. However, in regard to BusConnects in Dublin, for example, a lot of construction will happen with that as well as with BusConnects in Cork, Limerick, Waterford and Galway. The timelines on those are towards the end of the decade because of the current planning framework, the current capacity and because of the wider local political support around these projects. They are very difficult to deliver.

Professor Hannah Daly:

Our report covers the importance of State institutions, their mandate, their expertise, and the funding and the accountability of State institutions in bringing this about. If we look for one lever that can unlock many of these actions we are speaking about, it is something the Climate Change Advisory Council, CCAC, has recommended in its latest annual review, which is to align the legal mandate of State institutions with delivering rapid climate action.

In regard to some of Senator Higgins's earlier points, we review new ways of thinking about economic models, such as doughnut economics to which she alluded, and post-growth and de-growth narratives and new models such as incorporating well-being into economic frameworks and so on. There are reviews of this in our volume as well. More research is needed on how to bring this to the fore.

Alice-Mary Higgins (Independent)
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To clarify, by State institutions, does Professor Daly believe that the same key points would come to commercial semi-States?

Professor Hannah Daly:

Yes, however, I am not sure whether the research is there on that.

Alice-Mary Higgins (Independent)
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Is it the same kind of dynamic?

Professor Hannah Daly:

Yes.

Dr. R?is?n Moriarty:

I refer to a point that speaks across all sectors. We talked a good deal about carrots to get behavioural change. At the moment, we still have climate and environmentally damaging subsidies. Harmful subsidies are a carrot for the fossil fuel industry and other industries that do environmental damage. They should be redirected to socially and environmentally enhancing activities instead of damaging ones. That is a big lever that can be pulled across all sectors. That sends a strong signal that damage to the climate and to the environment is no longer going to be supported by public subsidies. In terms of land use, the second phase of the land use review is ongoing and that is where they are speaking to all stakeholders involved with land use. We will see some research and information come out of that, which will gauge the appetite for change, what kind of changes can happen in land use and agriculture, and what the appetite is for forestry and for managing water tables. It is about that balance between having the research and needing to do more research to find out what are the big levers we can pull in land use and agriculture. However, protecting nature is something we can do that will have benefits for climate, carbon, nature and people, and it is something we can do in balance with all the other requirements for land use.

Dr. Liam Heaphy:

Dr. Moriarty made the points very well in response to the question from Senator Higgins. I would add only one point to that in regard to the previous report from the first part of the land review on land use and land use fluxes and exchanges between the atmosphere and land use itself. That was an interesting piece of work because it brought those planetary boundaries down to the national scale. It made a lot of points, so that the dilemma in terms of, "If I do this, I cannot do that" and "If I do that, I cannot do this" and somehow a solution has to be found. It was laid out clearly just how difficult that will be. That is the challenge we have to deal with but it is not easy.

Professor Brian ? Gallach?ir:

To add one point, in Volume 2 on areas of future research, we call out that deep institutional innovation for sustainability is one that should be a focus. I am glad to report that since the report was published, we have secured funding from the EPA to start a research project in that space. That will look at some of the topics spoken about, not at that scale but at providing some additional new insights over the next three years in that space.

The acceleration of the measures that are in place is a key one. The Senator mentioned retrofitting as an example and asked about ideas in that regard. This is going beyond the specific report but it is one I often wondered about. With 400,000 households in receipt of various supports because of energy vulnerability and an ambition to fully fund the full retrofit of all of those by 2030, that would contribute not only to our emissions goals but also in terms of that kind of equity piece. Referring back to something that was mentioned earlier, it would lend itself more to this idea of building a national vision around sustainability that has the different elements of well-being and equity in it. That is just one idea.

Alice-Mary Higgins (Independent)
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On making it visible, we often talk about giving individual examples but if people can see large-scale examples, either in the public land owned by something like Coillte or large-scale public retrofitting, they set the visibility of the possibility and change. To follow up, it flows from what you were saying but I might just add something, also for Professor McElwain, about the idea of grants for ecological care. We do not have to tie it to carbon farming necessarily.

There was reference to the next research agenda, the vision and partnerships. There is a context of precarity within our higher education and research institutions. As a result, there tends to be an over-reliance sometimes on commercial or private-sector contracts in research, because there are such short-term contracts. The employment control framework is part of it and there are a lot of other issues. I am saying this because the Research and Innovation Bill is going through the Seanad. I will be bringing amendments to it later today. There is a chance for us to try to get research right through our new research infrastructure. How do we get that right so that it supports long-term thinking and public thinking? I am emphasising "public" because it can be the missing piece around long-term, public research for the public good and even public-public partnerships around research, as well as security for researchers so they can plan their careers. We want to have people going into this area and not all going to the tech companies and so on.

I mentioned public-public partnerships and I wonder if our guests could comment on those, including with the global south. This is really important research and it frames what is coming for Ireland and the different scenarios of where we could be in Ireland in a few years. We know we are already seeing the devastating impacts of climate change in the global south. I am thinking of the importance of partnership, technology transfer and ideas co-operation with global south researchers as well.

Professor Hannah Daly:

I thank the Senator for raising the issue of the structure of research, the issue of contracts and the role of universities. We have a dedicated part of the summary for policymakers in volume 4 focusing on this. For the role of research in universities in enabling transformative change, the potential is very strong. There is a growing body of literature to discuss the role of universities as anchor institutions in driving this. We refer to specific knowledge gaps in transformative change, and we have discussed many of those. Universities and research institutions can themselves undergo transformative change to align their own academic practices with societal, environmental and economic priorities. There is research that discusses the role of universities as agents of transformative change. Universities perpetuate and disseminate knowledge and research themselves. They can be exemplars of social change and agents for the kind of sustainable change that we want to bring. However, there are challenges.

Climate change is a wicked problem and it requires people to work across disciplines. We are often incentivised to work in silos and working across disciplines is challenging for various reasons. The nature of research funding contracts is often challenging. The small-scale competitive research bids with time horizons often of one to two years mean that researchers, some of whom are here, do not have long-term career certainty in their contracts. Instead, we need to develop strategic, transformative and interdisciplinary research across these really important societal challenges. We also identify that an overemphasis on industry co-funding can militate against public good research, which is a characteristic of much of the research on climate and biodiversity, particularly in the humanities, arts and fundamental science. The short-term contracts for highly skilled research staff have made it very challenging to recruit and retain skilled researchers, which diminishes Ireland's human capacity and expertise in climate change across the public sector and higher education, as researchers move abroad or move to private industry. I thank the Senator for raising the subject. On the issue of engaging with global south research, it is something we did not cover.

Professor Brian ? Gallach?ir:

On precarity, one reflection I had when I was thinking about the question is that we had many authors working on this report, yet many of them are not here and not in our universities any more, or are doing something else in our universities, partly because of that precarity the Senator speaks of. The second thing I wanted to say is the public funding available for research is quite abysmal compared with our fellow EU member states. I think the number across the EU in terms of the percentage of economic growth that is invested in research is between 2% and 3%, I am not sure of the precise number. In Ireland it is closer to 1% or 1.5%. We have this really low level of funding for public research that needs to increase if we are to deliver on the contribution from the research community to this challenge.

Professor Brian Caulfield:

Again I think it is a very good question and I agree completely with my two colleagues from UCC in their responses. Just to raise a point that was brought up before, funding was promised to the third level sector that has not yet been realised. As we sit here, we have all got exam papers we need to mark, and theses we are supervising and marking as well. Research is a part of what we do. Enabling the university sector to work better enables us to work better as well. We have never needed climate science and climate information more than we currently do. There are loads of other parts of science we need as well, especially biodiversity, but we need the funding that was promised to get to the universities.

I would agree that the amount of research we have in blue-sky or fundamental research, particularly in my own area, is abysmal. We had a very large European transport conference come to Dublin last week. I asked what research we were going to be showcasing at it because there was not and is not a national funding body that provides funding for fundamentals in transport research. That really needs to happen if we are to answer the questions that are required.

Professor Jennifer McElwain:

Picking up on a few questions, coming back to what we can do and what the big levers are, the Senator particularly asked about land use change. On the things we can do with land use change on the sequestration side and carbon uptake, we cannot do it in the short term and that is the big issue. It is emissions reduction that will have an effect on the short term. Any change we make on increasing the amount of carbon in soils and peatlands, in embodied biomass, is all long term and still has to be done. The Senator also asked how we measure the value for farmers. There is a whole area of research called natural capital counting. There is a big forum in Ireland called the Natural Capital Forum, which involves business-ecology linkages. I think Jane Stout----

Alice-Mary Higgins (Independent)
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I was actually just wondering could we not be just looking to ecological care grants, much as we look to forestry grants. Is there scope? Professor McElwain may go ahead, however.

Professor Jennifer McElwain:

Absolutely. On the ecological care grants, I am not an expert on this and we have not really talked about it in the report. There are measures now within the EU providing funding for ecological care, but we need to do much more of it. Pointing out the success stories, the high nature value farming stories across Ireland, things like Burrenbeo and other examples, are massively positive for biodiversity and for carbon.

Alice-Mary Higgins (Independent)
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Exactly. It is not in a narrow piece where one is trying to measure just the carbon piece. Rather, it is looking to a wider benefit.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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Does Dr. Moriarty want to come in again?

Dr. R?is?n Moriarty:

Professor Daly mentioned removing silos in research. I want to interject on behalf of some of our arts and humanities colleagues. Culture, arts and humanities are about being able to tell stories about what our future looks like. We also need funding to break down the silos between science and the arts and humanities in order to work together on some of the other elements we have spoken about.

Our four volumes are heavily based on climate science, science and engineering and there is this other part we are missing because of the way research funding is set up. We are working with colleagues across the arts, humanities and maybe more social sciences to get at some of those other elements such as how we make change happen in society and how we tell stories that inspire people to take action and work together for this new better world we can have.

Alice-Mary Higgins (Independent)
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Somebody was talking about Copenhagen's municipal public recycling centres earlier today and it was focused on that arts and culture piece. One of the recycling centres is located at a culture house and another at a library. These are almost mini recycling and reuse centres. Each of them generates a different way of thinking about it and that same kind of positive, enjoyable and joyful message that it is a not-for-profit, completely free recycling reuse centre. By locating them at cultural partners as was mentioned, they said it shifts the way people spoke about it and it was important on that equity and enjoyment component to climate action.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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It is a hugely important point by Dr. Moriarty. We have so many experts - many of them in front of us today - who are so good at defining what the problem is, how we got here and where we are trying to get to. That piece where we really need research is the political piece, the social piece, the communication and how we actually do that. It goes back to my question at the very start. We are on board that we have to do this, but we are just not quite sure how. We are trying and coming up with new policies. Accepting the funding is not there for the research in those critical areas - Deputy Bruton mentioned the psychology of the challenge, which is one of them - does Dr. Moriarty believe sufficient work is being done in those areas of research? She need not answer if she feels it would be inappropriate to reply. I suspect the answer might be "No" if the witnesses are saying the funding is not there. Are Dr. Moriarty's colleagues in the arts and humanities and so on churning out the relevant research which will help us to make the steps we have to take?

Dr. R?is?n Moriarty:

I know there is some research being done, such as on visioning the climate futures for Ireland. I cannot tell the Cathaoirleach how much is being done. We operate in such a silo that we do not get to talk to people outside our silos often enough to be able to answer that question properly.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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That is quite telling. I call Dr. Quinn.

Dr. Tara Quinn:

I am a social scientist and we were working on the adaptation volume. In that volume we have quite a focus on the importance of the social context in which climate change is unfolding, as well as trying to avoid this climate exceptionalism and recognising the value systems that inform which risks are relevant for people and the decisions they make and actions they take to respond to climate hazards.

There is certainly a burgeoning research field globally in thinking about the anthropocene, seeds of change, visioning and what the future can look like. There is particular interest in co-creation. The process of co-creation, such as who is included in the room and how the process is facilitated, is incredibly important. It is then backcasting - you create these visions for 2050 or 2100 and identify the steps you need to take to get to that place. There is work between the arts, social sciences and natural sciences, but the funding directed there is at an EU level. The EPA has funded social science on this topic but the sort of synergy of a community really trying to push it forward and being able to integrate that equity dimension is probably not there because of that resource constraint at the moment. The interest and the ideas nationally and globally are communicated, however.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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I thank Dr. Quinn. Professor Ó Gallachóir is invited to contribute.

Professor Brian ? Gallach?ir:

Last week at Queen's University Belfast we had an event called Reach 24 that was explicitly around connecting the arts with climate action. It was under the auspices of Sustainable Development Solutions Network Ireland, which is a gathering of universities in Ireland connected with a wider gathering internationally to bring information and knowledge from the universities into society to advance the sustainable development goals. There are emerging initiatives in this space. As Dr. Quinn mentioned, the EPA is to be commended as it has made some tweaks to its research programme in the past couple of years that have helped. It does not take away from the earlier point I made about the overall level of funding for research being insufficient given the challenge we are facing but some green shoots are certainly emerging.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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I thank Professor Ó Gallachóir. We will now hear from Dr. Torney.

Dr. Diarmuid Torney:

To follow-up briefly on the question, I am a social scientist and director of the DCU centre for climate and society. We are a cluster of social science and humanities scholars. Historically, a lot of the funding has gone to science, technology and engineering disciplines. This is rebalancing now but within the arts, humanities and social sciences, it is true the social sciences get more than their fair share. There are multiple inequities in how the funding is distributed but there are pockets of important research.

I mentioned our conference last week on climate and society. One of the highlights was the closing reflection delivered by Jane Clarke, a poet from County Wicklow. It was a wonderful way to end the day and it emphasised the importance of the humanities and the arts for all of us in the room.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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I thank Dr. Torney. I have a few more questions and we might be here for a while but I am conscious of the time. I will be brief. I am conscious everybody is probably hungry.

We have not really talked about the industry piece today. One of the big elephants in the room is cement. Perhaps Professor Ó Gallachóir or Professor Daly might speak on that issue as it is a big chunk of the energy piece. I know the climate action plan leans into the potential for carbon capture and storage. I would like to hear a little bit more about that. As I understand it, the challenges there are perhaps more economic than technical, but our witnesses can tell me whether that is the case.

I want to touch on the importance of transport emissions and getting planning right and this challenge we have. We currently have quite a dispersed settlement pattern in rural Ireland. There has been a significant amount of migration to the country, however. We expect to have about a million more people in the country by 2040 than we had in 2018. We have a question then of where those 1 million people should live and how we should enable their mobility. This is where planning and strategic planning comes in. We have not really gone there but a strong message needs to be sent in respect of the importance of getting and applying a transit-oriented development approach to housing.

Finally, I refer to the system of governance we have in this country. A lot of climate action is channelled through local government.

I am looking at Dr. Torney, who made strong points in this area, as has Professor Caulfield in sessions we have had in the past. Is our local government system set up to channel national policy effectively enough, given that a lot of housing policy goes through local government? Planning is obviously related, as is transport. I suspect that the system is not set up to adequately channel national policy and I would like to hear thoughts on what reforms of local government there might be to help us improve transport and housing in particular. Dr. Heaphy may go ahead.

Dr. Liam Heaphy:

In relation to transport and housing, the research of people like Niamh Moore-Cherry is interesting in terms of looking at forward planning and the history of forward planning in Ireland. She has historically looked at cases such as the Dublin docklands and the work that was done there. Certainly it would seem from that that there is a much greater role for forward planning. To resource that forward planning, it interacts with local government whereby more agency is given to government at the local scale to implement that sort of planning. We have seen those changes happen in areas that have been resourced with a lot of new developments, in Dublin City Council for example, as well as Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown and Cork city that are in alignment with sustainable planning principles that are fairly common around Europe and the world. On cement, the Irish Green Building Council, IGBC, published a report last year written by Oliver Kinnane and Richard O'Hegarty, which covers cement and those ceilings for that sector and for the construction sector in terms of where we are and where we hope to be.

Professor Brian Caulfield:

That was a very good question in respect of local government, I do think that we need stronger local government, particularly in respect of transport. When you look at the situation internationally, when there is a strong directly elected mayor in a city, they can bring people with them. They have a mandate to bring people with them. They can bring in the types of changes needed because they have been directly elected to respond to this. I spoke to the citizens' assembly a number of years ago about a Dublin mayor. I think that needs to be put in place and I can think of many examples from across the world where-----

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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We are going to have an election in Limerick but I did not ask the question even though I am a candidate. I want to clarify that.

Professor Brian Caulfield:

I will stay away from Limerick but there are many examples from right across the world that when such a person is put in place, he or she can have a vision and can bring people with them. That gets to the crux of Deputy Bruton's question of how do we win the hearts and minds. When you have a strong leader at local level, he or she can bring people with them. Paris is an amazing example of that type of vision. Transit-oriented design was mentioned. We have a dual crisis in that we have a housing crisis in this country and we need to be doing an awful lot better with joining the dots between housing and transportation, in order to alleviate the problems that we have. When we start to build more and more new housing, we cannot do what we did in the past, where there was no access to the things that we need in our daily lives. That cannot happen again.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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I am tempted to ask about parking policy but that is a whole other issue. It seems it is a nettle that we need to grasp, it drives a lot of car dependency. I will not because there is a bunch of other questions for Professor Daly and Dr. Torney.

Professor Hannah Daly:

I can briefly speak to cement. It was not a topic that we focused heavily on. The Cathaoirleach will be aware that there are options for material substitution like using wood fly ash or other materials instead of the carbon-intensive cement within construction, as well as retrofitting older buildings rather than increasing new builds to reduce the requirement for cement and utilising efficiency measures like rightsizing the amount of cement within builds. We looked at those demand reduction measures, as well as a host of potential technological measures. Carbon capture and storage was mentioned and is being examined in the new climate action plan. That and a number of emerging new technologies to make cement with fewer greenhouse gas emissions are coming to the fore.

One of the rapidly emerging spaces I have heard about recently is a way of making cement through electrolysis, for example using green electricity. We did not look at the policy measures necessary to achieve that in the report but we have spoken about different reports like the Irish Green Building Council report. One of the focuses could be on keeping an eye on these new technological solutions. Inevitably these new technologies will cost more in making cement than the existing technology, which is a very long established and entrenched, long-standing capital investment. Certainly State investment and incentives are necessary. This is not something like EVs, where a slight tweak in grants will motivate a big shift in technology. It will have to be a deeper State involvement with the industry, piloting new types of plants, procurement or mandating certain types of low-carbon cements to come by certain dates.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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We did not touch on district heating either. Every time somebody talks, I think of something else. That is also very related to public transport in that if you design for district heating, you effectively are designing for public transport as well. I call Dr. Torney to be followed by Professor Ó Gallachóir.

Dr. Diarmuid Torney:

Very briefly on local government, to echo what Professor Caulfield said, by international standards local government in Ireland is comparatively very weak in terms of both control over areas of decision-making and the ability to raise revenue. That hamstrings the power of local government.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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We could somehow enhance the revenue-raising powers of local government. That could be done but how do we make local government make the best decisions when it comes to climate?

Dr. Diarmuid Torney:

At the moment, the scope for action at local government level is relatively limited. Local government is directly responsible for a relatively small share of the emissions that are emitted within the geography of the-----

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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Not if we look at it more broadly, that is, to the transport and housing planning piece. They have a huge role there. I am not sure how switched on they are to the challenges we have with climate. There are national agencies driving policy, helping local governments for sure. I think of local government's role as being much bigger than their own buildings, for example, or vehicle fleet. They have a much broader challenge and role or responsibility.

Dr. Diarmuid Torney:

From conversations I have had in the past, however, that is my sense of how those in local government think about their own role, so maybe there is scope for some kind of mindset change.

Professor Brian ? Gallach?ir:

That is a challenge, in the sense of having direct responsibility for around 2% of overall emissions in the areas and yet having this wider remit and role. Some of that is an indirect responsibility through the planning process. Compact growth is something we pointed to in volume 2.

Second, there is a championing role that we are seeing emerge with the mission cities, for example. Last week, it was great to see that 31 local authorities have now completed climate action plans. Given the limited powers and budgets within that context, what can be achieved is still a work in progress. Certainly both of those would need to be addressed for local authorities to deliver their full potential. We did some interesting work previously with the Office of the Planning Regulator that we drew on in volume 2, looking specifically at the local authority development plan and climate action. We found that local authorities interpret their role very differently. There is a role under the Act but a lot of these local authority development plans predated the Act. Planning legislation has called out sustainable development for a number of years. That is an emerging role and it is one of the pieces of the jigsaw that needs to be urgently addressed to help us accelerate the emission reductions we need.

Compact growth is a key aspect in this regard in respect of dispersed settlement.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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Did Professor Ó Gallachóir say that compact growth has been touched on in volume 2?

Professor Brian ? Gallach?ir:

Yes.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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I thank Professor Ó Gallachóir. I call Dr. Quinn.

Dr. Tara Quinn:

I have a quick comment. This conversation is mostly about emissions mitigation but when it comes to adaptation, local authorities are a key stakeholder and key partner in the climate action ecosystem, as we described earlier. We are seeing, and we have seen, widespread development of climate action plans in local authorities. These will be where the key actions happen when we are thinking about adaptation to climate change working as a community. From an adaptation perspective, then, it is very much a focal scale of interest.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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Sticking with the adaptation aspect, mindful we have reached 2 p.m., if we return to volume 1 of the report and the different scenarios set out there, including what is, essentially, a worst-case scenario for 2100, that I think refers to a 4°C increase in temperature over the pre-industrial mean, are local authorities planning for this level of risk? Where are they at with this? I live right by the river in Limerick and I have been able to see in recent years more flooding as the tide comes in at certain times of the year. This is just an anecdotal observation but I am wondering about the long term. My situation in this regard would not be unusual. Hundreds of thousands of people in Ireland are in what would be considered vulnerable coastal areas. The question is if we are properly planning for the risk that exists here.

Dr. Tara Quinn:

It is a really good question. The time horizons for adaptation for decision-makers and actors often depend on the context in which they are working. I cannot speak to the time horizons local authorities are planning to now but I can come back to the committee with that information. In terms of coastal planning in Ireland, there is not really an overall coastal management plan. This does somewhat inhibit the ability to plan for these long-term horizons. The planning often stops at 2100. We know, however, that even if we reach the Paris Agreement goals, the sea level will continue to rise for generations afterwards. I will link back to comments made earlier about revising our concept of what coastal areas and areas next to rivers could look like in future, and the need to avoid, if we can, lock-in, that is, the idea that we would put in place adaptation interventions that would address a risk for ten or 20 years but then actually limit our ability to adapt to hazards that may unfold after that time.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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Okay. We will finish up. It has been a very interesting session. We touched on so much, and yet I feel we have only scratched the surface of the challenge. It is immense. It is important to point out how serious this issue is, which the witnesses did in volume 1 of their publication. This came across in their opening statement. They have made a very good effort to point the way forward as well, and this is so important. The session today effectively highlighted some of the major gaps still existing in all of our thinking around the challenge we face with climate change. It has been a fantastic session and I could ask questions for hours. We will, therefore, have the witnesses come back to the committee, and, hopefully, sooner rather than later. I hope they will take things a bit forward.

As a final question, this report has been completed but what is next for this group, perhaps, in terms of research? I know all the witnesses are doing their individual research, but what should we be looking to as politicians for the next seminal piece of work from academics to inform us?

Professor Jennifer McElwain:

One of the things that came out of our group was the idea of bringing forward the legacy of the report. Many of the postdoctoral researchers are in precarious positions. There is almost a need for permanent staffing to create the next five-year report because there is such a build-up. This was a five-year project. There is such knowledge, but then everybody goes off back into their own thing. Having a secretariat, or something like this, then, that would carry forward this reporting structure would ensure the ramp-up would be much less steep in future.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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Is this work led by the EPA?

Professor Jennifer McElwain:

Yes.

Professor Hannah Daly:

This project is finished, so there is no more funding. We are here on our own professional time or that of other projects.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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Yes.

Professor Hannah Daly:

Effectively, there are no full-time jobs in this regard. As tenured academic staff, we are very fortunate to be able to allocate our time to this endeavour, but no full-time researcher is time-dedicated to this work.

Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party)
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It might, therefore, be an idea for us to speak with the EPA directly to ask it what it sees as being the next steps in this area. Okay, we will finish on that point.

I thank all the witnesses, including those who have joined us remotely and all those who have come to Leinster House this afternoon to share with us their expertise and the detail, as best they could in the time we had, of the incredible work they have done. We certainly appreciate it and it should certainly not stop here. The work should not just sit there. It needs to inform everything we do from here on in, and I hope it does. Let us try to get this information out of this room to the broader Oireachtas and get all the Members thinking along the same lines as I think every member of this committee is thinking. If this is not happening, then I do not think we are going to make progress.