Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Tuesday, 28 May 2024

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action

Finalisation of Draft National Energy and Climate Plan and the National Long-Term Strategy: Discussion

Photo of Eamon RyanEamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party)
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We set that out in the Government-approved climate action plan last week. For transport, rail freight is critical. As the Environmental Protection Agency, EPA, stated this morning, road freight is the most challenging issue in transport. There has to be a strategic decision to switch to rail freight. That requires Dublin Port, the Port of Cork and the Port of Limerick to make the necessary investments and for us, collectively, to put in the marshalling yards so we start to make that switch. That is one example.

A second example will not be easy or popular. All the measures are difficult because of the scale of change that is needed. We will have to look at the likes of carbon capture and storage. Our cement plants, incinerators and other large industrial combustion units will have to capture the carbon, before converting it, using hydrogen coming from electrolysis, into other materials, which can be good for the country. Those other materials include fertiliser, sustainable aviation fuels and so on. Those are the sorts of large additional measures that we can take. Carbon capture and storage is not new technology. It has not been deployed much in Europe but it is starting to be. We need to do that. It will put a cost on cement, which will not be popular. The cement industry will be the first to cry foul and say "No", but that is a second example of the sort of changes we can make.

A third example will not be easy either. Farming is starting to kick in and do its bit. Irish farmers are behind this, but they are going to have to go further. As we all know, that is not easy politically because farmers rightly feel they are getting too much of the burden, attention and blame in this regard when they should not be. However, that is another area in which we are going to have to go further.