Eamon Ryan (Dublin South, Green Party)

The issue here is whether it is safe to have a pipe with highly pressurised untreated gas up to 340 bar with a heavy moisture content going across land that in some cases has up to 10 m of bog. Effectively, a bog of that depth is a watery body which would mean the pipe would be a floating one in a watery body. It is not just an ordinary 80 bar gas pipeline that Bord Gáis might run, but one with a very high pressure at certain locations with impurities and other materials in it that would be potentially hazardous to people or houses in the vicinity if they were to escape. That is the issue of concern.

We have been concerned about this for a significant period. In two years of examining this matter, I have yet to get a straight answer that it will be safe and that a bog movement of some kind would not endanger such a pipeline and put people in the vicinity at risk. The former Minister for Communications, Marine and Natural Resources stated that the pipeline met international codes, yet in his reply to a question on 8 July 2004 stated that there were no international design codes dealing with gas pipelines in peat bogs. Is that not one of the problems? In response to a question asked by me on 7 July 2004, he stated: "When the final application to install the onshore pipeline for phase 3 is received, the issue of deep peat soil will be examined along with all other matters such as design, trench depth and compliance with conditions attaching to pipeline consent of 15 April 2002". I have yet to see this analysis or to have any credible analysis presented to me.

The Minister stated today that the original quantified risk assessment has been published. Is he referring to the Andrew Johnson report of 28 March last? It presented some very serious caveats and concerns about the project and described the pipeline as very unusual. The former Minister issued consent therefore barely a couple of weeks after the issuing of the report during one of his last days in office.

The Minister specified that all the relevant public documents have been presented. If so, and if I have them in my possession, I am still uncertain about the safety of the pipeline. This is what concerns the residents and what has them in their current difficulties. The Minister, therefore, should be absolutely open and take the side of the people in ensuring the pipeline is safe rather than that of the developers in ensuring it proceeds as quickly as possible.

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