Denis Naughten (Roscommon-Galway, Independent) | Oireachtas source

The extent of the challenge to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, in line with our EU and international commitments, is well understood by the Government. This is reflected in the national policy position on climate action and low carbon development, published in April 2014, and now underpinned by the Climate Action and Low Carbon Development Act 2015, enacted in December 2015. The national policy position provides a high-level policy direction for the adoption and implementation by the Government of plans to enable the State to move to a low-carbon economy by 2050.

Statutory authority for the plans is set out in the Act.

The national policy position establishes a long-term objective to pursue substantial decarbonisation of the energy, transport and built environment sectors, as well as pursuing carbon neutrality in the agriculture and land sector. Transition to low carbon electricity generation will be key to successfully meeting this objective. Work is ongoing in this context in my Department, with the development of sectoral mitigation measures for the electricity generation sector for inclusion in the first statutory national mitigation plan. The first iteration of this plan will place particular focus on tracking implementation of measures already under way, putting in place the necessary measures to address the challenge to 2020 and also on planning ahead to ensure that beyond this appropriate policies and measures are in place.

A Programme for a Partnership Government sets out the commitment to establish a national dialogue on climate change. There is also a specific commitment that the national dialogue on climate change will identify the most suitable replacement low carbon power generation technology in anticipation of Moneypoint, the only coal burning plant in Ireland, coming to the end of its operating life in its current configuration. In this regard, my Department is reviewing existing analysis and studies carried out on Moneypoint in preparation for an initial discussion within the framework of the national dialogue on climate change, which will examine a range of issues, including technology options, security of supply, competitiveness and sustainability. My Department is currently assessing how best to optimise the processes that will underpin the national dialogue, including scale and format.

The White Paper on energy policy sets out a vision to decarbonise the energy sector in Ireland in the coming decades which will ultimately involve moving away from higher emission fuel types to lower emissions fuels or zero carbon renewable energy technologies.

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