Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The specific part of the Government’s action plan I wish to address is that related to the built environment, specifically the residential housing sector. As the plan rightly points out, approximately 30% of our emissions come from the urban environment and a very significant portion of those come from our housing stock, which is using approximately 60% more energy than the EU average. That reflects poorly on the quality of that stock. One of the more alarming elements, according to the CSO data on the building energy ratings, it that is not only our old stock, as the housing stock built between the late 1990s and the mid to late 2000s is some of the poorest in terms of energy efficiency. Alongside that, in the context of the just transition to which the previous Deputy referred, we need to acknowledge also that we have significant rates of fuel poverty. Some estimates, although official figures are hard to come by, suggest that as many 400,000 people are experiencing some form of fuel poverty, which we need to take into account. That means there are two major challenges. I am not convinced by what I have read in the built environment section of the action plan that the Government has yet made up its mind on the specific actions it will take to address both the legacy of inefficient energy buildings and the challenges in terms of planning new building into the future.

I will refer briefly to what I believe is needed and certainly what many people with far more expertise than me or the Minister on these matters believe is urgently needed. With respect to retrofitting, there are three immediate challenges. The first is the social housing stock. While €25 million was made available last year to bring some of the social housing stock to a higher building energy rating, BER, than where it is currently, it is still nowhere near enough in terms of the volume of funds or the energy efficiency improvements. In many cases buildings are being brought from a D rating to a C rating or from an F rating to a D rating, rather than further up the scale. That is not only a problem in terms of energy efficiency in meeting our climate change targets but many of these are the same households experiencing significant levels of fuel poverty. We need to hear from the Government how much extra it will start investing in upgrading the social housing stock.

The second challenge is funding for private home owners. That is a major challenge. None of us should underestimate the scale of the funds needed but all the experts are telling us we need a blended financing model of grant aid, albeit a reformed grant aid such as that currently provided by the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland, SEAI, and some form of Government backed low interest long–term loan, a system which operates in many other European jurisdictions. Whether that is provided through a utility and the cost of repaying the loan is deducted from energy bills, or whether a low-interest loan is provided by Home Building Finance Ireland or some other fund, we need to move to a simple, easy-to-access blended finance model where, depending on one’s income, one would get some level of grant aid and one would get an easy-to-access low-interest loan. That means we need to take the advice both of the Tipperary Energy Agency and the SEAI that accessing both the finance and the works needs to become much easier. Rather than having a single one-stop shop, every local authority in the country should have something like the Tipperary Energy Agency to facilitate precisely that type of work.

We also need to accept the fact that 340,000 residential properties are in the private rental sector, with one in four in Dublin. Finding a way of ensuring all private rental properties meet adequate standards is something that seems to be strangely absent despite the small reference to tackling the issue of what is called the split incentives. Many of the people concerned are low income earners and the big fear is that many of them would be hit with higher carbon tax charges. As they do not own the property in which they live, they would not be in a position to make the energy efficiency upgrades required. Therefore, that is an issue that urgently requires action.

Another issue concerns new buildings. While new building in not happening anywhere close to what is needed in the public or private sector, it is still increasing year on year. While I welcome the fact there is a proposal to include in the nearly zero energy building, NZEB, standard in the regulations a phase-out date not only for oil boilers but for gas boilers, 2025 is far too late for that. While there are some constraints in terms of skill levels within the sector, the priority should be to bring that forward much earlier in order that we do not have a situation where we are installing gas boilers in properties over the next five years only to have to then seek funding to retrofit to remove those in five or ten years' time. We could be much more ambitious.

We could go even further, particularly in the context of the new city and county development plans, and promote the very good technology and some good building practices among some of the public and private sector in terms of having fully passive buildings. There is simply no reason those standards could not become the norm. I would like to see us exceed rather than only meet the minimum standard with respect to the near zero energy building standard and become a world leader starting first in our public housing stock and then in all new private housing stock, so we get the highest quality new builds alongside a much more ambitious retrofit programme.

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