Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I propose to take Questions Nos. 17 to 22, inclusive, together.

The Department's 2022 resource-efficiency action plan sets out a range of actions to improve the management of energy, water, material and waste resources within the Department and to increase sustainability awareness among staff. It also includes measures on levels of energy and water usage and waste produced by the Department so improvements can be tracked and measured following the implementation of planned actions.

The implementation of the actions set out in the plan is overseen by the Department's green team, with progress made to date, including the retrofitting of all light fittings with LEDs and the installation of sensor lighting; increasing energy awareness among staff via workshops and regular communications; the installation of sensor taps in the main bathroom areas; the installation of brown waste bins and recycling stations; the removal of desk bins on a voluntary basis; and the installation of covered bicycle parking facilities at Government Buildings to encourage cycling.

As part of the Reduce Your Use public sector campaign, initiated in 2022 to reduce energy use by up to 15% in public buildings, the Department has reduced the hours of heating by 14% and external lighting by 75%. From 2023, under the Government's climate action plan, the Department is required to publish a new climate action roadmap to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions by more than half by 2030 and increase the improvement in energy efficiency from the 33% target in 2020 to 50% by 2030. The first iteration of the climate action roadmap for the Department of the Taoiseach has been developed with the assistance of the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland and will be published in the coming weeks. This will incorporate actions on the wider energy efficiency initiated through the resource-efficiency action plan process.

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