Ivana Bacik (Dublin Bay South, Labour)
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69. To ask the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment the ways in which the ongoing review into energy security will integrate sectoral emissions ceiling and carbon budget obligations; his plans to ensure that as-demand reduction measures are prioritised in the review; and the ways in which the principles of a just transition will be integrated into the review. [62757/22]

Aodhán Ó Ríordáin (Dublin Bay North, Labour)
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I agree with the Minister. Our country is heartbroken this morning. More will be said about that later but I join with the Minister in his condolences with the family of the lost soldier.

Will the Minister make a statement on the ways in which the ongoing review in energy security will integrate sectoral emissions ceiling and carbon budget obligations, his plans to ensure that as-demand reduction measures are prioritised in the review, and the ways in which the principles of a just transition will be integrated into the review?

Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party)
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The review of the security of energy supply of Ireland's electricity and natural gas systems is focused on the period to 2030, but in the context of ensuring a sustainable transition up to 2050. The review is considering the risks to both natural gas and electricity supplies and a range of measures required to address these risks. This includes the need for additional capacity of indigenous renewable energy and also the need to import energy, energy storage, fuel diversification and renewable gases such as hydrogen. The review set out a range of options for consideration and demand side response necessary as part of those options. For example, the gas mitigation package includes gas storage, renewable gas, green hydrogen and demand side response. Similarly, the electricity mitigation package includes demand side management and batteries. The consultation document has also highlighted that the most secure energy is the energy that we do not use and therefore, energy efficiency should always form part of our response to energy security.

As part of the review my Department carried out a consultation seeking views from interested parties on policy measures that could be implemented to support Ireland's security of supply framework. The consultation closed on Friday, 28 October and over 400 responses have been received. My Department is now working through these responses carefully. The completion of the review will be a key priority for Government. Insofar as just transition is concerned Climate Action Plan 2021, which will be replicated in the one due to be published next week, sets out a just transition framework to guide our approach to implementing our climate action policies. It is to be a central component of everything we do in this time of change to make sure that it delivers social justice, ecological justice as well as energy security.

Aodhán Ó Ríordáin (Dublin Bay North, Labour)
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The Labour Party has concerns partly because briefing documents prepared for the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Deputy McConalogue, which were obtained under freedom of information, reported in The Business Postat the weekend, stated it is not feasible for Ireland to cut methane emissions by 30% by 2030. We are particularly concerned to see this concession made by the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine. Agricultural methane emissions from livestock account for 95% of Ireland's methane emissions overall. Methane emissions from livestock have increased in recent years, not reduced. The briefing document stated the pledge to cut methane emissions allows for individual countries to pledge lower amounts. What is the Minister's view of these briefing documents prepared for the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Deputy McConalogue, and do they speak for the Government?

Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party)
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I saw the reports in The Business Postbut I have not read the full briefing documents. The issue of methane is somewhat separate to the energy security issue. It relates primarily to our climate targets and the need to reduce those short-lived greenhouse gases. We are committed within the European Union, in the wider global context, to deliver on that 30% methane reduction. I attended a meeting of the Climate and Clean Air Coalition in COP27 in Egypt. The Climate and Clean Air Coalition is the United Nations body charged with organising and delivering those targets in regard to reducing short-lived greenhouse gases. There was a clear understanding there that the first immediate priority is particularly in the area of fossil methane because the solutions can come very quickly and can actually save a lot of money. The leakage of gas from pipelines and the flaring of gas from the well-head is a huge source of such methane emissions which can be reduced very quickly.

That is the immediate focus. It was agreed there. We are very much involved and we have a member on the board of the Climate and Clean Air Coalition. We are very supportive and we are funding the work that is going to be done to show how land-use methane emissions can also be reduced. This is complicated because it includes, for example, rice growing, which would be a major source of methane emissions, and while we could change the practice, we do not want to risk food security.

Ireland will have to reduce its methane from agriculture as well, and that is recognised within our climate plans. I believe it is increasingly recognised within the agriculture sector that we cannot just continue to ignore those rising emissions which we saw last year from agriculture. Methane, as well as nitrous oxide and carbon dioxide from other elements of agriculture, will have to be reduced in line with our overall plan.

Aodhán Ó Ríordáin (Dublin Bay North, Labour)
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As the Minister knows, the Environmental Protection Agency, EPA, has made it clear a methane emissions reduction of almost 30% is required to achieve a 22% reduction in agricultural emissions, and we all remember the row over the summer in regard to emissions savings. We would have liked to have seen a commitment closer to a 30% reduction. The lower ceiling which is in place instead was accepted on the basis that it could not be exceeded. However, going by this report in the newspaper at the weekend, no credible pathway has been established by the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine to achieve the less ambitious commitment it made. Is it not concerning for the Minister not just that the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine clearly is not on board but, potentially, the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine is not on board?

Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party)
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I believe they are on board and he is on board, and I believe Irish farmers want to play their part. As evidence, the new agri-climate rural environment scheme, ACRES, the new mechanism to try to improve the environmental performance of farming, is massively oversubscribed. If we look at farm visits at the moment in the organic sector, there are huge numbers coming in because they realise the high emissions alternative is increasingly expensive. Yes, I would have liked a higher target of 30% in agriculture, but we work with people and work with the agricultural sector and the farming community. Pointing the finger, blaming and shaming them, and saying they are the problem will not get us very far. What we need to do is ask for their help and make sure the change that is coming is good for Irish farming, for young people and for family farms in particular. It is less intensive, less industrial, with less emissions but with better income and better outcomes for Irish farming. It is more stable and secure and is not dependent on big global markets, where the big processing companies, whether in beef or dairy, are the ones who make all the money, which is characteristic of the system we have seen develop in recent years. I think agriculture is ready to play its part and we will work with it to make this happen.