Christopher O'Sullivan (Cork South West, Fianna Fail)
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15. To ask the Taoiseach if he will report on the work of the climate action delivery board co-chaired by the Secretary General of his Department. [60184/22]

Christopher O'Sullivan (Cork South West, Fianna Fail)
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16. To ask the Taoiseach the details of the climate action plan progress report published by his Department on 22 November 2022. [60185/22]

Bríd Smith (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance)
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17. To ask the Taoiseach the total number of actions in the 2021 climate action plan which have not been enacted to date; the numbers of high-impact actions which have failed to be enacted or that are delayed; the high-impact actions that remain to be enacted; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [62712/22]

Ivana Bacik (Dublin Bay South, Labour)
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18. To ask the Taoiseach when the Cabinet committee on the environment and climate change will next meet. [2120/23]

Mick Barry (Cork North Central, Solidarity)
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19. To ask the Taoiseach to provide details of the climate action plan progress report published by his Department. [3280/23]

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE)
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20. To ask the Taoiseach to report on the work of the climate action delivery board. [3408/23]

Bríd Smith (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance)
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21. To ask the Taoiseach to report on the work of the climate action delivery board. [3411/23]

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 15 to 21, inclusive, together.

Climate action is the most pressing long-term global challenge of our time and is a significant priority for this Government. Through our strengthened climate legislation, Our Shared Future and our annually updated climate action plan, we have set ourselves the ambition of halving Ireland's greenhouse gas emissions by the end of the decade and of putting Ireland on course to becoming carbon neutral by 2050.

We are determined that Ireland will play its full part in EU and global efforts to stop climate change and in so doing, harness the opportunities and rewards that will come from moving quickly to a low-carbon society.

We must harness our massive untapped, renewable natural resources, providing greater energy security, stable prices, more jobs, and regional development.

The Cabinet committee on the environment and climate change oversees the implementation of the ambitious programme for the Government's commitments on the environment and climate change. It met four times in 2022 and its next meeting will be scheduled shortly. It is chaired by the Minister, Deputy Eamon Ryan.

The climate action delivery board, established in 2019, is jointly chaired by the Secretaries General of the Departments of the Taoiseach and the Environment, Climate and Communications. As well as overseeing the implementation of the annually updated climate action plan, it monitors implementation of carbon budgets and the sectoral emissions ceilings. It can also provide recommendations to the Cabinet committee on the environment and climate change on measures required to overcome any barriers or impediments to the implementation of climate policies.

The Department of the Taoiseach has responsibility for publishing quarterly reports on the implementation of measures committed to under the climate action plan. The most recently completed report was published in November, covering actions due for reporting in the third quarter of 2022. An implementation rate of 60% was achieved specifically on those measures that were due in the third quarter. Overall, 77% of the 708 measures that were due under the Climate Action Plan 2021 were achieved by the end of the third quarter.

A further progress report on actions due in the fourth quarter of 2022 is currently being finalised and will be brought to the Government for publication shortly. This system of quarterly reporting helps to maintain accountability and transparency for the implementation of climate actions across all Departments and Government agencies and will continue.

Christopher O'Sullivan (Cork South West, Fianna Fail)
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I welcome the Taoiseach back to the hot seat and wish him the best of luck.

On solar energy, the Climate Action Plan 2023 has a new ambition of 8 GW of power from solar photovoltaic, PV, sources, which is up from 5.5 GW. A large portion of that is going to come from the farming community and farm buildings. Farmers are up for this. They want it and are very interested in it, as we can see.

We have done a great amount. The planning exemptions and the targeted agricultural modernisation scheme, TAMS, grant has been introduced up to 60%, which is down to the hard work of the Minister, Deputy McConalogue, who is in front of me in the Chamber. As farmers can also avail of that clean energy tariff when they avail of the TAMS grant, we are doing a great deal for farmers. They are still meeting obstacles out there from the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland, SEAI, and the ESB in what they can avail of. The maximum kilowatt-hours are 17 kWh and 50 kWh respectively-----

Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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I am afraid the Deputy has reached the maximum time allowed to speak here.

Christopher O'Sullivan (Cork South West, Fianna Fail)
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-----but they have been told that they can have a limit of 9 kW. That needs to be addressed and we also need to roll that out to as many farmers as possible.

Ivana Bacik (Dublin Bay South, Labour)
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The Minister for the Environment, Climate and Communications launched another new strategy in the past week. This one related to electric vehicles with a new charging infrastructure strategy that will see €100 million invested over three years. I have raised concerns with the Minister about this issue on a number of occasions because we are just seeing a far too slow delivery on electric vehicle, EV, charging infrastructure. In the case of people who want to change to an electric car but who live in an apartment block, a terraced house or any home with no driveway, as is the case across my own constituency; they ask me and need to know when publicly-accessible chargers will be put in place with a sufficient network to serve increased numbers of EVs. Access to chargers is very difficult.

In the Portobello area, there is just one publicly accessible charger for the many people who now wish to move to EVs. There is a similar position in Ranelagh, in Rathmines and I am hearing of this across the constituency. As the implementation plan says the design of the new local authority package will not be in place until later this year, how many chargers does the Taoiseach expect to have installed across Dublin by then?

Mick Barry (Cork North Central, Solidarity)
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I ask the Taoiseach to comment on two pieces of climate news we have received since the start of the year.

The first is on the issue of climate criminals. We have now learned that ExxonMobil scientists in the 1970s mapped out with extraordinary exactitude what would happen if we continued using fossil fuels with respect to global temperatures. This information, however, was not released to the public. It was covered up and that company was involved in climate denialism for a long period after that. I seek the Taoiseach’s observations on that matter.

The other matter is the claim that is being made by some scientists now that if we have an El Niño event later this year, the world could a reach 1.5°C increase in temperatures well before this decade is out, with the implications that that might have for governments globally and in this country, particularly in the context of the washout that was COP27.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE)
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Ireland’s electricity emissions increased by 4% in the past year. The climate action plan requires electricity emissions to fall by 75% by 2030. Almost the entire carbon budget for electricity up to 2025 has now already been used up. The main reason is that electricity generation increased by 3%. Even though coal and oil generation fell and wind generation rose, emissions still increased because of a 10% increase in electricity produced by natural gas. Everybody knows that the main reason for this is the proliferation of data centres which the Government has encouraged.

Between 2015 and 2021, electricity consumption rose by 16%, and 70% of that was swallowed up by data centres, which used more electricity than all rural homes in this State combined. If the Government keeps enabling multinationals to dump their data centres here, we will be running to go backwards in respect of emissions. Will the Taoiseach commit to an immediate ban on further data centres?

Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Aontú)
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Public transport is one of the biggest solution opportunities in regard to climate change. In my own county of Meath, the majority of workers today left the county to go to work. That happens in no other local authority area. Most of those workers are forced to use cars. We have had the Government announcement on the Navan to Dublin rail line, which is a welcome announcement, but today we learned that no money at all has been put aside for that project as of yet. The status of that particular project is that it is still a decision of a future Government as to whether to back it financially. Is it feasible to live in a society where so many people cannot get to work in a fast and climate-friendly manner and will the Government put ring-fenced money behind this project now to ensure it will proceed?

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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A report was done by the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine approximately two years ago which suggested, astonishingly, that Ireland’s forest estate was a net carbon emitter. That was a shocking fact. Why might that be? It was because people who were interested in profit, rather than addressing climate change, biodiversity or, for that matter, supporting rural communities or farmers to engage in sustainable forestry, just grew plantations of Sitka spruce trees and cut them down too young for the market, that is, for profit. We then get a blight on the landscape and forests which do not contribute to climate action but are an actual obstruction to the sort of sustainable diverse forestry we need for climate action and biodiversity.

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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I thank Deputies again for their contributions on this issue. Deputy Christopher O’Sullivan, who is a great advocate for climate action and renewable energy, pointed out that our ambition now is produce 8 GW of solar capacity. That is a very ambitious target but one we believe can be achieved. I very much agree with him that we must remove any obstacles that we can. Planning laws have been relaxed and TAMS and other grants are available, as the Deputy has said. I also know that people are running into practical obstacles and we need to remove any of those that we can. I also agree that farmers can lead the way on this, whether this is by solar panels on roofs or on fields which can still, of course, be grazed, and we will be encouraging farmers to do exactly that.

When it comes to electric vehicles, as mentioned by Deputy Bacik, we have seen an increase in the purchase and uptake of these vehicles in the past year, where, I believe, in the region of 20% of all new cars purchased were battery electric vehicles or plug-in hybrids. That is in line with where we thought we would be around now and is a little encouraging. We have set aside €100 million over the next three years to provide more charging points because that infrastructure is necessary if we are to encourage more people to go electric.

I do not know the exact figures for Dublin but I will ask the Minister, Deputy Ryan, to pass them on to the Deputy.

I do not want to comment on the Exxon story. I saw the reports on the news and do not know their veracity or what Exxon's reply or defence has been, if there have been any.

Deputy Murphy is correct to say that emissions from electricity did go up. There are a number of reasons for that. We had to use coal again, something we had ceased doing. We also have increased demand for electricity. Data centres are part of that, but they are only one part.

Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE)
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The majority.

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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They account for about 10% to 14% of all electricity we use and less than 2% of greenhouse gas emissions. We have no plans for a ban, but we will reduce new connections and prioritise data centres linked to employment and important social functions, which they are. That is a fact and reality of modern life.

On the Navan rail line, I very much welcome the decision of Government to proceed with that project. It will be beneficial to County Meath and my constituency, where it plugs in at Hansfield. There will, of course, have to be funding to get it through planning and a railway order. There are already a number of projects in An Bord Pleanála, as Deputies will know, including metro, DART and BusConnects, and many are awaiting approval by An Bord Pleanála. The next step is to do planning and design with a view to reopening the rail line to Navan, connecting at Kilmessan and other stops along the way.

On the question of whether a forest estate is a net carbon emitter, one of the reasons may be where the trees were planted because trees planted in the past in Ireland were often planted in highland and peaty soils. It is not just about the trees; it is also about where they are planted. We should acknowledge that we need trees for lots of different reasons. We want more native and broadleaf trees, and for trees to act as a carbon sink. We want trees to provide biodiversity and help improve the leisure facilities we have so that people can walk and enjoy them. We also need trees for timber. There is a housing crisis under way. We should not solve the housing crisis entirely with steel and concrete, because that will drive our emissions up. We need to have more cross laminated timber, CLT, products used in housing. The most suitable trees for that are conifers. We need to have a rounded approach to this. The housing crisis is as important as the climate crisis.