Results 281-300 of 2,630 for speaker:Christopher O'Sullivan

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Finalisation of Draft National Energy and Climate Plan and the National Long-Term Strategy: Discussion (28 May 2024)

Christopher O'Sullivan: We will move on, if that is okay.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Finalisation of Draft National Energy and Climate Plan and the National Long-Term Strategy: Discussion (28 May 2024)

Christopher O'Sullivan: I thank the Minister. From my perspective, on the NECP, the Minister said there were only 40 submissions. Is that because this is essentially just a document of collated plans, there is actually nothing of substance in it apart from what is in the plans themselves, and that the real document or plan we should be focusing on is the climate action plan?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Finalisation of Draft National Energy and Climate Plan and the National Long-Term Strategy: Discussion (28 May 2024)

Christopher O'Sullivan: Is there anything in the long-term strategy of substance or is that essentially the same kind of thing?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Finalisation of Draft National Energy and Climate Plan and the National Long-Term Strategy: Discussion (28 May 2024)

Christopher O'Sullivan: Coming back to the EPA report this morning, the reason Deputy Whitmore is animated is because it is not great viewing or hearing when the EPA states that the maximum we can do with all the measures is 29%, which falls well short. It also alluded to the fact that there were some strategies it could not cater for because it said there was a lack of detail. It mentioned agriculture, which I...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Finalisation of Draft National Energy and Climate Plan and the National Long-Term Strategy: Discussion (28 May 2024)

Christopher O'Sullivan: I wish to touch on some of what I describe as the easy wins. Many of us here are a bit frustrated that some of the measures we feel should be achieved at a faster rate are not being achieved at a faster rate. One of them is electrification of the fleet. I know that electrification of the fleet is not the entire answer to reducing emissions in transport but I genuinely feel and I...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Finalisation of Draft National Energy and Climate Plan and the National Long-Term Strategy: Discussion (28 May 2024)

Christopher O'Sullivan: They almost overlap perfectly - the reduction of the grant and-----

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Finalisation of Draft National Energy and Climate Plan and the National Long-Term Strategy: Discussion (28 May 2024)

Christopher O'Sullivan: I thank Deputy Whitmore. The Minister has a chance to come back in.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Finalisation of Draft National Energy and Climate Plan and the National Long-Term Strategy: Discussion (28 May 2024)

Christopher O'Sullivan: Does the Minister have an issue with the EPA report? As a different way of phrasing it, does he accept the findings of the EPA report, given that it did not include many of these important sectors?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Finalisation of Draft National Energy and Climate Plan and the National Long-Term Strategy: Discussion (28 May 2024)

Christopher O'Sullivan: That is where public transport comes in. You can move a lot more people in the city areas with public transport whereas that is-----

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Finalisation of Draft National Energy and Climate Plan and the National Long-Term Strategy: Discussion (28 May 2024)

Christopher O'Sullivan: Regarding the easier wins, the carbon tax is controversial. I would always defend it because of what carbon tax is ring-fenced for and where it is intended to go. One of the places it is intended to go is the warmer homes scheme which is aimed at making older houses or houses for older people on payments like fuel allowance more efficient. Obviously, we know there are massive delays in...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Finalisation of Draft National Energy and Climate Plan and the National Long-Term Strategy: Discussion (28 May 2024)

Christopher O'Sullivan: The rate of pace of getting them-----

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Finalisation of Draft National Energy and Climate Plan and the National Long-Term Strategy: Discussion (28 May 2024)

Christopher O'Sullivan: Is there any strategy to reduce that waiting time?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Finalisation of Draft National Energy and Climate Plan and the National Long-Term Strategy: Discussion (28 May 2024)

Christopher O'Sullivan: Deputy Kenny touched on the issue of biomethane gas. As the Minister knows, I introduced a Bill in the Dáil on anaerobic digestion because I genuinely see the potential for it in rural areas to be done on almost a co-operative basis with farms, distilleries, chicken farms or whatever basically being the input into these anaerobic digesters and then having the digestate for fertiliser....

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Finalisation of Draft National Energy and Climate Plan and the National Long-Term Strategy: Discussion (28 May 2024)

Christopher O'Sullivan: We are not condoning any of that.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Finalisation of Draft National Energy and Climate Plan and the National Long-Term Strategy: Discussion (28 May 2024)

Christopher O'Sullivan: The experience regarding anaerobic digestion is that the controls are far tighter and the levels expected far higher than those in the UK and Europe. That is why we are seeing a more widespread roll-out of the technology in Europe. We might touch on that later.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Finalisation of Draft National Energy and Climate Plan and the National Long-Term Strategy: Discussion (28 May 2024)

Christopher O'Sullivan: We are going to move on.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Finalisation of Draft National Energy and Climate Plan and the National Long-Term Strategy: Discussion (28 May 2024)

Christopher O'Sullivan: We all agree that it is a threat to our future. We will move on to the second round. The first person to indicate was Deputy Whitmore.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Finalisation of Draft National Energy and Climate Plan and the National Long-Term Strategy: Discussion (28 May 2024)

Christopher O'Sullivan: I ask the Minister to be quick because other people want to contribute.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Finalisation of Draft National Energy and Climate Plan and the National Long-Term Strategy: Discussion (28 May 2024)

Christopher O'Sullivan: There are only ten minutes left in the session.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action: Finalisation of Draft National Energy and Climate Plan and the National Long-Term Strategy: Discussion (28 May 2024)

Christopher O'Sullivan: The Minister should respond very quickly because we only have ten minutes left.