Batt O'Keeffe (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)

Emissions in Ireland have been on a downward trend in the last several years and this trend must be judged in the context of sustained economic growth over the past ten years. There are an additional 300,000 people living in Ireland since 2002, bringing our population to 4.2 million, and there has been an increase in industrial production of more than 300% since 1990. House completions are now running at in excess of 80,000 units per annum; Ireland has the highest house building rate in the EU at more than 20 new dwellings per 1,000 population.

Emissions from the average dwelling fell by 30% between 1990 and 2004. This was owing to higher building insulation standards under the national building regulations and a significant shift away from solid fuel use towards less carbon intensive fuels such as natural gas. Continued decreases in emissions are projected for the period 2008 to 2012 due to ongoing improvements in building efficiencies and continued fuel switching. By 2012, average emissions per household will have fallen to 55% of their 1990 level, or by almost 4 tonnes per household.

The uptake of energy efficient practices is being stimulated by House of Tomorrow grants for housing schemes, greener homes grants for individual houses and the installation of renewable energy systems in local authority social housing schemes. As well as promoting energy efficiency technology, such initiatives are immensely valuable in allowing the Government to assess the feasibility of requiring, at some stage in the future, the use of renewable energy technologies through the building code. It would be inappropriate to make such technologies mandatory without a full assessment of the costs and benefits of doing so through the relevant regulatory impact analysis, which is now mandatory for all categories of proposed regulations.

Despite Ireland's success in decoupling our economic growth from growth in greenhouse gas emissions, current projections show that we expect to be an average of 7 million tonnes in excess of our Kyoto target during the 2008 to 2012 period if no further action is taken. Ireland's approach to bridging this gap is based on three broad strands, namely, further measures throughout the economy to reduce emissions in addition to those already in place; emissions reductions or purchase of carbon allowances by installations participating in the EU emissions trading scheme; and use of the Kyoto Protocol flexible mechanisms to address any remaining shortfall. The Government has already decided that the emissions trading sector will be responsible for 3 million tonnes of the 7 million tonnes gap. We have also begun to put in place further measures building on the existing measures described in Ireland's Pathway to Kyoto Compliance. Many of these are set out in the Government's Green Paper on energy. We will prepare a new national climate change strategy that will provide a sound basis for Ireland not only to meet its Kyoto Protocol targets but to set a course for the more stringent emissions reductions that are likely to be required in the period beyond 2012.

The criticism in the Private Members' motion of our building energy performance standards is not justified. The building regulations aimed at conserving energy have been updated and improved by this Government. They were introduced in 1992 and the standards improved in 1998. Changes with effect from 2003 and 2006 require higher thermal performance and insulation standards for the construction and reconstruction of both dwellings and non-domestic buildings. This will reduce carbon dioxide emissions by approximately 300,000 tonnes per annum by 2012 and meet the target set in the national climate change strategy.

That is not to say the building code standards are perfect or immutable. They must be kept under review in the light of improvements in insulation technology, the development of more energy efficient boilers and the emergence of renewable energy technologies. For this reason, and as required by the EU energy performance of buildings directive, the Government is committed to reviewing part L standards every five years.