John Paul Phelan (Fine Gael)

I welcome the Minister of State. I am deputising for my colleague Senator O'Reilly, who is out of the country today.

There were a couple of things in the Minister of State's comments on which I would like clarification. We all agree there is major potential in Ireland for the production of energy from renewable resources, and we have made great strides in the last few years, most notably in terms of wind energy and particularly on-shore wind energy. My area of County Kilkenny is the only region of Kilkenny in which there are wind turbines, and I have always been an enthusiastic supporter of the potential of wind energy. I was struck by the Minister's comment on the potential for developing offshore wave and tidal energy, which the Minister, Deputy Ryan, has mentioned many times.

I wonder whether the Minister saw, two weeks ago, the scrapping of the proposed Severn barrage in Britain, which had the potential to create a lot of energy, although I cannot remember the exact figures. The British Government decided to drop it due to cost issues and objections from environmental activists, and went for the alternative of building a new nuclear power plant. I am not suggesting that we should go down the route of building nuclear power plants here, but I wonder whether there is potential in some of our estuaries for structures similar to the proposed Severn barrage.

I also noted the Minister of State's mention of the electricity interconnector. Is this still on course for completion by 2012? The Minister of State also mentioned the level of afforestation in Ireland. I was struck by his comment that Ireland's rate of afforestation was the lowest in Europe and Ireland needs to encourage further expansion of our forests.