Sean Barrett (Independent)

I welcome the Minister to the House. I accept his view on the amendment, but Senator Daly makes an important point. Our initial surge into energy efficiency and green energy has been shown to have been excessive in terms of achieving value for money. The OECD recommended the end of grants for off-shore windmills and the phasing out of grants for windmills on land. It also has doubts about tidal and solar energy. To echo what Senator Daly said, as a legislature, we need to keep in mind whether a proposal is cost effective or just possible in engineering terms.

The advice of an bord snip (nua) is that energy efficiency schemes should be funded in the future only if the cost of achieving the reduction in carbon outputs secured by them is equal to or less than the market price for carbon credits. Things that seem to be good on philosophical or ethical grounds may not make much sense on economic grounds. That is the important point Senator Daly raises. Energy efficiency measures have to be efficient. I recall from the literature that the most cost effective energy saving measure is simply to draw the curtains at dusk as that will keep heat in a dwelling, and is much less expensive than some of the measures that have crept in. It is important to keep an economic perspective, as I am sure the Minister is doing, on some of these proposals, which were so enthusiastically advocated. Certainly the OECD reported that on the producers side they may not make much economic sense. We must be equally vigilant in persuading the consumer what energy efficiency measures are worthwhile. The ultimate test of a really good energy saving measure is the benefit of a reduced energy bill and therefore why should it need to be subsidised at all, apart from an information campaign? In these straitened times we must consider the use of resources and as Senator Daly has said some of these programmes require to be kept under constant scrutiny, as I am sure they are.