Pat Breen (Clare, Fine Gael)
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Question 202: To ask the Minister for Education and Skills his plans to install rain water harvesting systems in primary schools to conserve water supplies and reduce costs of water; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [9179/11]

Ruairi Quinn (Dublin South East, Labour)
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Rainwater harvesting systems were first introduced for major school building projects in 2008. Since then all major school building projects, where site conditions and circumstances allow and where economically viable to do so, can incorporate a rainwater harvesting system into their brief.

While fitting the systems in new schools during construction is relatively straightforward, retrofitting them in existing schools is much more difficult and expensive because of the various dedicated pipe work systems both within the building and externally underground and the amount of making good work that is required in each instance.

For existing buildings it is more cost effective to minimise the demand for water firstly through installing measures to reduce water usage such as push type spray taps, low flushing toilets, urinal controls, repairing leaks etc. To this end, as part of the Summer Works Scheme 2010, schools were invited to apply for Water Conservation measures. A list of schools whose applications under this scheme were successful is available on my Department's website, www.education.ie.