Bríd Smith (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance)
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456. To ask the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment the expenditure in the form of grants, aid and so on that is given directly or indirectly to universities and other institutions for courses including graduate and postgraduate connected to exploration or extraction of fossil fuel and the petroleum industry since 2010, in tabular form. [26265/18]

Seán Kyne (Galway West, Fine Gael)
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There is no expenditure from my Department either directly or indirectly to universities and other institutions for courses connected to exploration or extraction of fossil fuels and the petroleum industry.

The Department administers a scheme granting a limited number of scholarships  to students undertaking taught Master of Science (MSc) Degrees in topics of relevance to the development of Ireland’s indigenous oil and gas resources. The scholarship scheme’s objective is to encourage a potential pool of qualified Irish graduates with specialist qualifications of direct applicability to the sector in Ireland. The scholarship scheme seeks applications from students who have been accepted on to a relevant MSc degree course in petroleum geoscience, petroleum engineering or environmental science.

The cost of the scholarships is met from the Petroleum Infrastructure Programme - Expanded Offshore Support Group (PIP-EOSG) managed by the Department. PIP-EOSG is funded by way of annual contributions from companies participating in Frontier Exploration Licences. The cost of this scheme since 2010 is set out in the table: