Michael Lowry (Tipperary, Independent)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

362. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the annual afforestation rate necessary per annum from 2021 to 2060 to sustain the ability of the national forest estate to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [35081/21]

Charlie McConalogue (Donegal, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

Ireland's National Forest Accounting Plan examines and details the carbon balances that are expected to occur over the period 2021 to 2025 with particular reference to older forests and provides indicative trends out to 2050. The sequestration rates of new forests planted play an important role in removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. The question of whether the entire forest estate remains a sink is dependent on a range of factors such as the levels of afforestation, deforestation levels, the intensity of the harvest and the age class of the national forest estate.

Ireland’s National Forest Accounting Plan adopts the use of models to estimate these changes and, in conjunction with recent afforestation within the last 30 years, demonstrates that Ireland’s forests are and will remain a net sink of carbon dioxide up to 2050. However, afforestation levels will need to be maintained and increased beyond existing levels to ensure that as the sink capacity reduces towards 2035 that the entire estate does not become a temporary source.