Brian Stanley (Laois-Offaly, Sinn Fein)
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141. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills the position regarding the calls for an acceleration of the proposed works and refurbishment for a school (details supplied) in County Laois. [4614/22]

Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail)
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I can confirm to the Deputy that the school in question has been chosen as part of the 2022 Pathfinder programme to undergo extensive fabric upgrade to improve the energy performance of the building and installation of renewable energy solutions.

My Department understands that the project at this school is proceeding as planned with the school management engaging with the design team with the designs progressing to the agreed programme. The expectation is that the full retrofit in cooperation with the school's Board of Management will be completed this year, with the bulk of the works completed over the summer break.

The National Development Plan 2021-2030 which was published on 4th Oct 2021, provides capital funding of over €4.4bn for investment in school infrastructure during the period 2021 to 2025. There continues to be a strong Climate Action dimension to this additional and modernisation programme.

My Department and the Department of Environment, Climate and Communications established a jointly funded pathfinder programme with the SEAI, testing and demonstrating energy efficiency and decarbonisation retrofit approaches. This pathfinder is a great example of collaboration ensuring the deployment of new design approaches and technologies are introduced to the educational environment on an evidence based approach.

This Pathfinder programme is paving the way for, and informing, a much larger national schools’ programme for the energy retrofit of schools built prior to 2008 as included in the National Development Plan. It is facilitating research on a range of typical retrofit options, which will have been tried and tested. It is providing valuable development information for a solution driven delivery strategy which will be founded on a solid evidence base that has proven the robustness and scalability of renewable solutions within the schools’ sector.

The longer-term outcome of the pathfinder will be to create an accurate and scalable model for energy efficient retrofits of schools across Ireland. The deep energy retrofit programme for schools built prior to 2008 is due to be rolled out as included in the National Development Plan.

The pathfinder programme has retrofitted 41 schools across Ireland to date with work on an additional 9 schools added in 2021 underway. 2022 sees six additional schools undergoing deep retrofit to a Building Energy Rating (BER) of B with renewable heating systems. Each school undergoes a comprehensive assessment to ensure that the measures are suitable for that school and will deliver value to both the school and learnings for the national retrofit programme.