Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Aontú)
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350. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, and Local Government given the recent storms and the wipeout of electricity supply, if he will allow for chimneys to be built on new homes to allow for the burning of biomass. [3979/25]

James Browne (Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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All new dwellings must comply with building regulations, the aim of which is to provide for the safety and welfare of people in and about buildings. The Building Regulations set out the minimum requirements for the construction of new buildings and certain works to existing buildings.

The Energy Performance of Buildings Directive requires that the energy performance for new buildings are set in accordance with the Nearly Zero Energy Building or NZEB definition.

NZEB means a building that has a very high energy performance as determined in accordance with Annex I, with the nearly zero or very low amount of energy required covered to a very significant extent by energy from renewable energy sources onsite or nearby.

Part L of the Building Regulations provide that the nearly zero energy building performance requirements shall be met for new dwellings by achieving an overall energy and carbon emissions performance which is calculated using the Dwelling Energy Assessment Performance (DEAP) published by SEAI.

Building regulations are performance based and technology neutral. Chimneys for heating appliances such as single room solid fuel stoves or fireplaces using biomass can be installed in new housing under Part L of the building regulations once the overall energy and carbon emissions performance requirement for the dwelling is achieved.