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LAST UPDATE | 1 Jun 2022
GREENHOUSE GAS EMISSIONS rose by an estimated 6% last year following a pandemic-linked decrease in 2020.
The Environmental Protection Agency today published its greenhouse gas emissions projections for Ireland between 2021-2040.
The report said that urgent implementation of existing climate plans and policies, alongside further measures, are needed for Ireland to meet its 2030 and 2050 emissions targets.
Minister for Climate Eamon Ryan described the findings as a “clear indication that we need to double down on implementation of climate action measures”.
There are a number of targets Ireland has to reach in the decades ahead when it comes to slashing emissions – which is crucial to limiting the worst effects of climate change.
The main target is to cut overall emissions by 51% by 2030 and to achieve net zero emissions by 2050.
But this EPA report highlights that a lot more action and implementation is needed in order to hit these marks.
Emissions had previously decreased by 3.6% in 2020 compared to the previous year. Emissions had also decreased by 4.5% in 2019.
EPA projections said Ireland’s emissions will decrease from 2023 onwards due to the impact of emission reduction measures.
It said the planned policies and measures, if they are fully implemented, could lead to a 28% reduction in emissions by 2030.
Urgent implementation of all climate plans and policies, alongside further measures, will be needed for Ireland to meet its 51% reduction target.
The report also sets out that every sector needs to do “significantly more” to reach their individual emissions reduction targets.
In a statement, Minister Ryan said that climate targets “may seem daunting”, but that people “may overestimate what we can do in a year but underestimate what we can do in a decade”.
“Achieving our climate targets will provide numerous benefits to the country in terms of health, competitiveness, employment opportunities, biodiversity and climate impact, but will require changes across all sectors of our society and economy,” Ryan said.
These changes will require a collaborative effort by Government, business, communities, and individuals – to implement new and ambitious policies, technological innovations, systems and infrastructures.
“This will also require changes in individual behaviours, including how we work, heat our homes, travel, consume goods and services, and manage our waste.”
Agriculture and methane
The EPA’s projections indicate that Ireland has returned to pre-pandemic levels in terms of transport and other activities, resulting in higher carbon emissions.
The report said this is also likely to be exacerbated by a return to higher coal use in electricity generation to meet energy demands.
Laura Burke, director general of the EPA, said there is a “significant gap” between ambition in legislation and the realisation of the actions needed to deliver these goals.
“All sectors have work to do, in particular the agriculture sector,” Burke is expected to say at an EPA conference later today.
As the largest contributor of national emissions, more clarity is needed on how and when it will implement actions to reduce methane within the ever-shortening timeframe to 2030.
Agriculture was a key sticking point in this report. Around 37% of Ireland’s emissions come from agriculture.
Emissions of methane, a potent greenhouse gas, need to reduce by up to 30% to meet the lower range of the reduction target set out for the agriculture sector, the EPA report said.
The agriculture sector is responsible for most of Ireland’s methane emissions.
The report said the agriculture sector needs to “clearly set out” how these reductions will be achieved in order to address uncertainty around its ability to hit these targets by 2030.
Ireland’s agri-food strategy Food Vision 2030 sets out a target to reduce Ireland’s methane emissions by at least 10% by 2030.
Tom Arnold, Ireland’s special envoy for food systems and former chair of the committee behind the Food Vision 2030 strategy, said when this target was agreed it was “clear that was going to have to be adjusted upwards” down the line.
He said this report “puts more pressure” on the agricultural sector to increase plans in place to cut emissions.
“The days of rapid production of dairy I think are over, at least for the moment,” he told The Journal.
“I think we’re getting to the point now where, particularly in the dairy sector, probably the best that can be done is to get to a steady state.”
Today’s report is “very much a wake-up call that there’s a huge amount ahead” for the agricultural sector more generally when it comes to action on climate change, he added.
The projections in the EPA report are based on a number of data sets and can be split into two scenarios – one with more optimistic figures for emissions reductions and one with lower reduction figures.
One scenario projected future emissions by taking into account the policies and measures implemented by the end of 2020.
And the other scenario considered future emissions based on the measures outlined in the latest government plans published more recently – including the Climate Action Plan 2021 which was released at the end of last year.
This put more stringent targets in place but with many not yet implemented.
Different sectors and their impacts
Transport also played a key role in emissions increasing in 2021. Transport emissions are projected to increase by 18-19% between 2020 and 2022 due to the end of Covid travel restrictions.
But emissions from the sector are projected to reduce by 39% by 2030 if extra measures set out last year are put into action.
This includes putting hundreds of thousands more electric vehicles on the road and more measures to support sustainable transport methods.
The report said there are concerns about increased coal use last year but that increased renewable energy generation as planned can reduce emissions from energy by 10% each year between 2021 and 2030.
This would result in almost 80% of electricity being generated by renewable means by 2030.
It said that people spending more time at home due to lockdowns and working from home, along with the increasing cost of fossil fuels has “highlighted a need for improvements in home heating efficiency and better insulation”.
Senior Manager at the EPA Stephen Treacy said: “The message from the authors of the recent IPCC report on climate mitigation was clear – it’s now or never, if we want to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius.
Without immediate and deep emissions reductions across all sectors, it will be impossible.
“In Ireland, implementation of measures has consistently lagged far behind planning. It is important that all planned actions are implemented as soon as possible while, in parallel, identifying actions to address the remaining gap to meet carbon budget limits.”
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Does this mean the Greens tax policy has failed?. If so time to scrape there implemented taxes.
@Michael Dowling: because taxes clean the environment , cure cancer and revive people.
@Michael Dowling: It means there isn’t sufficient encouragement to meet targets. So more taxes and incentives are on the way
@Michael Dowling: Bleating on about green taxes, miniscule as they are, is a huge red herring, totally missing the point, and a diversion from every sector’s and every citizen’s duty to change, be they urban or rural. Fuel prices are shooting up and no chance them coming down so we have to do something. Reducing tax and duties on fuel will only have to be made up somewhere else so we have to seek alternatives which must be supported and encouraged by government.
@Jerriko17: miniscule taxes ?Maybe if ur living in the city they are
But for rural people it’s a other naill in the coffin .
Tax take on Petrol etc..all time high most of us living in the countryside no alternative at all
Taxes should be reduced .
@John Mcmahon: Just for your information…. There’s been huge duties and taxes on fuel for donkey’s years, long before the Greens ever appeared. Were you complaining then???? We need to leave the taxes on dirty fuels and incentivise people, rural and urban to change. Living in a city BTW doesn’t make you immune to taxes!!!! In fact it costs a helluva more to exist in city. Also the price you’re paying for petrol and diesel has much more to do with Putin than Eamonn.
Another example of Eamon Ryan asleep at the wheel? Well I never. Now can we have a breakdown of where all these green taxes have been spent… that would make for interesting reading
@Carl Corcoran: What about the rest of us, every sector in this country and countries worldwide is sleepwalking into a climate disaster…. That’s not me saying that, it’s the EPA, The UN, and the majority of scientific evidence. Great gas(sorry for the pun!!) to have a pop at Eamonn but the rest of us have to cop on, take off the blinkers, and, yes, WAKE UP…. before it’s too late.
The government have failed on this with no joined up thinking. Nearly every house in the country has the capability to generate enough and surplus electricity for eight months of the year and 15% of their electricity for the other four years by investing in solar PV panels. The problem us that the incentive is not there. In Australia when you import your excess production to the grid you get a credit for it so that when you import it back its free because its your electricity. In other words the grid is used as a giant battery. In Ireland you will get a credit of about 7cents per KW and then are buying it back for 27 cents per KW. This is forcing people to buy expensive batteries that are causing a problem to the environment themselves.
@Michael Hanley: and what do we do on a dark Christmas eve when the demand is a t a max and solar pv is a at a trickle. The wind is low and the temperature dropped…. Where does the balance for the surge in demand come from……….. I’m all ears
@Baronvoncass: Sure, we’ll have to burn something non-renewable when it’s not daylight/windy, but we don’t have enough PVs/wind turbines in place now, so we’re still burning fossil fuels when it is bright/windy. Our yearly CO2 could be much lower, even if it’s bad on certain days.
@Michael Hanley: bigger problem is the requirement for planning permission on systems bigger than 12sqr meters; it makes it completely uneconomical to install as the payback period is just too long. Now waiting over 12 months for promised legislation removing this to be passed (had been promised for Q4 2021).
Other than completely screwing the motorist Ryan and his ilk are talking out of their hoops when it comes to “policy”
@Baronvoncass: we do what we are doing at the moment. The point I am making is that we could be self sufficient for eight months a year and have a reduced reliance on fossil fuel for the rest of the year.
@Type17: We have approx. 4,200Mw of installed Wind generation capacity, thankfully we don’t yet have much P.V. capacity, when you posted at 2.15 this p.m. our 4,200Mw of wind generation were producing 60Mw, the heavy lifting was as usual being done by thermal generation
Farming now produces 37% (up from 34%) of all irish greenhouse gases yet receives massive subsidies from other Irish taxpayers to export up to 90% of what it produces.
There is 0% tax on all these greenhouse gases
yet a paye worker is paying massive carbon taxes to heat their house and drive their car to work to pay to 50% income taxes, what a joke of a country , run by the agricultural industry’s lobby groups (Fine Gael)
@a h: The figures for farming are gross figures. Every acre of grassland in Ireland sequester 2 ton of carbon per year. Every ton of grain sequesters 1 ton of carbon, where is all this being recorded
@a h: The figures for farming are gross figures. Every acre of grassland in Ireland sequester 2 ton of carbon per year. Every ton of grain sequesters 1 ton of carbon. Farmers are not getting any of these on the credit side of the ledger
@Brendan Godley: these are the figures that eu fines for excessive emissions will be based on , will the agricultural industry pay their share of these fines ??
@a h: food security not important IYO.
So when the new green initiative was announced with their aims like electric cars etc, it was said it was ambitious but mostly unattainable due to the time window.
So now we have the confirmation that this plan and it’s makers are inept and it’s what it is; JUST ANOTHER TAX.
Even the greens are jumping on the insipid political gravy train.
Another example of Ireland being all talk and no action? Well I never!
@Paul Cunningham: we need to stop conflating the inability of the government to run a country with what Irish people in general are capable of.
Minister for Climate Eamon Ryan described the findings as a “clear indication that we need to double down on implementation of climate action measures”.
So double down on taxes it is…
There’s no real plan to get us off carbon emissions. The government needs to setup an in-depth study of all potential carbon free energy sources wind, solar, hydro and nuclear. There is no guarantee we will be able to generate enough hydrogen for backup when to wind isnt blowing to provide a steady supply of energy.
@Matthew Donoghue: Anyone technically copped on, knows that the only way to win this Warming World War, is by a mass movement into the use of Small Modular Nuclear, meaning literally thousands of them, into every existing thermal plant, cement works and all the rest.
“Oh but they’re ten years away at the earliest”. Sure. “We must go to filling the gaps with hydrogen”. Non vested interest analysis from the likes of DW, shows that hydrogen can be got to 20% of the renewables intermittency solution by 2050. We’ll all be cooked by then. How this SMR route would work here, explained in link below.
https://salmonwatchireland.ie/2022/05/13/arather-unique-and-interesting-point-of-view-regenerating-our-salmon-and-rivers-by-nicolas-grubb/
@Nicholas Grubb: people are being fed BS that wind and solar will save the day. Truly large scale projects that need state planning are needed. The sun and wind are only a small part of the solution. For every kW added it does not change the requirement for backup gas turbine power. And yet we have stopped adding natural gas projects…….. Idealism over pragmatism.
With the high cost of heating our homes, we should welcome a small increase in temperature.
I estimate that our emissions are dropping (I don’t need proof like this article)
More green taxes will fix the problem.
This is Ireland. You can’t have one rule for the airport and another for pollution or housing. Everything fails. That the rule.
Increased cause covid lockdowns the year or two before hand do do’s
have your say