ANALYSIS:The carbon budget offered only modest steps to achieve the 3% reduction in emissions, writes Harry McGee
IN THE wake of Tuesday's drama and its savage Budget cuts, yesterday's carbon budget was about as much of an anticlimax as could be imagined.
The acid response of Labour's Joanna Tuffy summed it up. "The news from the carbon budget is that there is no carbon budget," she said.
Tuffy was not all that far off the mark. There was some good news. The Environmental Protection Agency's provisional figures showed emissions actually decreased in 2007. It was a modest fall of 1 per cent, of 700,000 tonnes to just below 69 million tonnes, but that was as good as it got.
The overall impression from Minister for the Environment John Gormley's second carbon budget was that it was underwhelming to say the least. Sure, there were a number of relatively modest measures announced on Budget day by Minister for Finance Brian Lenihan: a tax incentive for cyclists, new levies of €200 for parking spaces and holiday homes and a very modest €20 million increase in funds for energy efficient homes. To that yesterday, was added a €5 million boost for cycling lanes in Dublin.
Even Gormley affected an apologetic air, in his speech and at the press conference. The Greens were making a difference in Government, he argued,while accepting that progress was painstakingly slow.
The key Green achievement in the programme for government was a commitment to reduce CO2 emissions by an average of 3 per cent per year between 2008 and 2012. In effect, that means reducing emissions from about 70 million tonnes to about 63 million tonnes.
The scale of that is daunting and most experts believe it will be impossible without significant carbon credit purchases. The Greens concede it is a difficult ask. "I accept that we will have to buy credits, but I do not want to go down that road," Gormley said yesterday.
The targets for emission reductions next year are surprisingly modest, only 400,000 tonnes, split equally between transport and agriculture. And the underlying signs don't look good. While overall emissions fell by 1 per cent, that was partly due to energy reductions in afforestation.
Transport, waste and agriculture emissions remain stubbornly high. The baseline trend for all those sectors continues to rise. Gormley openly admitted that this year's Budget represented only a modest step, almost like re-arranging the deckchair on the Titanic. The net effect is that Ireland is still as far away as it was from its Kyoto targets as when the Greens entered Government.
While there are ambitious targets for 40 per cent of renewables by 2020 and for 10 per cent of road transport vehicles to be electric, they are not matched with funding commitments, nor is there any concrete proposal for agriculture, which is responsible for 27 per cent of all emissions.
"I am being upfront. We do need to be more radical. It's not an admission of failure. What I am saying is that there has to be more radical measures. We are making progress, but it's painstakingly slow," said Gormley.
His colleague, Minister for Energy Eamon Ryan, says he can understand that people are frustrated when they don't see "tangibles" or huge progress.
"There is change, but it is taking longer than anticipated. But I would not underestimate its effect. It will have long-term results." Ryan argues that many of the big changes - the Metro and Luas and energy renewables, the ESB programme to become low-carbon, the grid - will make a huge difference in time.
He says modest measures like the bicycle programmes and benefit-in-kind for car parking should not be discounted.
"They may not seem much but like the changes in VRT and motor tax, they can have a very quick effect. They can create a cultural change."
He also highlighted the political problem for the Greens, caught between tangibles and getting things right. But politically, the party finds itself in troubled waters over its key promise. The sense of impatience grows over meeting the 3 per cent annual reduction. There are few big measures for 2009 and the implementation of the carbon levy is at least 18 months away.