Not the Greens - Village Magazine

60 April 2023 April 2023 61

n May 9, 2019, Dáil Éireann

declared a climate and a

biodiversity emergency. Two

emergencies.

The Greens entered government

a year and a month later.

The Greens naturally get the imperatives.

Typical are leader Éamon Ryan’s comments from

the end of last year on Newstalk radio: “There

needs to be a Green party in Government for

climate to be taken seriously…the main goal is

getting the State to commit to an annual

emissions reduction of ﬁve [sic] per cent. That’s

the metric I’ll be ﬁxated on in the next two years.

If we succeed in that, we’ll succeed politically”.

It’s redolent of when John Gormley said the

Greens would go in to government with Fianna

Fáil in 2007 to deal with climate change, even

though it was on “Planet Bertie”. The Greens were

in power then for three and a half years and,

despite an imploding economy, failed to reach

their unambitious target of 3% annual emissions

reductions. They failed to get a Climate Act,

publishing a largely toothless bill that was never

enacted.

Anyway…everyone wished the Greens well

again in June 2020. Everybody understood their

apparent imperatives, but their reactions to what

the Greens have been doing have been

multifarious. Of coure the anti-environmental

brigade are always going to deny the facts, deny

the emergencies. More interesting is what the

Greens’ various acolytes think.

Green types

Benign conservatives

Right-minded moderates of an Irish variety think

the Greens can do no harm and always give them

a pass. In this class strangely now comes the

Irish Times. For example, reﬂecting a mentality of

blind conﬁdence, in the person of its political

editor Pat Leahy, the Irish Times recently insisted

“The Greens’ insight was to get that FFG will

commit to a policy price, for power. They’ve been

successful” but it is impossible to treat the

imputation of success seriously since the Greens

are, again, getting little from coalition, including

Not the Greens

Yellow, brown, and now sadly blue

By Michael Smith

on climate and biodiversity, ostensibly their

priorities: certainly the priorities for the survival

of civilisation.

The left

People on the left note that the Greens are

supporting a centrist, sometimes regressive

government. A recent article on the subversive

Ditch website, for example, claims the Greens are

just a mudguard for Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael:

“The purpose of the Green Party is to provide a

vote laundering service to middle class liberals

who want to support Fianna Fáil or Fine Gael but

are too embarrassed to do so…Once you

understand what the Greens are actually oering

it makes sense that their elected representatives

so often pretend to be people who don’t hold the

levers of power”.

Environmentalists

People who understand the environmental

agenda divide. Many of the leaders and

spokespeople of the environmental movement

have been compromised either because of

personal relationships or, because they have

EPA research shows we are

on track to cut emissions by

only 12.8 per cent by 2030

instead of the government’s

target of 35 per cent

Source: Mason Hayes & Curran, Solicitors

ENVIRONMENT

60 April 2023 April 2023 61

beneﬁted materially from the Greens’ presence

in government. Most environmental NGOs

supported the Greens going into government.

When the Greens required an internal vote on the

proposed programme for government last year

An Taisce, the ‘Environmental Pillar’ and Friends

of the Earth all called for the Greens to vote go

into government.

A statement from An Taisce said “The newly

published Programme for Government has been

welcomed by An Taisce as a significant

breakthrough on climate and environmental

action” . The statement ignored suspicious

weakness, highlighted by this magazine, in

prescribing enforcement mechanisms generally.

It overlooked the muddledness on biodiversity It

said nothing about planning: more speciﬁcally

regionally-balanced development, high-rise,

apartment sizes or one-o housing. Unlike other

Green parties, interestingly the Irish Greens down

the years, even in their constitution, seem never

to have embraced the centrality – promoted by

the UN – of sustainability and quality of life and

the programme for government doesn’t prioritise

environmental indicators.

A Statement from its Director Oisín Coughlan

in August 2020 noted: “the Programme for

Government promised to introduce a law very

similar to what we’ve been asking for, with legally

binding ﬁve year targets. Not only that but it

promised to end new licenses for oshore gas

exploration and formulate a policy to prevent the

import of fracked gas via LNG terminals. It

promised a just transition for peat and coal

workers and support for community scale solar

and other renewable energy projects. There was

good news on the transport front too - with a

commitment to a 2:1 ratio of investment in public

transport over roads. Plus €1 million euro a day

for cycling and walking infrastructure”.

But now, if they have any sensitivity to policy

and facts, these environmentalists are in retreat,

though since they are environmentalists even the

retreat is wobbly.

In August last year Friends of the Earth Ireland

gave the government it controversially endorsed

two years before a C.

So what is the record?

Greenhouse gas emissions

Ireland is committed under the Programme for

Government to reducing emissions by 7% 2021-

30 which is to say by 51% by 2030 (compared to

2018 levels) and achieving net-zero emissions by

no later than 2050. Despite these goals, Ireland’s

emissions are actually RISING and have

rebounded to pre-pandemic levels. When the

Greens’ friends in the media say they are

achieving things on climate remember: total

greenhouse gas emissions are estimated to have

increased by 6 per cent in 2021 but the 5-yearly

carbon budget required emissions to reduce by

4.8 per cent. Ireland had the highest emissions

of greenhouse gases per head in all of the EU in

the second quarter of 2022, according to a

Eurostat report. EPA research shows we are on

track to cut emissions by only 12.8 per cent by

2030 instead of the government’s target of 35 per

cent. Let’s say that again as it’s close to the only

thing that matters. EPA research shows we are

on track to cut emissions by only 12.8 per cent by

2030 instead of the government’s target of 35 per

cent. The EPA is kind, so it uses the ﬁgure of 35%

rather than 51% as the one that’s being missed

— that is because the reduction is dated from the

start of the government in June 2020 rather than

from 2018.

The Greens’ ecacy is simply measured by

whether they get 7% average annual reductions

in emissions.

Village estimates the ﬁgure is likely to be under

half that, for all the lies that 7% is somehow

legally binding.Anyone, and there are many of the

best, who claimed 51% was legally binding

stands sadly discredited.

So the compromise of going into power is for

only half the beneﬁt pretended. And even this is

kind since a recent analysis by Ireland’s Economic

and Social Research Institute shows that when

emissions are worked out on the basis of what

Ireland consumes, rather than what it produces,

the contribution to man-made climate change is

fully 70% higher. Inconvenience upon

inconvenience.

So though Ireland rose nine spots from 46th to

37th out of 57 in the 2023 Climate Change

Performance Index (CCPI) — regarded as the most

reliable indicator of countries’ climate approaches

In August last year Friends

of the Earth Ireland

gave the government it

controversially endorsed

two years before a C’

62 April 2023 April 2023 63

— it remains in the low-performiong countries.

Ireland receives a medium rating in the Renewable

Energy and Energy Use categories, with a low in

Climate Policy and a very low in Greenhouse Gas

Emissions.

However, the report was fundamentally and

weirdly misleading on Ireland since our actual

emissions score is “very low”, i.e. very bad, the

worst in the EU, along with Poland. Ireland is

great on greenhouse gas emissions except for the

“emissions” part! This didn’t seem to bother the

compilers as much as it could have. For some

reason they bought Greenwash about our “trend”

improving, assessing it at 23rd out of 57. This

must have derived from the clear-eyed Greens

and their NGO acolytes, the ones who are selling

the environment down the river so persuasively

that the media have bought their lies hook, line

and sinker.

Let’s be clearer: there’s no evidence of Ireland’s

trend improving, and the Green Party is anyway,

tragically, on the way out electorally to be

replaced by a backlash.

The CCPI experts accurately noted that there

has been signiﬁcant progress in climate policy in

2022, with the introduction of legally binding

carbon budgets and sectoral emissions ceilings.

Unlike the 7% annual targets, ﬂouted from the

beginning, these are binding.

However, the CCPI noted, government

implementation remains weak with necessary

actions and measures delayed or ignored in many

areas.

A devastating High Court case is being taken

by Friends of the Irish Environment against the

Mickey Mouse sectoral targets which when totted

up don’t actually reach the 51% target!

And the allocations are unethical. Agricultural

emissions are to be reduced by only 15%. Ireland

has 7.4 million cattle and according to the Central

Statistics Oce cattle numbers have increased

by 37,000 in the 12 months to last June, with dairy

cows accounting for 22,000 of the increase, 61%.

The dairy herd has increased by approximately

50% since 2010, with the lifting of milk quotas.

Let’s be fair. Anomalously, one entity, the

Green Party, has the epochal burden of custody

of the existential climate agenda. But it is

screwing up monumentally.

Biodiversity

Animals

Ireland continues to experience accelerating

biodiversity loss — “a very disturbing picture of

losses and declining trends” over the past ﬁve

years continuing unabated, and inadequately

monitored, even under a Green Environment

Minister. According to the National Biodiversity

Centre: “Around 31,000 species are known to

occur in Ireland, yet the conservation status of

only about 10% has been assessed”. As to

mammals, it has been alleged that the weight of

humans is greater than the weight of all other

mammals on earth but the methodology of

National Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS)

surveys seems complacent. In 2019 it recorded:

“Of the 27 species assessed, one was found to

be Regionally Extinct (grey wolf), one achieved a

threat status of Vulnerable (black rat, Rattus

rattus), and the rest were of Least Concern”. There

don’t seem to be surveys of actual numbers.

There’s a crisis but the reaction is lackadaisical,

even in an ocial emergency. BirdWatch Ireland

surveys show the status of 63 per cent of Ireland’s

211 regularly occurring wild bird species are

categorised as in moderate to severe declines.37

species of bird are of high conservation concern,

including species such as curlew, hen harrier,

twite and yellowhammer. The corn bunting has

become extinct since around 2000 and the once

widespread corncrake is just lingering on in the

western extremities of counties Donegal and

Mayo. Three of our iconic ﬁsh, the Atlantic

salmon, European eel and angel shark have

suered catastrophic population declines, and

the freshwater pearl mussel, Ireland’s longest

living animal, is facing extinction.

Plants

‘Plant Atlas 2020’ compiled by the Botanical

Society of Britain and Ireland showed a 56 per

cent decline in range or abundance – and often

both – in Ireland’s native plants, with native

grassland plants suering most, while non-

native plants, introduced since 1500, are

increasingly dominating the landscape.In

addition, many plants found in lakes and

wetlands have also declined, indicating growing

pressure on these habitats.

Trees

At 11 per cent (770,000 hectares), Ireland has

one of the lowest levels of forest cover in Europe

– 2 per cent of the country is covered by native or

semi-natural woodland. The Government has a

target of 22 million trees every year for the next

20 years with short-rotation conifer plantations

accounting for 70 per cent of new aorestation,

with the remaining 30 per cent being broadleaf

treesIn 2017, Sitka Spruce made up 51 per cent

of all trees planted, a total of 343,310 hectares.

Need to shift so 90% of new forestry being

broadleaf and, while keeping existing conifer, it

needs to be interspersed with 20% broadleaf.

Habitats

The 2019 report by the NPWS outlining the state

of Ireland’s EU-protected habitats and species

showed that 85 per cent of these habitats have

“bad” or “inadequate” status including

peatlands.

Peat

99% of the actively growing raised bog in Ireland

has gone, with one third of the remaining 1% lost

in the last 20 years. Illegal extraction of peat is

continuing from raised bogs in designated

special areas of conservation (SACs) in spite of

the ban introduced in 2011, according to ﬁgures

released under the Freedom of Information Act to

the Irish Wildlife Trust. 330 plots were cut in

2022, with 290 plots cuts in 2021.

In February Eamon Ryan voiced concern at the

extent of peat exports annually – an estimated

500,000 tonnes per year – without planning

permission. Analysis from data journalism

website noteworthy.ie revealed there were more

than 500,000 tonnes exported during 2021.

The 2019 report by the NPWS outlining the

state of Ireland’s EU-protected habitats and

species showed that 85 per cent of these

habitats have “bad” or “inadequate” status

including peatlands

62 April 2023 April 2023 63

Information released to the Irish Wildlife Trust

earlier this year showed that, illegally of course,

“of the 57 SACs, turf-cutting was monitored by

the NPWS on around one third of the sites (18

SACs) in 2021”. FIE ﬁled a ‘Request For Action’

under the Environmental Liability Directive which

was accepted by Ireland’s Environmental

Protection Authority in February 2022. FIE was

assured, “We will be in contact in due course

when we have progressed and investigation and

have further information”. No further

communication has been received.

One hectare of undisturbed raised bog stores

around 3,000 tonnes of carbon. This is 10 times

the equivalent area of rainforest. The total carbon

stored in Irish bogs is about 2.22 billion tonnes.

Water

Only just over half of Ireland’s surface waters

(rivers, lakes, estuaries and coastal waters) are

in satisfactory condition (achieving good or high

ecological status and able to sustain healthy

ecosystems for ﬁsh, insects and plants). The

deterioration in estuaries and coastal waters is

mostly along the southeast and southern

seaboards and is due to agricultural run-o.

Urgent and targeted action is required to reduce

nitrogen emissions from agriculture in these

areas.

Ireland is in the bottom third of EU countries for

bathing water.

77% of areas in Ireland classed as suitable for

bathing were deemed of excellent quality,

compared to the EU average of around 85%,

according to figures from the European

Environment Agency in 2022.

Transportation

The 2: 1 ratio between public transport and

roads, ordained in the Programme for Government

is fragile and the Greens are reported as having

lost their battle for it in the still ambiguous

National Development Plan published eighteen

months ago. Not a single rail project, whether

heavy rail, light rail or underground, is actually

under construction. The lack of urgency is

exempliﬁed by MetroLink. First suggested in

2001, a proposal was ﬁnally submitted by the

National Transport Authority (NTA) to An Bord

Pleanála last year. Of the four plans to upgrade

and extend the Dart system only Dart+ West is

before An Bord Pleanála. Not a single road has

been omitted in the translation from the last

national development plan three years ago to the

current one which proposes to spend €35bn on

transportation over 10 years. Meanwhile the big

road projects include the M20 motorway from

Cork to Limerick; the co-funded A5 to Derry; the

upgrade of the N4 from Mullingar to Longford;

and the N24 from Limerick to Waterford; the

widening of the N3 (M50 to Clonee), and the

Galway Bypass which was stopped by legal

action (though the Green Party failed to involve

itself in the action). However, the plan has merely

been remitted to An Bord Pleanála for a new

decision.

The Greens always point to the Programme for

Government’s commitment to preserve a 2:1

between public transport projects and roads but

that is hardly a mandate to refuse particular roads

since decision-makers needing to approve roads

will simply point to the possibility public transport

budgets will increase proportionately,

particularly in the early years of the NDP.

The Greens are incapable of saying No to

anything. It’s part of their discomﬁture with

reality. Hence they bang on about electric

vehicles and — evidently — fail to curtail SUVs.

So 54% of car sales in Dublin in 2022 were fossil-

fuel squandering SUVs. The top car models, by

sales, in the year to date are Hyundai Tucson,

Toyota Corolla, and Kia Sportage, a rollcall of

proﬂigacy.

Symbolising the lack of motivation is that while

even some Fianna Fáil ministers never fly

business class on State business, the Green

leader and deputy leader have no diculty

justifying it if they need to arrive prim for a

meeting. Environmental ethics and ecacy do

not always coincide, but it is all too easy for a

cynic to claim they do here.

Planning

The Greens left planning to the Minister for

Housing, Fianna Fáil’s Darragh O’Brien. It is clear

that they have no intention of reversing patterns

of sprawl of Dublin into Leinster, of one-o

housing or indeed of prescribed excessive height

in our historic inner cities. The party has lost its

one-time pre-occupation with planning and

architecture.

Wind energy

Last year around 36% of Ireland’s electricity came

from wind turbines. The share was higher only in

Denmark, which managed 46%. The Irish

government wants to push the ﬁgure to 80% by

2030; The hope is that improvements in energy

storage, and a new electricity interconnector with

France planned for 2026, will allow Ireland to sell

surplus wind power to European countries. The

future is oshore. Ireland’s only oshore wind

farm, on the Arklow Bank, was the largest in the

world when completed in 2004, but has since

been dwarfed by newer ones elsewhere in

Europe. Because Ireland has deeper waters and

stormier coasts, it needs the development of new

types of turbine that ﬂoat on the water rather than

being ﬁxed to the sea bed. Over 10,000 MW of

Onshore Wind and over 30,000 MW of Oshore

Wind are in active development by the private

sector in Ireland with budgets of up to €80bn.The

Government’s most recent Climate Action Plan

from December 2022 set a target of at least 7GW

of oshore wind energy to be produced by 2030.

However, 2GW of that will be used for green

hydrogen production.

Therefore, the objective of the plan is that 5GW

of oshore wind generation will be installed by

2030.

These areas have yet to be identiﬁed, and may

not be for several months to a year. In general the

wind energy industry claims there is too much

planning bureaucracy and now constraints on

where permissions will be operable. Last year

CETA has provisionally applied since 2017,

with some considerable heed paid to social

and environmental concerns and the

litigation was more about the constitutionality

of the dispute-resolution provisionsthan

about tangible negative environmental

upshots

To be reworked

64 April 2023 April 2023 PB

Wind Energy Ireland claimed it had “absolutely

no conﬁdence” in key state agencies to ensure a

reasonable planning process. But the solution to

this has long been designating limited portions

on and offshore for controversial energy

developments and ensuring ad ‘one-o’ energy

facilities including wind-farms are deterred to

avoid disproportionate negative effects on

communities and landscapes.

Waste

Ireland generates 3.2m tonnes of municipal

waste, of which 42pc is incinerated, 41pc is

recycled and 16pc goes to landﬁll while a small

amount gets composted. Much of the recycling

takes place — or allegedly takes place abroad.

The recycling rate has not improved since 2016

but it must reach 55pc within the next three years

to hit EU targets. Only 29% of plastic is recycled

compared to the 50pc targeted for 2025. Ireland

has the highest per capita plastic consumption

rates in Europe. 71pc of plastic packaging is

incinerated.

Latte Levy

The ‘Latte levy’ on single-use coee cups is dying

a death through consultation when it is

transparently a good idea. We live of course in a

world where McDonald’s still inﬂicts bags on

customers even if they are ‘eating in’. In July 2022,

the BBC reported: “A new levy to restrict the use

of disposable coee cups is to be introduced in

the Republic of Ireland”. Momentum was lost

after government parties called for a study on the

200 million cups disposed of annually in Ireland.

In January it was reported Fine Gael are rowing

back on the proposed 20 cent per disposable up

levy.

Fracking

While the Government hopes renewable

generators will supply 70 per cent of Irish

electricity needs by 2030, natural gas is likely to

produce the remaining 30 per cent. The

Programme for Government provides: “As Ireland

moves towards carbon neutrality, we do not

believe that it make sense to develop LNG gas

import terminals importing fracked gas.

Accordingly, we shall withdraw the Shannon LNG

terminal from the EU Projects of Common Interest

list in 2021. We do not support the importation of

fracked gas and shall develop a policy statement

to establish that approach”.

Shannon LNG has applied to a particularly

slow-moving An Bord Pleanála, to develop a

€650m liqueﬁed natural gas receiving terminal

on the Shannon Estuary near Tarbert in County

Kerry. An attempt to extend an earlier 1999

decision struck down buy an action from Friends

of the Irish Environment in the High Court in 2020

and Eamon Ryan said that it would not be

appropriate to proceed with any LNG terminal

here, pending the outcome of an energy needs

review, due to be ﬁnished shortly.

On Easter Sunday, the Business Post reported

that, in an interview, Eamon Ryan accepted he

might now have to consider accepting an LNG

terminal for energy security purposes. The soon-

to-be-published review of energy security is

thought to have concluded that a non-commercial

natural gas facility would be far too costly. Senior

Green Party sources stressed Mr Ryan’s

comments could not be interpreted as him

opening the door to that eventuality but with the

Greens you rarely know.

Taoiseach Leo Varadkar has said the Shannon

LNG terminal in Kerry will not be blocked by the

government, and that if it can secure planning

permission on its own terms, then it will go

ahead, despite government policy, sort of making

that not government policy, government policy.

In new accounts signed o on February 15 of,

Shannon LNG Ltd notes that “the company

intends to begin construction of the terminal after

consultation is completed and the planning

permission isapproved. ”Embarrassing and

cynical, the Greens continue to pretend using the

wrong legal procedure and shouting, when the

environment suers, is as good as being legally

strategic. A bill is no good here. The PfG should

have insisted the Department of Planning issue

a directive on LNG/Fracking. Many government

TDs would welcome LNG. Junior Minister Niall

Collins has said the State “must grasp the

opportunity presented by [project developer]

New Fortress”.

CETA

The Supreme Court recently ruled on a case taken

by dissident Green TD, Patrick Costello, that

Ireland can’t ratif y the EU–Canada Comprehensive

Economic Trade Agreement (CETA) unless

changes are made to the legislation governing

arbitration.

The Supreme Court, by a majority of 4–3, held

that the Constitution of Ireland prevents the

Government and the Dáil from ratifying CETA.

Responding Tánaiste Leo Varadkar said: “The

decision of the Supreme Court is noted. While it

is disappointing that ratiﬁcation is not now

immediately possible, the Government remains

committed to ratifying the CETA agreement in full.

Apart from the dispute-resolution provisions,

CETA has provisionally applied since 21

September 2017, with some considerable heed

paid to social and environmental concerns and

the litigation was more about the constitutionality

of the dispute-resolution provisions, which

sidelined Irish courts, than about tangible

negative environmental upshots.

General environmental

approach

Sadly the greens do not like big solutions and are

not focused on the need, in pursuit of key

environmental agendas, to survey what remains,

set targets, and above all to make the targets

legally enforceable i.e. justiciable.

Social betrayal

And that’s not mentioning the failure to extend

the evictions ban, the failure to deliver housing,

the failure to deliver free healthcare and the

failure to deliver the key Green Party explicit

promise of an end to Direct Provision. The Greens

couldn’t even keep Eco-Eye on the airwaves.

Irelnd genertes 3.2m tonnes of municipl wste, of which 42pc is incinerted, 41pc is recycled

nd 16pc goes to lndﬁll while  smll mount gets composted nd much ends up on beches

Sadly the greens do not

like big solutions and

are not focused on the

need, in pursuit of key

environmental agendas,

to survey what remains,

set targets, and above all

to make the targets legally

enforceable i.e. justiciable