76. Deputy Paul Murphy asked the Minister for the Environment, Climate and Communications if he is aware that the emissions impact of imported liquefied natural gas, LNG, is worse than that of coal; and if he envisages the building of either a State-led or commercial LNG terminal in that context. [7030/25]

Sentiment score: -0.05

Is the Minister aware that the emissions impact of imported LNG is worse than even coal? It is the dirtiest fossil fuel. Despite that, the Taoiseach has said that we will "have to have an LNG facility of some kind." Will the Minister be going along with the Taoiseach? Will that be a so-called State-led project, as the previous Government was in favour of, or a commercial LNG? Can the Minister update us on the progress of the memo his Department is meant to be bringing forward?

Sentiment score: -0.02

I note the Minister simply ignored the actual question. That is obviously a prepared answer; he has a prepared question. I could go again. Is the Minister aware that the emissions impact of imported LNG is worse than that of coal? This is research from last October by an environmental scientist called Robert Howarth. I will give the Minister some of the lowlights. The paper states that "LNG is 33% worse in terms of planet-heating emissions over a 20-year period compared with coal." It goes on to state that "Drilling, moving, cooling and shipping gas from one country to another uses so much energy that the actual final burning of gas in people’s homes and businesses only accounts for about a third of the total emissions from this process." The large resulting emissions mean there is "no need for LNG as an interim energy source". The paper adds that “ending the use of LNG should be a global priority” and yet the Government is going in the opposite direction. The Government is paying lip service to targets that the previous Government was not going to meet, and that this Government is going to miss by an even greater margin, unfortunately, than it was on track to miss them by. It seems that this is driven by the Healy-Raes on one hand and Donald Trump on the other.

Sentiment score: -0.03

It is not my contention, Minister. I do not claim to be a climate scientist. It is the contention of those who have researched the matter. Perhaps the Minister is going to ignore the science on it. The answer in terms of energy security and resilience is, first, to stop expanding data centres. They are putting our energy usage on an accelerating upward track - they are going to be at 30% by 2030 - and the Minister is basically telling them to "burn, baby, burn", let it rip and go up even higher. First, we need to reduce energy usage where necessary rather than expanding it. Second are batteries and third is interconnection. I will ask the question explicitly. Was there a secret deal with the Healy-Raes to give a wink and a nod to the Fortress Energy commercial LNG terminal in Tarbert, County Kerry? That is what the Business Post is reporting, saying that the line the Minister cited in the programme for Government was included, in reality, to get Healy-Rae support. Is it about appeasing Donald Trump? The Taoiseach said that Europe will have to buy more liquified natural gas from the US to appease tariff threats from Trump. Those are his words, not mine. Are we going to trade away our climate, our children's future and our energy prices to placate Trump's bully-boy tactics in order that the US fossil fuel giants can drill, baby, drill?

Sentiment score: 0.13

Hospitals, Minister?

Sentiment score: 0.00