Ireland's 'clean and green' image no longer matches the grim reality

ANALYSIS:A new report indicates that we are continuing to fail our environment on many fronts, writes Frank McDonald

CHALLENGE IS a word used repeatedly in Ireland's Environment - An Asset Under Threat- the latest report by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on the state of our environment, in all of its aspects. And the main message is that we are failing on many fronts.

Whether it is tackling climate change, managing the waste we generate, ensuring supplies of clean water or looking after our wildlife, we are facing "challenges".

And many of these derive from the excesses we indulged in, individually and as a society, during the boom.

Take the example of transport. As the report points out, carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from transport soared by 170 per cent between 1990 and 2006, due to spectacular growth in the numbers of cars and trucks on Irish roads and their consumption of petrol and diesel.

And because we have locked ourselves into unsustainable suburban sprawl, with more and more people commuting longer distances by car, transport emissions are expected to continue, increasing from just short of 20 per cent of the national total to 22 per cent in 2020, the EPA says.

Emissions of nitrogen oxides, currently well above the ceiling set by the EU for 2010, are expected to remain high, "mainly due to the continued emissions from the significant number of cars we drive".

The same goes for other pollutants from fossil fuels until alternatives are found.

Even under the most favourable scenario, in which the Government actually delivers on the implementation of a whole range of policies and measures, the EPA says Ireland's greenhouse gas emissions will exceed the proposed EU reduction target for 2020 by seven million tonnes.

Similarly, the EU landfill directive's 2016 target for diverting biodegradable waste from dumps will be missed by 800,000 tonnes.

The maximum quantity of such waste allowed to be landfilled under this directive is 451,000 tonnes, or just over 50 per cent of the projected target.

On water quality, the report is also dubious about our ability to meet EU targets.

With 29 per cent of river length polluted, mainly from sewage and agricultural effluents, how can we hope to meet the terms of the water framework directive requiring all waters be of "good" status by 2015?

Many aspects of Ireland's flora and fauna remain under serious threat from human activities, leading to often irreversible losses; indeed, a range of key habitats and seven species are considered to be of "bad" conservation status. "Once this asset is gone, there is no comeback," the EPA says.

What's at fault, as the European Court of Justice ruled in 2007, is that Ireland didn't put in place a system of strict protection for protected species or habitats, including raised bogs, dunes, lakes and woodlands - largely because (although the report doesn't say this) of pandering to vested interests.

The major "ongoing challenge", as the EPA makes clear, is to meet our international obligations in tackling climate change - not just under the Kyoto Protocol, but also the more rigorous regime that is likely to be required after it expires in 2012, particularly a target 20 per cent cut in emissions by 2020.

This is going to be the tallest order of all. If it's to be achieved, the present Government will have to implement a consistent range of policies and measures right across the board, with a focus on reducing emissions by 3 per cent per annum - as it pledged to do under last year's coalition deal.

Kyoto is merely the test-bed in this context. But as the EPA report clearly shows, Ireland is set to overshoot even its modest targets by an average of five million tonnes per annum, despite all the claims in recent years by successive ministers for the environment that these targets would be met.

To comply with its legally binding Kyoto commitments, we will need to purchase another 1.4 million tonnes of CO2 credits on top of the 3.6 million tonnes planned for in last year's revised National Climate Change Strategy - and at a time when the public finances are already stretched. But then, protecting the environment was never an easy option.

Frank McDonald is Environment Editor of The Irish Times