{"id":640319,"date":"2026-09-30T06:54:10","date_gmt":"2026-09-30T06:54:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/640319\/"},"modified":"2026-09-30T06:54:10","modified_gmt":"2026-09-30T06:54:10","slug":"european-commission-to-put-irelands-poor-climate-action-record-under-scrutiny-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/640319\/","title":{"rendered":"European Commission to put Ireland\u2019s poor climate action record under scrutiny \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ireland\u2019s sluggish climate action<\/a> efforts will be brought under scrutiny as the European Commission<\/a> seeks to push laggard countries to achieve their emission reduction targets. <\/p>\n

EU commissioner for climate Wopke Hoekstra said talks would take place with the Government to find solutions to whatever was impeding progress. <\/p>\n

He would not be drawn on the areas the talks would focus on, saying it was \u201cnot helpful\u201d to negotiate in public. <\/p>\n

But he said all sectors, including land use, would be under review. That primarily means agriculture, the country\u2019s largest emitting and most politically sensitive sector. <\/p>\n

Nine of the 27 EU member states, including Ireland, are running far behind the national targets set for them as part of the overall EU goal to cut emissions by 55 per cent by 2030. <\/p>\n

More challenging targets \u2013 a 90 per cent reduction by 2040 and net zero by 2050 \u2013 will follow. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe have agreed to these obligations with the whole European family so we do need to take these commitments very seriously,\u201d Hoekstra told The Irish Times. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe commission has a sometimes complicated, but at the same time important, role to make sure we deliver what we told ourselves we wanted to deliver. <\/p>\n

\u201cAt the same time, it doesn\u2019t make sense to just tell countries this is a pass or this is a fail.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0Scrapping carbon tax means handing \u2018billions of euro to Ursula von der Leyen\u2019Opens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are in a joint endeavour to fix things and that is the conversation I\u2019m looking to have. <\/p>\n

\u201cEvery sector is by definition part of this conversation.\u201d <\/p>\n

The Climate Change Advisory Council<\/a> and Irish Fiscal Advisory Council have warned Ireland could face penalties of up to \u20ac26 billion for failing to meet the 2030 target, which on current performance could be missed by half. <\/p>\n

Hoekstra would not discuss penalties, saying while he had heard Ireland\u2019s representatives say they would not meet the targets, he did not believe that point had been reached. <\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not there yet,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

However, Minister for Climate Darragh O\u2019Brien<\/a> later repeated his assessment that Ireland would not comply with the targets. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re not going to hit our 2030 target but that does not reduce our ambition in that regard,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\"MinisterMinister for Climate Darragh O\u2019Brien. Ireland will lead the EU delegation at the Cop31 climate summit in November. Photograph: Bryan O\u2019Brien\/The Irish Times <\/p>\n

He said increased support for retrofitting, investment in public transport projects such as MetroLink and the strong pipeline of renewable energy projects were all evidence of this. <\/p>\n

O\u2019Brien appeared to play down the significance of the intervention Hoekstra signalled. <\/p>\n

\u201cI meet him regularly, actually. He\u2019s a good colleague,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

He said he met the commissioner on Monday and discussed many issues, including preparations for the Cop31 climate summit in November where Ireland will lead the EU delegation. <\/p>\n

Hoekstra told The Irish Times priorities for Cop31 would include ensuring other wealthy countries followed the EU\u2019s example in cutting emissions and providing climate finance to help poorer countries deal with climate disasters and adopt clean energy.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0Is Ireland ready for a monster El Nino? Expect ugly potatoes, transport chaos and widespread disruptionOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

He said China, responsible for 30 per cent of global emissions, had set itself an emissions reduction target of just 10 per cent by 2035 and was also not contributing adequately to climate finance. <\/p>\n

\u201cI think it is fully fair to ask Europe to do its fair share \u2013 we\u2019re doing more than our fair share. At the same time I\u2019m not going to be lured into a corner where we are beyond asking others to chip in. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s fair to ask nations in the Gulf, the Americans \u2013 knowing how complicated that is \u2013 and indeed China, which has a GDP [gross domestic product] per capita that is higher than at least one of our member states \u2013 and the list is much longer \u2013 to also do their fair share.\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ireland\u2019s sluggish climate action efforts will be brought under scrutiny as the European Commission seeks to push laggard…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":640320,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[2885,52922,25746,1712,61,60,43],"class_list":["post-640319","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-climate-change","tag-climate-change-advisory-council","tag-darragh-obrien","tag-european-commission","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/640319","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=640319"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/640319\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/640320"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=640319"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=640319"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=640319"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}