DEAR EDITOR

Recently, the joint CCAC/IFAC report A Colossal Missed Opportunity pointed out that Ireland could be exposed to fines of up to €26bn for non-achievement of EU/Irish 2030 emissions targets; they have suggested major investments in the hope of ameliorating these fines.

But there is a much simpler solution. That lies in properly accounting for Irish agricultural emissions.

These are currently grossly overstated through using an inappropriate laboratory-derived equivalence factor for the greenhouse warming effect of methane compared to CO2 — a factor that simply does not apply in the real world atmosphere.

The latest climate science by the world-renowned physicist Professors Will Happer and William van Wijngaarden (among others) has definitively proven that this real world impact of Irish ruminant methane emissions is actually infinitesimal.

Therefore, the 40% of Ireland’s emissions supposedly relating to agriculture should be correctly reduced to almost zero, thus enabling achievement of Ireland’s 2030 emissions target at the stroke of a pen.

Why is no one in the CCAC, IFAC, EPA or DECC proposing that glaringly-obvious cost-free solution?