Sustainable Energy Ireland is working with industry, power providers and consumers to promote greater energy efficiency, writes David Taylor

Over the past six weeks leading up to the World Summit and the launch this week of Sustainable Energy Ireland's five-year strategy, there has been a lot of reference to renewable energy, sustainable development and our own progress as a society towards achieving the Kyoto targets for greenhouse gas emissions.

The first estimate of the investment needed to meet the Kyoto target is of between €350 million and €500 million per annum continuing until 2012.

The Kyoto protocol was fashioned as a first response to the scientific consensus that global warming was under way and that the principal cause was the emissions of greenhouse gases associated with the use of fossil fuels.

The Government published its Green Paper on Sustainable Energy in September 1999. This was followed by the National Development Plan (NDP) and the National Climate Change Strategy.

The NDP included an energy priority that comprises an Energy Efficiency Measure and an Alternative Energy Measure, with funding of €223 million designated for the pursuit of a least-cost, or most overall effective, approach to achieving a more sustainable energy economy. Sustainable Energy Ireland was established on May 1st, 2002, to spearhead that plan.

The objective of guiding the economy and society to a more sustainable path is so multifaceted that it is arguably everybody's business and therefore at risk of being nobody's responsibility.

It was for this reason that the Government established Sustainable Energy Ireland to, as Minister Ahern put it on Monday of this week, "underline this Government's commitment to tackling climate change".

He continued: "In our joint programme for government we gave a commitment to implement the Climate Change Strategy. The Taoiseach, in his address to the Earth Summit in South Africa, reiterated that commitment as recently as the past fortnight."

Sustainable Energy Ireland has a mandate to promote and assist energy efficiency and renewable energy.

It has funds to support research and development of technologies that will provide energy services more sustainably in industry, energy supply and energy use.

Sustainable Energy Ireland programmes are organised along sectoral lines and focus on large industry, residential and commercial sector buildings, and on sustainable energy supply, principally renewable energy for electricity generation.

Even the comparatively large funds entrusted to Sustainable Energy Ireland will, on their own, have limited impact on the issue to be tackled.

Other significant and complementary measures are contemplated and will be needed. These measures will range from the purely informational, to ones with strong legislative support. Taxes in some form are likely to be part of the mix.

Examples of informational measures would be energy labels for domestic appliances, cars and houses. These measures need European co-ordination, alignment between manufacturers, distributors and retailers and good public information campaigns to make them really effective. Sustainable Energy Ireland will play an active role in all these areas.

Voluntary agreements can, like Sustainable Energy Ireland's "self-audit scheme" for large industry, work well, especially to begin with and as they gather experience they can be formalised into mandatory schemes to, among other benefits, reduce costs and minimise free riders.

Applied to energy products, such agreements have the effect of sending early signals to manufacturers about the direction in which technical standards need to evolve. This in turn encourages R&D and innovation that influence investment decisions by manufacturers and consumers alike.

This process of market transformation is intrinsic to realising the sustainable aims of society to secure for future generations the resources and quality of life they need.

In this sense, Sustainable Energy Ireland is a truly unique organisation working with industry and energy service providers to develop technologies, promote markets and empower consumers for the ultimate benefit of the whole of society.

Its targets are ambitious, its brief from its board, chaired by Prof Frank Convery, is to register and make a difference while working constructively with market and other players for a truly sustainable and attainable future.

Sustainable Energy Ireland's five-year strategy, available on request or online at www.sei.ie, outlines 12 programmes designed to engage business, researchers and service providers with grant support for joint action.

Mr David Taylor is chief executive of Sustainable Energy Ireland