The Minister for Climate Action and the Environment has rejected criticism from environmental groups that the Budget fails to deliver on the Taoiseach's commitment to new ambitions on climate change.
It comes after the organisation Friends of the Earth labelled the budget as "a complete failure on climate change".
Denis Naughten said there is a focus in the budget on energy efficiency with €117m allocated to significantly expand the energy efficiency programmes.
Included in this is €35m to be invested in the residential, commercial and public sectors to reduce carbon dioxide emissions from the built environment.
An additional €17m has also been allocated to support the roll out of the Renewable Heat Incentive Scheme and increase the uptake of electric vehicles.
There is also an allocation of €34.8m to support the Environmental Protection Agency meet its expanded role in areas such as air quality, noise monitoring and the climate challenge.
Mr Naughten also highlighted the Budget day commitment to carry out a review of carbon tax with a view to bringing forward proposals in Budget 2019 around the role of the tax in driving changes to behaviours in households and business.
Friends of the Earth said the budget incorporates a drop in the bucket on energy efficiency, a few baubles on electric vehicles and a review of the carbon tax.
The organisation’s director Oisin Coghlan, said he is not sure what planet the Government is on.
He said the State's own figures indicate we need to invest €2 billion every year from now to 2030 in making homes warmer and less polluting in line with the Paris Agreement on Climate Change, yet the budget only includes €38m for energy savings schemes.
Mr Coghlan also criticised the €17m included in the budget for renewable heat generation.
He said it is a big mistake the exclusion of community scale projects from the proposed support scheme.
Green Party leader Eamon Ryan said there are loads of smaller measures in the budget relating to climate change but no real response to the issue.
Mr Ryan said that aside from the large fines that the country is facing, a proper response to climate change is necessary because that is where future jobs are and where the economy is.
He said that on transport alone, there is a major problem because our cites are clogging up and people cannot even get in every morning.
Deputy Ryan said the government had put €3m into cycling but tens times this figure is required.
