Activists have protested at the Department of Environment, Climate Change and Communications against Government plans for a Liquefied Natural Gas terminal.
The group from Extinction Rebellion Ireland parked a boat outside the department's building on Adelaide Road in Dublin, and used smoke bombs to illustrate what they claim are the risks associated with LNG.
One protester, Nathan Hutchinson-Edgar, said: "We want to have the opportunity to voice our concerns around LNG to the minister," adding "it often comes from fracked gas which is obviously one of the most polluting types of energy, in fact it has an emissions profile which has been described as higher than coal."
Another protester, Angela Deegan, staged a sit-in at the reception area of building saying "it's outrageous to consider LNG storage as an energy security solution when the overarching threat to a secure future is the climate crisis - a crisis driven primarily by the emission of greenhouse gases from fossil fuels like LNG - plus the fact that LNG facilities are so vulnerable to terrorist attack, not to mention the potential devastation to any surrounding communities in the event of an accident at an LNG facility."
The activists say they reject the report 'Energy Security in Ireland to 2030', which recommended at a strategic LNG terminal to protect against possible disruption undersea pipelines which carry most of Ireland’s gas supply.
They pointed to evidence given to the Oireachtas Committee on Environment and Climate Action on "Liquefied Natural Gas and Oil Prospecting" by Professor Barry McMullin, Faculty of Engineering and Computing at Dublin City University, where he stated, "in terms of geopolitical risk, any geopolitical actor that has both the means and interest in attacking the gas connection infrastructure between Ireland and the UK, by definition, has the means and interest to attack."
The activists also claimed the construction of an LNG terminal goes against promises to ban the import of fracked gas.
Johnny McElligott, of Safety Before LNG, Kerry, said: "It's a strange world when so-called Green politicians can move from a ban on LNG terminals importing fracked gas, to a ban only on commercial LNG, to now supporting the construction of a "non-commercial commercial LNG terminal" with a public-private partnership where LNG will have to be traded and replenished regularly due to evaporation.
"They are paying more attention to word games and increasing gas demand at a runaway pace for data centres than their pre-election promise of no new large-scale fossil fuel infrastructure".
A spokesperson for the Minister for the Environment, Climate Change and Communications, responding to the Extinction Rebellion protest, said the proposed terminal would be a temporary measure, used to ensure energy security as Ireland transitions away from fossil fuels to renewable sources.
