Bord na Móna has been urged to turn to the retrofitting of thousands of homes across the country for energy savings in a bid to address huge employment losses due to the closure of bogs and decarbonisation measures.
A study, to be published by the Irish Congress of Trade Unions, says a national retrofit programme would create almost 19,000 jobs and that up to 800 workers losing their jobs in the midlands this year, should be retrained with the skills to complete the work.
The report also calls on the Government to turn back to the ESB to roll out broadband in rural areas using the existing infrastructure.
It says the measure would expedite the introduction of high speed broadband in the Midlands where it is badly need to create jobs and save €500 million earmarked already to subsidise the national broadband plan.
The report calls for the re-branding of Athlone Institute of Technology as a "Green Centre of Excellence" where workers leaving peat harvesting would be retrained.
