EPA Update
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Ireland
Protecting and improving the environment as a valuable asset for the people of Ireland.
Interested to hear about the reduction in Ireland's greenhouse gas emissions in 2023? Want to learn about the impact of microbeads, hear about our freshwater assessments and get the latest updates on wastewater treatment and drinking water quality? This month’s newsletter, brings you the latest EPA reports and insights on these topics and more.
Ireland's Provisional Greenhouse Gas Emissions 1990-2023
On July 9th, the EPA published its provisional greenhouse gas emissions for Ireland for 2023.
The figures show a reduction of 6.8% compared to 2022, with emission reductions in almost all sectors.
Here are some key takeaways on where we’ve made reductions:
? Power generation emissions decreased by 21.6% due to a 12x increase in imported electricity and increasing share of renewable energy.
?? Agriculture emissions decreased by 4.6% driven by reduced fertiliser use and, except for dairy cow numbers, an overall reduction in livestock.
?? Residential emissions decreased by 7.1% driven by a shift away from fossil fuels accelerated by high fuel prices and a mild winter.
?? Transport emissions increased marginally by 0.3% in 2023 with a significant increase in biofuels and more electric vehicles moderating the impact of an increase in the vehicle fleet.
However, these latest data show that 2023 greenhouse gas emissions were still only 10.1% below 2005 levels, well short of Ireland’s EU Effort Sharing reduction commitment of 42% by 2030. Read the full report on the EPA website: bit.ly/3RZUSg2
What is the EPA doing about microbeads?
What are microbeads?
These are small plastic particles that were commonly used in cosmetic and cleaning products such as face scrubs and detergents. They don’t break down in water, which means they can be consumed by fish or other animals, and ultimately can end up being consumed by us! The good news is that they’ve been banned in Ireland by the Microbeads (Prohibition) Act 2019 – but we need to remain vigilant to make sure everyone is complying.
To find out more about microbeads, and hear what the EPA is doing to prevent them, watch our video.
And if you think you find a product with microbeads in it, please email [email protected]
Freshwater Assessments
EPA freshwater ecologists recently carried out an assessment of aquatic plants on the Upper Lake at Glendalough.
Aquatic plants help us to figure out if the quality of the water is good or bad. A total of 224 lakes, covering around 80% of the surface area of all lakes in Ireland, are monitored as part of the national surface waters monitoring programme.
EPA and National Library of Ireland photographer-in-residence Paula T. Nolan captured this footage of the team at work. Read more about our lake monitoring programme bit.ly/3zwvt7r
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National Priority Sites List
The latest National Priority Sites list for Q2 2024 features four sites from the Anaerobic Digestion, Closed Landfill, Food & Drink and Non-Hazardous Waste Transfer Stations Sectors.
The National Priority Sites List is a system?of performance-based indicators?to rank industrial and waste licensed sites in order of priority for enforcement.??We use the?National Priority Sites List to target our enforcement effort at the?licensed operators with the poorest environmental performance. This helps us?to?drive?improvements in environmental compliance.
Learn more and view the Q2 enforcement data at: https://bit.ly/3B9AxLw
Ringsend Waste Water Treatment Plant
Do you know where 40% of Ireland’s wastewater is treated?
At Ringsend in Dublin. The EPA granted a revised licence for the Ringsend waste water treatment plant (WWTP) in May this year. It's the 10th largest WWTP in Europe, and is currently undergoing a €500m upgrade to increase the capacity to treat waste water for 2.4 million people. The upgrade will enable the plant to treat wastewater to the required standards and accommodate a population equivalent of 2.4 million by 2025.
The plant is currently overloaded and is one of the priority urban areas identified by the EPA where treatment must improve. The related sewer network extends to over 3000km (more than 4 times the length of Ireland!) and encompasses 386 discharges from storm water overflows.
EPA Drinking Water Quality Report
Urgent action is needed by water suppliers, local authorities and government - as private drinking water quality isn’t improving in Ireland. The EPA has released the report ‘Drinking Water Quality in Private Group Schemes and Small Private Supplies 2023’. Key takeaways:
?? Many people in Ireland get drinking water from small private supplies which are not registered or monitored and may therefore be putting their health at risk.
? The number of private group schemes with E. coli failures increased in 2023, impacting approximately 4.6k people.
? 21 private group schemes, supplying 22k people failed the standard for Trihalomethanes (THMs) - up from 16 schemes serving 16,000 people in 2022.
?? €38.5 million of available Government funding that could have been invested in improvements to private supplies between 2019-2023 was not used.
Read the full report here bit.ly/3A8DMGE
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RN
3 个月Too bad our EPA is so corrupt and doesn’t care about our health. They are in the pockets of Corporations also. We have the best medical care but can’t figure out why so many are physically ill. Lobbies and Money