Ireland’s Climate Action Minister Richard Bruton TD is speaking at the plenary of COP24 in Katowice Poland today. Minister Bruton is calling for an “all of Government approach” to climate, and will announce €4.5m in funding for ‘global climate action’.

Part of Ireland’s commitment to climate action and decarbonisation is the planned shutdown of the Moneypoint coal-burning plant by 2025. However, ESB International, a State-owned company subsidiary under the Minister’s direct control is providing the engineering and project management services for a new 1,200MW coal-fired power plant in the Philippines.

This project is being fought by a range of civil society organisations in the Philippines, who in a joint statement [1] point out: ‘We cannot allow our communities to suffer from the double whammy of coal-fired power plant projects that come in the form of negative health and environmental impacts’.

The statement continues: ‘Hundreds of families were forcefully displaced to give way to their construction, without any proper resettlement plan in place. Moreover, many fisherfolks lost their livelihood because of the decrease in fish catch caused by the plant’s operation. Health records also show that there had been an increase in cases of respiratory diseases among children and elderly’.

“The damage caused by this proposed project in undermining international solidarity on climate action and decarbonisation of energy eclipses the increased climate funding announced by the Minister”, according to Ian Lumley of An Taisce, who is in Katowice, Poland for the COP24 conference. The project is widely opposed in the Philippines by social justice and environmental organisations who are attending COP in Poland and have written seeking a meeting with Minister Bruton.

“You cannot on the one hand promote an ‘all-of-Government’ approach to climate action while on the other, allow State companies to pursue contracts to operate coal-fired power plants that damage the health and well-being of local communities while contributing to spiralling global carbon emissions”, Lumley added.

ENDS

For further information, contact:
Ian Lumley, Advocacy Officer, An Taisce: +353 83 153 2384
For Phillipines: Ian Rivera, National Coordinator Phillipines Movement for Climate Justice 0063 917 474 6178
Charles Stanley-Smith, Communications, An Taisce. Tel: +353 87 241 1995
email: [email protected]
An Taisce The National Trust for Ireland

Notes

Letter to Irish Government from Phillipines NGO's https://drive.google.com/file/d/15gJmJ1V4kYRmhW_6srOndKz_Y5arjD8C/view?usp=sharing

About An Taisce

An Taisce is a charity that works to preserve and protect Ireland's natural and built heritage. We are an independent charitable voice for the environment and for heritage issues. We are not a government body, semi-state or agency. Founded in 1948, we are one of Ireland’s oldest and largest environmental organisations.