madam president i am touched by the words smart and intelligent which are very much part of this debate because the solutions we try and use in our house to reduce energy consumption are certainly not working and they are neither smart nor very intelligent
telling children to turn things off is just not the solution
i wish it were as it would mean that i was in control
so we do need all of the things that others have spoken about sensors and other technological advancements that will make everybody's life easier in terms of achieving our energy efficiency objectives
tonight's debate is a massive one it is about our climate change agenda security of supply solidarity between member states and also economic growth and that is an issue for us at the moment and how we can achieve a better use of our energy resources
the country i come from ireland relies on oil for almost sixty of our energy needs and it is all imported
so clearly we have a particular problem
we need to reduce that dependency we need to develop our indigenous resources and as i have already mentioned improve our efficiency
clearly the issue of interconnection between member states is crucial particularly for countries on the periphery
ireland's dependency is extremely high ninety-one of our needs are imported
that is quite a staggering percentage and while we have not experienced the gas problems that other colleagues have spoken about or the cold and the horror that caused for other member states we did learn from watching that how critical it is that we do something about our energy mix and our energy insecurity
so all of the issues that are part of this report and the oral question are extremely important for us
in particular the issue of land use needs to be addressed
the swedish experience of forestries is interesting from the perspective of ireland where we have not developed our forestry sector
but this is a key issue getting the balance right between food production and fuel production
