HUMANS are a clever, if destructive, bunch.
From walking the earth looking for nourishment to domesticating wild plants and animals and kick-starting farming, our ancestors have, understandably, looked for easier and more efficient ways of doing things.
Before we worked out that digging up and burning coal, oil and gas could power things, and steam engines and internal combustion engines took over, we relied heavily on horses to do what we might now call the donkey work.
In 1850, Ireland had about 600,000 horses who ploughed fields, provided transport, and did all manner of lugging and hauling.
Last week I hosted a panel discussion about the decarbonisation of Ireland’s gas network and how biomethane, a renewable gas generated in an anaerobic digester from organic feedstocks such as food waste and agricultural wastes, could replace a significant percentage of the natural gas that we currently use in heating, industry, transport and electricity generation.
Unexpectedly, in the conversation about the acutely 21st century problem of global heating, we heard some interesting 19th century figures on land use and energy from a Teagasc researcher, JJ Lenehan.
In 1850, Ireland dedicated about 600,000 hectares of land to growing oats, an area a bit less than the size of county Galway. It took a hectare of oats to feed a horse, so at that time Ireland devoted a lot of land to feeding horses because they were essential to doing work.
Lenehan’s point was that Ireland’s agricultural land is 80% grassland and is well placed to grow grass for biomethane production.
If 3% of agricultural land was dedicated to generating feedstocks for anaerobic digesters, it would meet 10% of Ireland’s gas requirements. It is not such an unusual idea to think of us ‘growing’ plants for energy when, in the past, we grew oats as the energy for horses.
The government has recently set a target of 10% of the gas grid to be fuelled with biomethane by 2030. Research by Gas Networks Ireland suggests we could go further, to 25%, and points to Denmark, which has recently hit 40% biomethane in its gas grid and has committed to fully displacing natural gas with biomethane by 2035.
Ireland’s decarbonisation plan has ambitious targets to electrify large parts of transport and heating, and power them with wind and solar energy, but now electricity represents just 20% of the total energy we use.
As we stick plugs on things like cars, and switch to heat pumps for heating, that percentage will grow, but at the moment the bulk of Ireland’s energy is still generated by burning oil and gas.
Last year, Ireland’s gas network transported twice the energy transported by the electricity grid, so we need to decarbonise the gas network if Ireland is to reach its climate action goals.
Anaerobic digesters are established tech to move us away from burning natural gas and are set to become a key part of the circular economy - taking wastes from food production and animal slurries and turning them into biomethane for energy production.
Of course, careful consideration needs to be given to any unintended consequences of establishing an indigenous biomethane industry.
We need to make sure that dedicating agricultural land to grow grass solely for biomethane production does not lead to any potential food security concerns.
Growing crops for biomethane production must be done sustainably without additional inputs of fertilisers or pesticides. Issues like soil degradation and loss of biodiversity must be considered as well as broader impacts on agriculture and the environment.
Ireland’s focus on renewable electricity and energy conservation as the first prong of attack on decarbonisation is understandable because perpetuating the fossil fuel industry and infrastructure is not desirable.
However, given Ireland’s dependence on natural gas, it is clear we need to deploy all reliable renewable technologies to slash our emissions by 2030.
The ongoing situation of importing climate-destroying fossil fuels to meet most of our energy needs is untenable. Moving to a more sustainable gas makes sense. Wind, solar, biomethane (and hopefully hydrogen in the future) - we’ll need them all!
Goodbye Navalny
The death of Alexei Navalny, the prominent Russian opposition leader and anti-corruption activist who had been imprisoned in Russian jails since 2021, stopped me in my tracks.
I cared because last year I felt like I got a small glimpse inside his life.
The documentary Navalny won Best Documentary at the 2023 Oscars and is an unforgettable portrait of the man who was fearless in his challenge to Vladimir Putin’s power.
I was entirely unaware of who Navalny was or his work until the Oscar award, but I sought out the film and was staggered by his story, the access the filmmakers had to his life, and the tale they revealed.
Navalny miraculously survived poisoning with the nerve agent novichok in 2020 and the documentary details his investigation into how he was poisoned.
It is a jaw-dropping film, and I would encourage everyone to watch to get an insight into the fear and oppression perpetrated by Putin’s regime. (I rented it on YouTube)
The Kremlin is a long way from Cork, but the ripple effects of Putin’s brutal rule is felt here and all around the world.
Navalny’s sudden death in a Russian prison felt like an inevitability. How could one man topple a vast country of corruption and oppression?
Navalny’s wife and children are the ones who now must spend the rest of their lives missing him and hoping that his death was not in vain.
I recommend watching the documentary and helping his memory live on.
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