The 42 Shades of Green

"THE Forty Shades of Green" you remember that schmaltzy Johnny Cash classic that a million karaoke singers couldn't destroy? Well, they need to rewrite the lyrics. From now on it should be 42 shades of green, in honor of the two Green Party guys who have become senior ministers in the new government in Ireland.

Make no mistake about it; last week marks a significant turning point here. It might be an exaggeration to say the country has turned green (in the environmental sense) overnight. But it is true that environmental issues are going to be on the agenda here from now on like never before.

It's not just the arrival (on their bikes!) of the two Green ministers. The Taoiseach (Prime Minister) Bertie Ahern has made it clear that it was not merely a question of buying the support of the Green Party for a new government.

The fact is that Ahern could have formed a government without them. He wanted them in because he sees that across Europe, indeed around the world, global warming and green issues generally are now unavoidable and governments are starting to take them seriously.

What better way to acknowledge this in Ireland than to make the Green Party a part of the government? It underlines the inevitability of the change that must happen. And since much of this change will be painful for voters here, why not have the Greens in the government to share the blame?

Ahern says now that he has been considering this option (of including the Greens in a government) for the past two years "if the numbers fell that way after the election." He seems genuinely to have accepted the green agenda.

And he must have been conscious that, after two terms in government, there could be no better way of giving a new Fianna Fail-led government a fresher image and a more radical edge than by going green.

The green shift has particular local relevance in Ireland. Like everyone else on the planet, we need to modify our behavior to make our contribution on tackling global warming. But the need for environmental change is also seen here as locally important.

The booming economy via the Celtic Tiger has been wonderful over the past decade and a half. But we all know that it has come at a price in congestion and pollution and a growing concern about our quality of life.

To take just one example, a lot of work needs to be done on our water quality. The fiasco in Galway City, where people have been boiling water for months now to make it fit for human use (washing as well as consumption), is still ongoing, and the solution is still a couple of months away at least. The contamination of the water supply in Galway is truly shocking because of the scale of the problem and the failure to keep up with the expansion of the city over recent years.

Partly because Galway is an important tourist destination, this has made the headlines. But water supply systems in many other areas are under pressure as well. Our growing population, industrialization, housing sprawl and our indulgent lifestyles have overpowered the ancient sewage and water supply systems still creaking away in our cities and towns.

Most of our lakes and rivers now show symptoms of stress from pollution, whether agricultural, industrial or human. And that's just water.

Air pollution from traffic is a problem in some areas. And then there's land pollution caused by the stresses of the huge building boom over the past decade as well as the growing garbage mountains from all those construction sites and extra houses.

Ireland has not been spoiled yet. lt's still one of the most beautiful countries on earth. But alarm bells are going off all over the place as the stress on our environment has increased. Yet people still don't want incineration plants to deal with garbage, and the idea of a nuclear plant to cut down on oil use is a complete non-runner. Every time something like that is suggested the NIMBYs (Not in My Back Yard) kill it off.

We all know that these local environmental issues have to be tackled and, in the wider context, that Ireland must begin to play its part on global warming. That concern is echoed across the program for government agreed between Fianna Fail and the Greens.

The new government will set up a Climate Change Commission to keep an eye on how we are keeping up with our international commitments, and that will keep the issue to the fore. The target of an annual 3% reduction in Irish greenhouse gas emissions will also focus efforts. And so will the agreement to have an annual report on meeting environmental targets, a sort of carbon budget every year before the real budget.

There is also agreement to accelerate the use of renewable energy sources for electricity generation, heat and transport. The undertaking is to have one-third of all electricity coming from renewable sources (wind energy, etc.) by 2020. A price support scheme will encourage investment in wave and tidal power, and an offshore wind farm will be developed in partnership with other countries in Europe.

And there is a wide range of other energy-related commitments, on building standards, home heating, insulation, electricity use and so on.

On transport, there are interesting proposals nationwide. There are commitments to ease the pressure in schools. And there are moves to put more equity into taxation and to use the tax system to encourage environmental choices.

There is going to be a stick as well as a carrot, with a carbon tax to be introduced during the lifetime of the government to make industries less wasteful of energy and to encourage people to drive fuel-efficient cars. All the good intentions in the world won't change our behavior as fast as a carbon tax.

This will be painful, of course. No one likes paying more tax, but in this case we will be able to avoid the tax by changing our behavior.

We can also expect more intensive education programs to make us more aware of how we can reduce our carbon production. Simple things like turning off lights, reducing heating, buying unpackaged goods and so on are all as important as car sharing and not using gas-guzzling SUVs.

On transport, the agreement includes commitments to widely expand commuter train services and inter-city rail use as well as more buses and better public transport services generally to get more of us out of our cars.

It may be aspirational, but the program for the next government does put a green hue right across policy in many areas. And although a lot of this was already Fianna Fail policy, the Greens in government will want to see it become a reality.

The characterization of the Greens in the past as muddle-headed muesli-eaters was often justified. But they have become more realistic and the rest of us have become more aware of the need to care for the global and local environment. So there has been a meeting of minds.

Over the past week we saw them show an impressive level of professionalism as they negotiated with Fianna Fail. There was no evidence of any failure to connect with the reality of everyday politics, which, as we all know, is the art of the possible.

The two Green ministers arrived for their first day at work last Friday on their bicycles (even though it was raining!) Eamon Ryan was pursued by photographers as he cycled into his department's office block on Adelaide Road on his first day as minister for communications, energy and natural resources. Meanwhile the new minister for the environment John Gormley arrived at his offices in the historic Custom House on the Quays, also on his bike.

The image will have been a shock to Fianna Fail ministers, for whom the ministerial Merc and driver is one of the most important perks of the job. No doubt the Green ministers will use their official cars as well, but it was interesting that they cycled to work, which is what many suburb dwellers should be doing.

It's going to be a baptism of fire for both of them, since neither have any ministerial experience.

The Department of the Environment, for example, has several divisions and several thousand civil servants on the staff and is responsible for many contentious areas of state administration, like building regulations, planning and so on.

In his last hours in office, for example, the outgoing minister signed the go-ahead for the controversial new motorway section near the Hill of Tara, one of Ireland's most historic sites. This was something the Greens had opposed.

Now it's something they will have to live with. It was a wake-up call to the difficult compromises that lie ahead of them.