Ireland's emissions fall for fourth year but 2030 climate targets slip out of reach, EPA warns

Emissions fall but pace too slow

Ireland's greenhouse gas emissions dropped 2.2% last year, according to provisional EPA data, marking the fourth straight year of decline and the third year emissions stayed below the 1990 baseline. The reduction leaves total emissions 14.5% below 2018 levels, far short of the national target of a 51% cut by 2030. The EPA calculates that annual reductions must now run at more than 10% (over four times last year's pace) to close the gap.

With just four years to 2030, Ireland needs to accelerate delivery and achieve much deeper annual reductions to meet our climate targets.

Sectoral performance

All main sectors recorded falls. Residential, commercial and public buildings saw the largest drop (4.7%), helped by a milder winter and a 21.9% rise in heat-pump energy use. Transport emissions fell 1.5%, driven by a 14.9% increase in biofuels and growing EV adoption, though the sector still exceeded its emissions ceiling by 8.1%. Agriculture, the largest emitter at almost 39% of the total, edged down 0.2% as the cattle herd shrank 3.3%, but a 12.7% jump in fertiliser nitrogen offset part of that gain. Energy generation emissions hit a 36-year low, while industry broke its ceiling by 9.1%.

Data centre power surge

Separate CSO figures show data centres consumed 23% of Ireland's metered electricity in 2025, up from 5% a decade earlier. Their electricity use rose 10% year-on-year to 7,663 GWh, while all other consumers' demand grew just 2%. UCC senior lecturer Paul Deane said the extra load equates to adding 160,000 homes to the grid and would generate emissions equivalent to 30,000 extra cars. EirGrid has warned of a potentially challenging supply situation between 2026 and 2028.

In Ireland, they started doing that in 2015, so we had a 10-year headstart, so a lot of that extra headroom that we had on our capacity of wires to push power around and on our power plants to make power has pretty much been saturated now.

What's needed

EPA director general Eimear Cotter said clear prioritisation and sustained investment can deliver further cuts, and urged households to consider renewable power suppliers, efficient vehicles, and food-waste reduction. The Government has promised more EVs, heat pumps, fewer cattle, and more renewable electricity, but the EPA projects that even if all planned measures are delivered on time, the maximum reduction by 2030 would be 25%, well short of the 51% target.