An independent TD has said that the government must not become complicit in demonising farmers and the agricultural sector in the emissions debate.

Carol Nolan said that the ongoing negotiations about sectoral ceilings should not foster a view that farmers are in any way hostile to responsible engagement with environmental or climate concerns.

The Laois Offaly TD was speaking ahead of her attendance today (Wednesday, July 20) at a Joint Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine debate on the calculation of methane emissions.

The committee is set to hear from Bill Callanan, chief inspector at the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM), as well as Marc Kierans, principal officer at the Department of the Environment, Climate and Communications.

Callanan is expected to outline that even reaching the lower end of the target range will require significant transformational change in the Irish agriculture sector.

The meeting will also hear a submission from the Carbon Removals Action Group (CRAG) and several of its prominent scientific advisors.

Deputy Nolan said that it is her firm view that government has allowed a number of opportunities to reduce emissions to slip through its fingers, including tackling hedgerow carbon sequestration and failing to hit its own afforestation targets.

“A number of the submissions to the committee hearing today have clearly identified and underscored the massive levels of change that are being demanded from farmers and from Irish agriculture.

“As I understand it, the committee will hear from CRAG that farming in Ireland is undergoing a reputational crisis, due in no small part to repeated and incomplete assertions that methane emissions from cattle are largely responsible for global warming," Nolan continued.

CRAG is also expected to outline that the separate treatment of methane, outside of the carbon cycle, is provided for in the 2006 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) guidelines for national greenhouse gas (GHG) inventories.

Nolan said she found it "profoundly alarming" that the Irish government insists on treating biogenic methane the same as carbon dioxide (CO2).

“It is time this government took its head out of the green sand that it has its face buried in for the last number of years.

"It is time to properly explore rational and reasonable alternatives which do not require setting Irish agriculture on the path to ruin," Nolan concluded.

The Cabinet is expected to sign off on sectoral emissions reductions targets over the comings days, with the agricultural ceiling to be set between 22-30%, relative to emissions in 2018.