Background
Since the mid 1980s, there has been central oversight of energy consumption by Northern Ireland public organisations with the objective of meeting the targets for government departments which have been specified from time to time.
The current targets are those established under the 1999 Climate Change Programme (which embodied the agreements contained in the Kyoto Protocol) and the 2003 White Paper “Our Energy Future – creating a Low Carbon Economy”.
While the targets in these policy papers do not automatically apply to the devolved administrations, in summer 2004 the then Minister endorsed the current targets as applying in Northern Ireland.
