The Green Party has called for a once-off fossil fuel inflation fund of €2.5 billion in the budget to help families pay to install solar panels in their home in addition to what it called “targeted credits” for families who are struggling to pay energy bills.

Opening the party’s one-day gathering of its representatives in Dublin, party leader Roderic O’Gorman criticised the Government for financing one-off measures focused on fossil fuels while making no investment in alternatives.

He said that allotting some of the €2.5 billion to increase the roll-out of low-cost solar panels would help families reduce energy bills and would also help the transition to electric vehicles as cars could be charged at home.

“This would make a really important step for families now, but into the future as well. Once you’ve solar panels installed you are getting free or low-cost electricity for the years and the decades to come.

“You’re protected from these up-and-down spikes in the prices of oil and gas into the future.”

He also said that part of the fund should be used for short-term measures such as targeted energy credits across 2027.

At a media conference, O’Gorman said the key themes for the party as the Dáil returned were to use Budget 2027 to protect families from the immediate impact on inflation and up-and-down spikes in fossil fuel, work towards social justice and put pressure on the Government for its failure to take action on climate change.

He also said the party would seek funding of €85 million to the National Transport Authority to neutralise the fare increases recently announced.

Deputy leader Cllr Hazel Chu told the conference that the party would be advocating for a levy of 1 cent per kilowatt of electricity used by data centres, which would raise €84 million in revenue.

“Data centres consume 23 per cent of metered electricity and that is set to rise to 30 per cent by 2030,” she said.

Chu also called for a moratorium on the building of new data centres.

Cllr Janet Horner said the party would be participating in protests during US president Donald Trump’s visit to Ireland over the weekend.

“We’ve seen Trump drag women’s rights backwards in the US. We have fought in Ireland for repeal, we fought for expansion of abortion rights,” she said.

“We’ve turned out on the streets day in, day out to protest a genocide in Palestine … while we have seen the Trump regime champion Netanyahu’s genocide.”

Senator Malcolm Noonan said hundreds of thousands of hectares had been destroyed by wildfires in Europe during the summer.

“We’ve had a huge loss of agricultural production, not just in Europe but also here in Ireland, where we’ve had extreme levels of drought and which has had a knock-on effect on water quality. It has a knock-on effect on livestock, but it has a knock-on effect on farm incomes as well,” he said.

He said another consequence was a cost-of-food crisis, which needed to be addressed.