The Oil Promotion Federation has claimed that thousands of jobs in the sector are at risk because of the Government’s proposal to extend the Galway to Dublin gas pipeline.
The OPF said it is inappropriate for the Government to put huge emphasis on promoting gas in the heating market, to the detriment of other sources of energy.
Peter Conway, a spokesman for the group, said more than 20,000 people are currently employed in the Irish oil industry and thousands of those jobs could be lost because of the promotion of gas over oil.