On Ireland and Housing

Here's a clip from a story the BBC had that talks about Ireland and housing (the article was on making homes that produce no greenhouse gases):

Few European countries have seen such rapid economic growth in recent times as Ireland, where the "Celtic tiger" phenomenon stimulated the house-building industry, with demand and prices quickly rising.
Joe Durkan from the House of Tomorrow Programme, a project of the government agency Sustainable Energy Ireland, believes the introduction of energy performance certificates in this thriving house-building sector has raised the profile of energy efficiency.
"There's lots of information about it, and lots of excitement," he told BBC News.
"Builders are now using it as a marketing tool; the certificates have a sliding scale from A to G, and developers are now competing to offer A1 certificates on the properties they have for sale."