Shell, the corporation which owns Enterprise Energy, is reluctant to make any further investment in the Mayo gas pipeline, unless there is a reasonable chance of overcoming the planning difficulties surrounding the major project, the Taoiseach told the Dáil yesterday

The global board of the corporation will decide this month whether to go ahead with the project, but Shell's president is "loath" to sign the allocation for a "few billion euros unless he believes there is a reasonable prospect of success", Mr Ahern said.

At a recent meeting, the corporation president told the Taoiseach he was concerned because Shell "has literally put hundreds of millions of euro into that project", and asked if the Critical Infrastructure Bill could be in place before that decision was made.

The legislation would fast-track major infrastructural projects through land and planning requirements. An Bord Pleanála has upheld an appeal against the original project.

The board made a unanimous decision to turn down the application because of the high risk posed by the transfer of some 650,000 cubic metres of peat to adjoining blanket bog - equivalent to an unstable "blanket" covering 94 acres, with part of it running down onto a regional road.

It said this would constitute an "unacceptable risk to the health and safety of the local community and of the general public on the public road" adjoining the site.

Mr Ahern said he had informed the Shell president that it was "not possible or realistic", with the "best will in the world in the timescale required to pass a major Bill that has not yet been drafted in the Department and has to come to Cabinet and to the Oireachtas".

Mr Ahern said: "I gave him my best advice which was that he would have to go through the existing process."

He added: "I could not give him a guarantee that he would get through the planning process. I did say that the country viewed this as a good project but he has to comply with the planning regulations."

The Fine Gael leader, Mr Enda Kenny, during Taoiseach's questions, said that the Enterprise Energy project to bring the gas pipeline ashore "is clearly in the common good. While cognisance has to be taken of legitimate objections by residents and so on, the Government should be able to make a decision in the common good in cases that are of major national import".

Mr Ahern pointed out that the Bill had to be "drawn narrowly", which was the correct approach. It would not be for many projects because otherwise, in the future, TDs could be "lobbied left, right and centre so that everything was covered in the Critical Infrastrcutural Bill".