It reveals that Co Dublin has the lowest share, with just 13pc of employment there in the five highest polluting sectors.
The report by the Nevin Economic Research Institute identifies the five highest emitting sectors as: agriculture; forestry and fishing; manufacturing, electricity, gas, steam and air-conditioning supply; water, sewerage and waste management; and transportation and storage.
Dublin’s record as a county with low levels of jobs in high-emission sectors contrasts with Cavan, Monaghan, Tipperary, Longford and Clare. In these counties, the report says jobs in the highest emitting sectors make up 33pc, 32pc, 31pc, 30pc and 30pc of total employment, respectively. The report, Measuring Green Jobs in the Republic of Ireland, concludes that this is due to the fact that these counties have a high share of agriculture, forestry and fishing.
If agriculture was removed and replaced with the next highest emission sector – mining and quarrying – the figures change dramatically in Monaghan, Cavan, Tipperary and Leitrim.
“These four counties lost 9pc, 9pc, 8pc and 7pc respectively, meaning that the percentage of intensive sectors as a share of the whole workforce declined,” it says.
“For Cavan, the change was considerable, as it went from a third of all jobs being emission intensive to slightly less than a quarter – showing the impact that the agricultural sector has on the Irish workforce.”
It says Dublin is the only county that saw no change, while Louth, Kildare, Meath and Wicklow saw a change of less than 4pc.
When someone imagines a green job, they picture a solar panel installer, environmentalist, or a worker in an electric vehicle factory, says the report. However, it says roles from train drivers to chemical scientists can be classified as green occupations.
It says green jobs reduce our impact on the local and global climate and improve the quality of the environment. It points to 145,365 green jobs in Dublin, representing a quarter of all green employment.
“Different methodologies for green job measurement come to very different conclusions about the extent of the green economy in Ireland,” says the report.
A “narrower”, but commonly used “environmental goods and services sector” definition, means “green” jobs made up just over 2pc of overall employment according to the latest data.
The highest portion of these jobs are in manufacturing and industry because engineers and workers producing goods to increase efficiency and reduce emissions work in this sector.
The report says the overall objective of the “green transition” is not to make every job actively “green”.
“In reality, not every job will be tasked with actively improving our planet, but the core change must be made by reducing the number of “brown” jobs so that their negative impact can be grossly outweighed by the impact of this new green sector,” it says.