An Bord Pleanála has rejected an application by a wind energy company to grant it leave to apply for “substitute consent” to enable eight turbines that have been operating beyond their planning remit in Waterford to remain in operation.

IT’S not so long since Irish people thought trees were for the birds — a century ago, a miserly 1% of our land had trees on it, the nadir of 1,000 years of plundering and chopping for which we can blame the Vikings, the Normans, the English and ourselves.

Donal Hickey looks at mountain biking in Ireland