Developer-led offshore wind could result in a 'free-for-all,' Taoiseach warns

Enterprise Minister Simon Coveney and Taoiseach Leo Varadkar, centre, with senior Ørsted executives, Duncan Clark (left) and TJ Hunter at the Danish multinational energy firm's Irish HQ in Cork. Picture: Darragh Kane

A State-led, plan-led approach to developing Irish offshore wind resources instead of a developer-led approach needs to be adopted, the Taoiseach has said.

Leo Varadkar was responding to concerns about the pace of planning for developing offshore wind raised by business network Chambers Ireland on RTÉ this week.

Chambers Ireland director of policy and communications Shane Conneely told Morning Ireland that the Government’s latest offshore renewable energy development plan is conservative and retrograde, and could “act as a further bottleneck in the process of activating our offshore renewable energy resources".  

The plan would prevent Ireland from fulfilling climate targets of 5GW of offshore energy in Irish waters by 2030, Mr Conneely said.

Mr Varadkar said concerns like those expressed by Chambers Ireland would be listened to at a renewable energy summit to be hosted by the Department of the Taoiseach “in the coming weeks,” but that a collaborative approach would be important for the country to meet its energy targets. Mr Varadkar said: 

I set the ambition of Ireland becoming energy independent and that means everyone working together to achieve that. 

“To my mind it makes the most sense that we have a State-led, plan-led approach to this rather than a developer-led approach, which could be a bit of a free-for-all and might not work out the best.” 

The Taoiseach was speaking at the Irish HQ of Danish renewable energy company Ørsted in Cork on Friday, where the firm was celebrating an investment of €700m in wind energy in Ireland in the past two years.

Coastal communities in Cork, Waterford, and Wexford would need access to a robust planning process to make sure their voices are heard when it comes to developing offshore wind farms off the south coast, Mr Varadkar told the Irish Examiner.

A total of 17 licence applications for surveys and site investigations for offshore wind farms along the south coast, stretching from Rosslare to Skibbereen, are in various stages of progress at present.

A Waterford campaign group, Blue Horizon, is calling for all offshore wind farms to be located 22km from the coast to minimise the impacts on tourism, fishing and biodiversity. Some of the exploration licences seek to survey sites as close as 8km to shore.

Mr Varadkar said that while he wouldn’t necessarily support a 22km limit under all circumstances, he understood the concerns of coastal communities.

“I can understand people’s concerns about the visual impact and the impact on fisheries and so on, but when you’re building anything big, be that a motorway or a new power station, those kinds of concerns arise,” he said. 

“That’s why we have to have a robust and fair planning process that weights everything up and makes the right decision in the wider common good.”

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