'In a nutshell, do robot trees work?' Cork City Council defends data delay

Cllr Colm Kelleher officially launched the ‘city trees’ in August 2021 during his term as lord mayor, and had to defend the spending of just over €404,000 of public money on them as part of a wider ‘greening of the city’ initiative. Picture: Andy Gibson

City officials have defended the delay in providing data on the impact of Cork’s controversial ‘robot trees’ on air quality.

Councillors were told air quality was a complex issue and they will have to wait until the first quarter of next year before the analysis of a full year of "raw data" from the devices will be published.

The confirmation came at Monday’s city council meeting where former lord mayor, Cllr Colm Kelleher, asked why the data on the effectiveness of the devices was not available now, some 12 months after they were unveiled.

“In a nutshell, do they work?” he asked.

Mr Kelleher officially launched the ‘city trees’ or moss wall devices in August 2021 during his term as lord mayor, and had to defend the spending of just over €404,000 of public money on them as part of a wider ‘greening of the city’ initiative.

The moss is designed to filter the air and remove pollutants, with in-built sensors used to collate air quality data for analysis. The 3m-high devices also feature a built-in chair and act as street furniture.

But last May, the Local Government Audit Service criticised the council for the lack of any “value-of-money assessment conducted in advance” over the expenditure in October 2020 on the devices.

The moss is designed to filter the air and remove pollutants, with in-built sensors used to collate air quality data for analysis. The 3m-high devices also feature a built-in chair and act as street furniture.  Picture: Andy Gibson.

Mr Kelleher said a year on, he wants to see the data to see if the devices are effective or not.

David Joyce, the director of services in the council’s roads and environment operations directorate, said it was made clear when the devices were officially launched that a full 12 months of data needed to be captured in order to make any evaluation meaningful.

“The impact of the moss walls may differ from season to season — cold, wet or dry conditions,” he said.

“Thus, without a full set of data, 12 months, any evaluation would be meaningless and a waste of time.

“Now that the 12-month trial period has been completed, the raw data that has been gathered over the past 12 months needs to be processed, analysed and results/conclusions drawn from same.

“This process will take some time and is scheduled to take place during Q4 of 2022.

“It is therefore planned to include the evaluation of the impact of the moss walls in the Air Quality Annual Report which will be published in Q1 of 2023.” 

He said air pollution was a complex issue and the city council was open to exploring new and innovative ways to tackle it.

“It is also important that Cork City Council embraces and indeed trials new and emerging technologies in “live” testbed environments," he said.

“We have a responsibility as a public service body to assist and further important research and trial innovative technologies that, going forward, could help combat air pollution.

“It is also essential to trial new and cutting-edge technologies and to be innovative, given our important status as a Smart city and a technology cluster.”