Original gas pipeline was in landslide area

IN his attempted defence of Shell’s Corrib gas project in Co Mayo (Letters, December 13), Brendan Cafferty has unwittingly highlighted some of its fundamental problems.

He points out that the landslide in 2003 was miles away from the refinery site at Bellinaboy. However, as he should know, the site at Bellinaboy is eight kilometres inland and so requires miles of onshore pipeline to deliver the raw gas. The original pipeline route was in the path of the 2003 Dooncarton landslide and if there had been a rupture there, it could have devastated a large area.

To determine the safety radius for sheltered and unsheltered people, engineers must assume the maximum operating pressure of the pipeline, which was to be 345 bar. To suggest that Shell only intended to operate at lower pressures is irrelevant.