Michael Clifford: Governments failing on an issue convulsing communities across Ireland

Years of passing the buck on updating windfarm guidelines has put renewable energy targets in doubt and caused bitter division in our communities, writes Michael Clifford

The introduction of windfarms, though valuable for meeting renewable energy goals, can endanger the long-term cohesion of communities. Picture: Denis Minihane

As the evenings shorten, RTÉ is having another stab at drama.

This season’s offering taps into a major issue in rural Ireland.

The South Westerlies has as its setting a fictional West Cork town earmarked for a new windfarm.

The promotional material sets out the conflict that arises between the commercial interests of the Norweigan-owned farm, fronted by a Dublin woman, and local objectors to a major intrusion on life as they know it.

The cast is high calibre. It should be worth a punt.

Irrespective of how good or bad it turns out to be, the series can rely on close scrutiny from one constituency — the growing number of communities around the country who have been there, done that.

In the last 15 years, the development of windfarms has evolved into a major issue for rural communities.

The scenario has been replicated right across the country and always had the makings of great drama.

A rumour takes flight that they’re a-comin’. Inquiries are made.

It turns out that, yes, there is a farm earmarked and in the preliminary planning process.

Public meetings are held, and research is conducted into every aspect of wind energy.

Politicians are lobbied, the media contacted.

Campaigns of opposition arise out of fear and can sometimes heighten fears beyond a rational level.

Orla Brady as Kate in The South-Westerlies

Much of the fear is soundly based and revolves around noise, in particular, the concept of shadow flicker from turbines, and also visual impact.

On the other side, there is often a local business interest behind the windfarm venture.

This person may be required to possess nether regions of steel in a local area, where the hostility can be radioactive.

Of course, those who object would instead suggest that it’s the brass neck that is this person’s outstanding feature.

The other cohort in favour of development tends to be local landowners whose property will be utilised.

Rental income from windfarms is steady, long term, and an antidote to farming in a time of great uncertainty.

This heady mix can lead to some serious bad blood and does absolutely nothing for the long-term cohesion of communities.

In the worst-case scenarios, there will be a blockade or the objectors are forced to court, taking on long months and years freighted with stress and worry over the ruinous financial fallout that comes from an unsuccessful legal action.

All of this is against a backdrop in which renewable energy takes on greater significance with each passing day as climate change tightens its grip on the planet.

The State has committed to producing 70% of its energy through renewables by 2030.

Just this week, we have two examples of wind energy generating opposition in rural Ireland. 

A windfarm earmarked for the scenic Gougane Barra in West Cork was refused planning permission by the county council.

Among the reasons for the refusal was that plans for blades on the wind turbines were of an order of 178.5m. The plans had also come up against opposition from the local community.

Tadhg Ó Duinnín, chairman of a community group in the nearby village of Ballingeary, was quoted in yesterday’s Irish Examiner as saying the area was already encircled with windfarms.

“This community has had to take more than its fair share of them,” he said.

Meanwhile, the semi-state forestry body Coillte has recently submitted plans for a windfarm on the Sligo/Leitrim border, prompting the setting up of a local objection group, Wind Aware Dromahair.

The farm is designed to accommodate 10 turbines with an average height of 170m. A spokesperson for the group told The Irish Times yesterday that the plans are based on the 2006 guidelines for windfarms, and they fear that 40 homes in the area would be adversely impacted.

St Finbarr's Oratory at Gougane Barra  Picture: Eddie O'Hare

The issue over out-of-date guidelines cited in Dromahair is the one that has dogged windfarm development for nearly 15 years and created major confusion and frustration.

Turbines are being constructed under the 2006 guidelines, while technology has raced ahead at a breakneck speed. For instance, in 2006, the average size of a turbine blade was 50m. Now it is, as seen above, in the region of 170m-180m. The guidelines are simply not fit for purpose — yet successive governments continue to long-finger a statutory update.

This is down to nothing more than the politics of kicking the can down the road. New guidelines will inevitably leave somebody feeling aggrieved, probably highly aggrieved. Install stringent guidelines, however, and developers will simply refuse to build.

To be fair, developers already have to work in a State that has one of the most dispersed populations in Europe. Decades of appalling planning has seen to that. Most possible locations for farms are going to impact on somebody, and you can’t blame homeowners today for the disastrous planning policies of the last 40 years.

The answer to this dilemma since new guidelines were first proposed in 2009 seems to have been for successive ministers to gladly pass it on to their successors.

In August 2013, the then-Minister for the Environment Phil Hogan told the Dáil that a process to draft new guidelines “which will address the key issues of noise (including separation distance) and shadow flicker” was under way.

“Draft guidelines will be published for public consultation by end-November 2013, with a view to finalising guidelines by mid-2014,” he said.

Of course, they weren’t. The parcel was subsequently passed to each successive environment minister, each of whom apparently ran into some problem that relieved them of the burden of making a decision.

The latest draft was published in December 2019. According to the Department of Housing, there have been almost 500 submissions which will require “detailed analysis”.

One thing is certain — there will be no rush with it. The smart money says the current minister Darragh O’Brien will be gone before any new guidelines see the light of day.

In this, successive governments are failing abysmally to lead on an issue that is convulsing some communities across the country and impacting on the State’s ability to general renewable energy.

The resultant conflict, fallout, divisions, and heightened emotions all make for great drama. But it’s no way to run a country.