Newsview: Life after the early Norman invaders and heritage castle
looks at the constructed remnants of early Norman invaders and the green technologies guiding the development of early 21st-century data centres.
There's an old story about Con Houlihan, the revered sports journalist who wrote a column for the Sunday World, at a time when it was in its pomp.
One of the young sub-editors was proud to be put in charge of the great writer’s work and took a call from Houlihan one day.
He wondered how far away The Irish Times’ offices were from the Sunday World offices — there was a pause, as the impressed, but slightly nonplussed junior editor replied that it was a couple of minutes walk away… “Well,” said Houilhan.
“Would you ever go down a borrow a bag of semi-colons from them so…”
It’s a great story and sorry, any excuse to use it because I’ve been meaning to mention the latest book from the Heritage Unit of Cork County Council, Heritage Castles of County Cork for some time.
It’s the fifth in the series following others on heritage bridges, houses, churches and centenary sites and it’s a great book — and one that will give the background to most of the castles in Cork for family rambles this summer.
However, the most outstanding element for those afflicted with the nervous tic of proofreading, (and yes, we have glasshouses too), is the glaring lack of not just semi-colons, (for they are out to pasture these days), but of the simple, cadence-making comma.
Ah they’re there, but spread out like a miser’s butter, when they could be sprinkled like confetti all over the text.
Perhaps that’s just a priggish response— (and an excuse to tell that Houlihan story) because this is not only a great book, but a superb initiative from Cork County Council’s heritage, architectural conservation and archaeological departments.
Liaising with local communities and using all the resources to hand, this series of books offers the built heritage of the county up for free, (especially if you go online to read in PDF format, or heaven forbid, download the lot and print from here.
But do buy the book, or books, for a tenner, support the work and have them on the shelves forever, or, as Kya deLongchamps points out, keep them in the car and use them for summer Sunday drives to get the details on all the places you see and visit.
Heritage Castles is a great one because who doesn’t like to visit a castle? There’s an easy description of castle types in the introduction, followed by an historic chronology of the Norman invasion and the advent of a new form of defensive structure — the motte and bailey, followed by the construction of stone castles towards the end of the 12th century.
And throughout the following centuries, significant defensive and tower houses were built by the Anglo Normans and Irish alike, with the history of each castle given as part of the description of it’s location, date of construction and the numerous sieges, wars and more, that involved the notable structures in this book. (Blarney Castle for some reason, is left out, but name-checked).
It’s also a great way to refresh one’s grasp on Irish history and see it not just as a linear progression of various outrages, (and there are those too), but as a sociological chronology of the evolution of Irish society — we have a good strong line in native, robber-barons too, it would appear.
Do please seek out this book, it’s a brilliant collection, easily written, highly informative and only academic where it needs to be — great for parents, teachers and anyone with any interest in our past.
The book retailing at €10, is available in bookshops around the county including Waterstones.
There are some minor benefits from the roll-out of data centres around the country — peripheral jobs in the areas of architecture and engineering, for instance, with the opportunity for specialist firms to get hands-on experience of emerging trends in the construction demands for the high-tech industry.
Last year, for instance, RKD architects were commissioned by Microsoft to “deliver a volume prototype to commence the LEED V4 certification for Data Centres, in the procurement of data centres as part of its global sustainability programme”.
What that means is that they are about to create a prototype for data centres, built to American Green Building council standards, to roll out around the world for the company.
The LEED V4 system is American-generated by the not-for-profit Green Building Council, (USGBC) and the Irish firm was recognised for its part in designing these prototype data centres along LEED V4 lines.
A ceremony celebrating this distinction took place atthe Greenbuild Europe 2018 conference in Berlin last month:
“As part of the closing plenary session, RKD Architects was honoured as part of a select group of leaders delivering on the promise of green buildings for all.
“During the event RKD joined Mahesh Ramanujam, president and CEO of the United States Green Building Council (USGBC) and Green Business Certification Inc (GBCI), on stage so he could personally thank us for our dedication to sustainability in the built environment and green building certification,” RKD says.
There’s an emerging trend related to data centres when it comes to the installation of wind turbines in the country — clusters or ‘farms’ specifically commissioned by the companies behind large data centres.
The advent of ‘private’ wind farms could be seen as a form of green-washing, were it not for the serious matter of millions of euros worth of carbon penalties coming down the line for Ireland shortly, if we don’t get our act together in time.
Wind farms specifically designed to guarantee a secure supply to companies such as Amazon and Microsoft, who have large data clusters in the greater Dublin area, may be one answer.
RKD is acting as masterplan and architectural advisers to @DiageoIreland in the developer selection process for one of the biggest #urban #regeneration projects in Europe.https://t.co/lHI8IJrTzi pic.twitter.com/sL9oN4q51Q
— RKD (@rkdarchitects) May 8, 2018
The drive to “greener, more efficient data centres from design to operation to maintenance”, which RKD is involved in, may yield further benefits in the long term.
Investment in data centres in Ireland is expected to exceed €1bn over the next four years, and according to 2017 figures, they use over 5.5% of our total energy resources, but that draw is expected to rise considerably by 2024.
The question these statistics beg, is whether off-grid solutions in wind and other micro-gen applications will offset future, heavy, data centre energy draws?
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