Green light for Inishowen’s €100 million wind farm

The go-ahead has been granted to Inishowen’s biggest ever wind farm, which will cost €100 million to construct.

The Glenard wind energy project will consist of 15 giant turbines, each with a total tip height in the range of 162 to 173 metres, four times the height of Derry’s Guildhall.

An Bord Pleanala has granted planning permission to the massive new development after rejecting its own inspector's findings that it could lead to water pollution and landslides.

FuturEnergy Ireland, the joint venture company of ESB and Coillte, had sought permission three years ago to build Inishowen’s biggest and Donegal’s second biggest wind farm at Glenard - and it has now secured the green light.

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The green energy development will be situated in the rural heart of the peninsula, 6kms to the east of Buncrana town, mainly on the north-western facing slopes of Crocknacraddy Hill in the Illies - not far from the Eddie Fullerton Dam.
The €100m wind farm could generate enough power for up to 55,000 homes while avoiding around 85,000 tonnes of CO2 emissions every year.

If the wind farm generates more than 75MW of renewable electricity, it would provide enough electricity for 97 per cent of all households in County Donegal. The figure was based on an average household use of 4.2 megawatt hours (MWh) of electricity per year.

During the construction phase, around 125 jobs are expected to be created, while the wind farm would need three to five permanent staff during its operational phase.

There will also be one 110kV permanent electrical substation including a control building on the grounds of the development. A connection between the proposed substation and the national electricity grid will be necessary to export the electricity generated by the proposed wind farm.

It is intended for the wind farm to connect to the national grid via the existing Trillick 110kV Substation which is located 6.2km southwest of the proposed on-site substation with underground cables.

As part of the application, a borrow pit will be constructed, to source stone on-site for road upgrade and construction; one peat and spoil repository, to place excavated material during the construction phase.

Senior Planning Inspector Kevin Moore refused the application in his report due to reservations regarding both the burrow pit and the spoil repository, leading to pollution or possible landslides.

“I must impress upon the Board that concerns relating to landslide susceptibility on an upland site where it is proposed to store 415,600m3 of peat cannot go unnoticed, particularly with due regard being given to the substantial engineering of this site relating to site drainage management,” Mr Moore said.

He further added that “there is a concern that entrainment of suspended solids and the release of nutrients to waterbodies arising from a possible landslide or failure to contain huge volumes of peat and other waste materials constitute a realistic
potential outcome, with potentially significant effects for Lough Swilly.”

Mr Moore also had reservations over the visual impact the development will cause and the effect it will have on the local bat and bird population.

The An Bord Pleanála order — which is signed by Peter Mullan, the chairperson of An Bord Pleanála on behalf of the Board members — said Board members had considered but did not accept “the Inspector's assessment and conclusion reached that the Bord could not be satisfied that the proposed development, either individually or in combination with other projects, would not be likely to have an adverse effect on the Lough Swilly Special Area of Conservation.”

Instead, the Board, having reviewed the Environmental Impact Assessment Report, concluded that, in the first instance, both the existing ground conditions, including commercial forestry planted on peat and the existing drainage regime on site serving the forestry, are evidently well understood by the applicant, from information gathered from site walkovers and investigations.

The Board was also satisfied that the type and volumes of peat and spoil that require excavation and management on site arising from the construction of the wind farm development are also well understood as they are part of the project design.

A Geotechnical and Peat Stability study was carried out on the site. The findings of the assessment conclude that the site has an “acceptable margin of safety and is suitable for the proposed windfarm development and this includes the excavation of peat and spoil and subsequent deposition of the unusable peat and spoil to their permanent locations in both the borrow pit and peat and spoil repository.”

The assessment includes recommendations and control measures for construction work in peat to ensure that all works adhere to an acceptable standard of safety.

“A small number of locations were found to have a slightly elevated construction risk and these were noted to require localised control and mitigation measures to control surface water flow and prevent build-up on water in drains.”

Overall, the Board was satisfied that the type and volume of peat and spoil requiring excavation and placement within the site is well understood and was further satisfied that the development has been designed to take account of this environment with a low risk of a peat failure or landslides occurring or significant effects on the environment arising as a result.

It is also of relevance to note that the design and layout of the windfarm took account of previous peat failures that have occurred on peatland sites (such as recent failures at Shass Mountain 2020, Co Leitrim and Meenbog 2020 and the Derrybrien failure in Co Galway in 2003). The lessons learned from these peat slide events have been incorporated into the design of this project and the construction.

An Bord Pleanála granted permission on 20 strict conditions, these include that the developer shall review usage by birds of the wind farm site and document bird casualties through an annual monitoring programme. The developer shall provide for the use of trained dog search teams for bat carcasses for a minimum of 3 years post-construction on the site.

A further condition was that the construction stage and filling of the repository and borrow pit on the site shall be supervised by a qualified and appropriately experienced geotechnical engineer.

Meanwhile at the end of last year, FuturEnergy was granted permission by Donegal County Council to construct Europe’s first iron-air battery storage facility. The ‘Ballynahone Energy Storage,’ will contain 248 shipping containers at Ballynahone, Trillick on the outskirts of Buncrana. Since getting the green light, the application has been referred to An Bord Pleanála after a number of objectors have appealed the decision. A ruling by the planning body is expected to be made in April.