A COUNCILLOR who called on Cork County Council to create clear planning requirements for solar farms, energy storage facilities, and wind turbines was told that this remit is outside the powers of the local authority, as they adhere to current national guidelines.
North Cork-based Independent Cllr Peter O’Donoghue raised the motion at a recent meeting of Cork County Council and asked that all current applications for such developments be put on hold until such requirements are in place.
He said the planning requirements would ensure the county’s fertile agricultural land is preserved for food production and natural scenery.
‘There is no county as beautiful as ours, but now this is under threat due to industrial solar and wind developments. Throughout Cork, farmers are being offered huge amounts of money by solar companies to install hundreds of acres of solar panels on their land, with East Cork particularly targeted,’ said Cllr O’Donoghue.
Cllr. Peter O'Donoghue (Ind).
‘It makes absolutely no sense to use productive fertile agricultural land to accommodate largescale industrial developments.
‘Put these solar panels on houses, sheds and commercial buildings all over the county to subsidise our grid – but not in our fertile land,’ he pleaded.
He said this development is far from ‘clean or green’ and maintains it’s the exact opposite of what the environment needs, and queried what happens to these solar farms when they are finished.
However, Council chief executive Moira Murrell said it’s not legally possible to put current applications on hold, and said that it is really important that as a planning authority it’s not something they could do.
It was suggested that the motion be referred to the planning strategic policy committee (SPC) after a similar motion about battery storage facilities was raised in July.
Cllr. Isobel Towse (SD).
Cllr Isobel Towse (SD) said that while she opposed his motion, she does agree that the county needs to focus their efforts on rooftop solar for farms, businesses, schools and homes.
‘This level of direct access to clean, essentially free electricity should be our priority, but I am not opposed to solar farms at all,’ she said.
‘I believe we need a bit of everything in the right places and solar farms must be part of the mix. Energy storage is crucial to the renewable energy transition also. It’s just not helpful or a good use of everyone’s time to try and block all renewable energy developments outright, when the science to support them is there.’
Cllr Ann Marie Ahern (FF) said that the national guidelines have not been updated since 2006 and called for an immediate review, while Cllr John Buckley (Ind) said solar farms are an ‘eyesore and blight on the countryside’ and that many locals are not happy with them in their locality.
‘If the guidelines were more transparent, it would allay fears of locals,’ he said.
Cllr John Collins (Ind Ire) said people should ‘beware of those bearing gifts’ and said these companies have caused rifts in many small communities, while Cllr Ann Bambury (SD) said she lives near a solar farm which isn’t having a huge impact on the local community, but it did initially during the planning process. She said it’s not having the big visual impact that people originally thought it would have on completion.
Cllr O’Donoghue concluded that he found it hard to hear that the local authority don’t have the power to do anything and called on the Council to write to the Minister and his department for concise planning requirements for solar, wind farms, and energy storage facilities.
