Ireland may help to put the UK back on track in its use of clean, renewable energy

Plans to link electricity grids offer the UK a chance to meet its clean energy targets – but threaten to blight Irish beauty spots
 Ireland's unspoiled, windswept west coast could become the focus of a new wave of wind farm construction in the wake of a high-level diplomatic meeting to be held tomorrow in London.

UK deputy prime minister Nick Clegg, Taoiseach Enda Kenny and other senior members of the British-Irish Council will gather to discuss a plan to expand electricity grid connections throughout the British Isles. In particular, they want to build new inter-connectors to link the electricity grids of Ireland and Britain in order to transmit power from new windfarms in Ireland to England.

The aim of the plan, created by the British government, is to open up remote regions that could provide Britain with more power generated by wind farms, as well as by tide and wave plants, and so reduce its reliance on fossil fuels.

"The west coast of Ireland has some of the fiercest winds in Europe," said Charles Hendry, the UK energy minister, who will be attending the meeting. "They whip in off the Atlantic which makes it is an ideal location for wind farms. However, the Irish market for electricity is less than a tenth of that of Britain. That means that companies cannot afford to build wind farms in Ireland because there is no market for their power. We want to put that right."

The construction of wind farms in Ireland that would supply power to neighbouring countries could help to put the UK back on track in its use of clean, renewable energy. Britain has recently been criticised for falling short of its targets for constructing wind power plants and for cutting its carbon emissions. Importing clean power could help to resolve the problem.

A link connecting the grids of Ireland and Britain is currently under construction and will stretch from Rush North Beach, Co Fingal, to Barkby Beach, north Wales. The Irish Sea Inter-Connector will cost £500m and have a capacity of 500 megawatts. However, under the scheme to be discussed tomorrow, other new links would also be built. This would open up a market for electricity for wind farms on the west coast of Ireland whose power could be transmitted under the Irish Sea.

Developments like these would be controversial, however. Construction of wind turbines generates strong opposition and plans to build clusters in mainland Britain have been greeted with fury. Opponents say wind turbines rarely work to capacity; spoil some of the country's most beautiful landscapes; and kill large numbers of wild birds.

Supporters argue that wind farms help to reduce dependence on carbon-emitting fossil-fuel plants and are non-polluting. Nevertheless, the prospect of giant turbines peppering the wild, craggy coasts of the Dingle Peninsula, Kerry and Galway will provoke a furious response.

Hendry rejected the idea that the turbines would be controversial in Ireland, however. "It will be up to the Irish government and the Irish people to decide if they want to build them. This is a voluntary programme and it could bring significant wealth to the country with very little downside."

The All Islands electricity plan is not confined to Ireland and Britain. The British-Irish Council meeting – which will also be attended by Alex Salmond, Scotland's first minister, and leaders of local governments in Wales, Northern Ireland, Jersey, Guernsey and the Isle of Man – will consider a number of proposals to modernise the British Isles' electricity grid network. Some of these focus on existing sources, in particular onshore and offshore wind turbines, while others anticipate the construction of new forms of energy generation such as wave and tidal power. The islands of Islay and Orkney have already been targeted as promising sites for tidal plants. However, all sites suffer from the problem of remoteness, an issue targeted by the plan to be discussed tomorrow.

"Some of the best resources for generating tidal power lie in waters off the Channel Islands," said Hendry. "But as things stand at present, there is no way to get that power to mainland Britain. We need to look at building a new inter-connector with France, taking it from the new nuclear power station currently being built at Flamanville, via the Channel Islands, to the UK. When the tides are right at Jersey and Guernsey, we could take electricity from their wave generators, and when they are not providing power, take it from Flamanville."

Hendry added that earlier discussions with delegates indicated that the plan would be well received tomorrow. Once the various proposals had been discussed, detailed analysis would be carried out over the next 18 months with the aim of turning them into specific projections that could be launched in 2013.


Source: Robin McKie, science editor - guardian.co.uk, Saturday 18 June 2011 22.40 BST