Hard to Hide the 'Hook'!
Those familiar with the Waterford Estuary in southeast Ireland will know how hard it would be to hide the dramatic image of the Hook Peninsula and its imposing lighthouse. It is an unchanged day and even night landscape since my childhood days 5 kilometers away in Dunmore East. In its stark treeless, seascape setting there is no way that you could mitigate its 42m high landscape/visual impact and I am sure that there are few who would wish to screen off the iconic image. When the original beacon was erected at the tip of Hook Head some eight centuries ago the concern for visual impact would have been to ensure that it could be seen by as many sailors as possible from the longest distance possible.
Its landscape ‘presence’ today is already somewhat muted by the on-land wind turbines trundling along in the eastern background, but it may soon be far less iconic as it competes visually with an armada of off-shore 150m hub height plus turbines due to come a-sailing in from the south.
Perhaps future generations will in time come to love their segmented horizon and will need to be consulted in due course about their removal, but as we prepare to launch the proposed fleet let us in words borrowed from the current consultation process ensure that we do indeed end up with “the right offshore technologies, in the right places”.
The draft plan and the accompanying strategic environmental assessment (SEA) might reassure you that this admirable aim will be achieved through strategy, research, best practice guidance, design, planning, and monitored delivery. But, there is a problem at the heart of the package of documents that is of ‘wind turbine’ proportions.?????
The SEA rightly lists landscape as an impact to be considered and assesses and that the impact will be significantly negative in the absence of mitigation and suggests that this might reduce to ‘minor?negative’ with mitigation!
The SEA Objective 16 states – “Implement the requirements of the European Landscape Convention through high quality design for sustainable stewardship of Ireland’s landscape and by integrating landscape into Ireland’s approach to sustainable development”
On Pages 111 & 112 the SEA states the following:
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“Landscape and visual effects to be given due consideration during lower tier (DMAP and/or individual project) assessments and due account should be given to any regulations or guidance on visual assessments by the Minister Housing, Local Government and Heritage.”
?And
“Areas included within the environment model should be subject to further, more detailed analysis to understand and appropriately mitigate potential effects in lower tier assessments.”
There would appear to be a major problem with the SEA and the OREDP II Plan which is dependent on the SEA for its credibility.
The European Landscape Convention 2000 (ELC) is identified as the main mechanism to facilitate mitigation. Surprisingly, there is no mention of the National Landscape Strategy 2015-2025 (NLS) – which should be delivering on the aims and objectives of the ELC. Perhaps the authors of the SEA were aware of the problem in that the NLS was not adequately resourced from day one and since 2018 it has stalled with no staff or resources. The responsible minister – Minister of State for Heritage & Electoral Reform consequently is in no position to offer advice and guidance on how best to mitigate the potential landscape/visual offshore renewable energy developments during lower tier assessment.
The OREDP II is identified as a high level, national level strategy which seeks to provide a framework within which lower tier assessments may subsequently address site or project-specific details. The National Landscape Strategy 2015-2025 is also a high level, national level strategy. Both strategies have to be resourced and implemented in parallel, otherwise as a matter of good, honest, integrated governance OREDP II cannot proceed on the basis of the current SEA!