Mr. Kevin O'Donovan:

I will answer the question on land agreements and how they relate to designated areas, NHAs and SACs. This would have been one of the criteria in the site selection process at which we would have looked at the start.

I am not sure what proportion of Coillte's overall land bank is under environmental designation but we avoided those areas in the context of identifying sites in which we were interested.
On the land agreements, the process is quite long. We approach a landowner and explain the potential for wind development on his or her lands. There is usually quite an amount of back and forth communication between our land team, based in Tullamore, and the landowner, explaining the concept of the project and then getting into the finer detail of what is involved in wind farm development if the landowner is interested in continuing those discussions. At the end of that process, if the landowner is still interested, it proceeds to the point of drawing up an option agreement. The option agreement then goes to the landowner's legal adviser or solicitor. There is a back and forth process between solicitors to ensure the legal agreement backs up what was agreed with the landowner. Typically, with wind farm development, an option agreement is put in place during the assessment, feasibility and planning stages of the project. A lease agreement is only put in place if planning permission is obtained for turbines on the land and the project is about to proceed.
It is important that this committee has an overall understanding of how we have approached consultation and of what has happened to date. The committee must also understand that we have a long way to go yet. Initially, we launched the concept of this project for the midlands in 2012. At that time, we explained that there was a potential for this type of development in the midlands but that a lot of work had to be done to identify suitable areas and sites. We have a community-based team in Tullamore who are meeting and working with local groups in the five counties. We have had public meetings, distributed newsletters and have used various other forms of communication to explain what is involved in the project to the communities. However, that process is not finished. There is a lot more to be done and one of the key steps, towards the end of the assessment process, is to hold further public meetings to present to the public the exact location of turbines and the overall extent of the proposed project. That is a very important step and we are working towards that at the moment. In the overall context of consultation, the strategic environmental assessment is a key part of the process to allow export projects to be considered for planning permission applications. That is an important step in the process, particularly in the context of addressing concerns around the Aarhus Convention and the need for full consultation.
As I understand it, an enormous amount of feedback and submissions were received in response to the first stage of the consultation phase of the strategic environmental assessment process. The next stage will take place over the next few months and I have no doubt, given the number of submissions that have been made, that there is full public involvement in the process leading towards an overall framework and policy for the development of export projects. It is probably frustrating for interested parties that they do not have all of the details at the start, but that is the whole idea of consultation. This is not a fait accomplibut an ongoing process of interaction between the various parties, including developers, other stakeholders and the public. That is what is going on at the moment. There is agreement that issues like planning guidelines, strategic environmental assessments and other parts of the process must be worked on to incorporate the concept of export, but we have long way to go in terms of consultation on these matters.