Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)

I attended a public meeting on Monday night in Ballymackey outside Nenagh organised by a biogas concern group. I also met groups here a week earlier. Despite the issue of the location of the plan possibly being unsuitable, which road networks alone would dictate, we are committed as a country to achieving certain renewable goals in this area by 2030. It is proposed that there would be over 200 of these plants. There is no regulatory process for how these plants will be put in place. There are no planning guidelines. All county development plans say something different when it comes to this area. When will we have a regulatory framework for this? When will we have planning guidelines for this to give some guidance to local authorities when it comes to the mass of applications for this? When will a tariff be confirmed in relation to their construction? We are all in favour of renewables but we are way behind and it is unfair on communities across Ireland to be left in this situation.

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