Albert Dolan (Galway East, Fianna Fail)

I appreciate that it will go to public consultation and guidelines will be forthcoming, but the fear for people at the moment is the speed at which we are moving to see this enacted. While we in the Dáil and Government Departments are dealing with this, there is a delay that is allowing for more of these applications to come forward. Five or six of them are live in Galway East right now for wind farms, and there are proposals coming forward for solar also. Consideration definitely needs to be given to the appropriateness of different sections of land for solar. We have multiple proposed developments at the moment. Solar was not really viable in this county and it is only become viable in the last two or three years because of the decrease in the price of panels. Solar is going to play a bigger role. The fear is that our landscapes will be unrecognisable because it is too late to react to the planning applications that are in today. We need to move at speed in dealing with the proliferation of energy projects in Galway East.

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