planning permission needed for domestic windturbine?

ei.sdraob

Anyone know if planning permission is needed for a windturbine

nothing big maybe 3-6KW

house and land on top of hill, west facing, plenty of wind, in galway county

area is not under any special clauses last i checked, but there i an old ruin (ruin of a castle) about 300 meters away (the ruin is for sale too )

sydthebeat

ei.sdraob wrote: »

Anyone know if planning permission is needed for a windturbine

nothing big maybe 3-6KW

house and land on top of hill, west facing, plenty of wind, in galway county

area is not under any special clauses last i checked, but there i an old ruin (ruin of a castle) about 300 meters away (the ruin is for sale too )

see class 2 (b)

http://www.environ.ie/en/Legislation/DevelopmentandHousing/Planning/FileDownLoad,1486,en.pdf



1. The turbine shall not be erected on or
attached to the house or any building or other
structure within its curtilage.
2. The total height of the turbine shall not
exceed 13 metres.
3. The rotor diameter shall not exceed 6
metres.
4. The minimum clearance between the lower
tip of the rotor and ground level shall not be
less than 3 metres.
5. The supporting tower shall be a distance of
not less than the total structure height
(including the blade of the turbine at the
highest point of its arc) plus one metre from
any party boundary.
6. Noise levels must not exceed 43db(A)
during normal operation, or in excess of
5db(A) above the background noise,
whichever is greater, as measured from the
nearest neighbouring inhabited dwelling.
7. No more than one turbine shall be erected
within the curtilage of a house.
8. No such structure shall be constructed,
erected or placed forward of the front wall of
a house.
9. All turbine components shall have a matt,
non-reflective finish and the blade shall be
made of material that does not deflect
telecommunication signals.
10. No sign, advertisement or object, not
required for the functioning or safety of the
turbine shall be attached to or exhibited on
the wind turbine.

ei.sdraob

sydthebeat wrote: »

see class 2 (b)

http://www.environ.ie/en/Legislation/DevelopmentandHousing/Planning/FileDownLoad,1486,en.pdf



1. The turbine shall not be erected on or
attached to the house or any building or other
structure within its curtilage.
2. The total height of the turbine shall not
exceed 13 metres.
3. The rotor diameter shall not exceed 6
metres.
4. The minimum clearance between the lower
tip of the rotor and ground level shall not be
less than 3 metres.
5. The supporting tower shall be a distance of
not less than the total structure height
(including the blade of the turbine at the
highest point of its arc) plus one metre from
any party boundary.
6. Noise levels must not exceed 43db(A)
during normal operation, or in excess of
5db(A) above the background noise,
whichever is greater, as measured from the
nearest neighbouring inhabited dwelling.
7. No more than one turbine shall be erected
within the curtilage of a house.
8. No such structure shall be constructed,
erected or placed forward of the front wall of
a house.
9. All turbine components shall have a matt,
non-reflective finish and the blade shall be
made of material that does not deflect
telecommunication signals.
10. No sign, advertisement or object, not
required for the functioning or safety of the
turbine shall be attached to or exhibited on
the wind turbine.

thanks!, seems to fit in with all of the above, the site is sloped with the back of the site (top of hill) being about 40-50 meters from house and the land at back of the site being at same height as the top of the house (~6 meters me thinks)

there are 2 houses to either side and large fields behind, would definitely have to talk to neighbor, the other house is for sale now

are these things noisy? its very quiet area, most you hear is odd car going by or cows mooing


also im trying to find threads here on how the whole ESB 2 way connection works, anyone have any experience to share?

quentingargan

There is no such thing as a totally silent wind turbine - they all make some noise in different wind conditions. Often though, this is most apparent during fairly calm conditions - all is dead still on the ground, but 12m up there is enough wind to spin the turbine, so you hear it. In stronger winds, the background noise is louder. Sometimes you can set the controller to switch off the turbine in these lighter winds - it is a modification I've been working on here for our own one.

But either way, I generally recommend that any turbine should be 50m or more from a house, particularly a neighbour. Hearing your turbine brings you the satisfaction of knowing that your meter is spinning, but your neighbour might not derive the same satisfaction. If your site is generally downwind of your house, you seem to fit in with that.

In relation to ESB, just make sure that your inverter is not just EN50438 compliant, but has incorporated the modifications required uniquely for Ireland (which has its own unique parameters). ESB is insisting that the EN testing has been done with these parameters included, which is a bit of a nuisance. I haven't actually signed off on my own system at home as I'm still tweaking it, but our inverter has been approved.

Q

Mazotasan

On the planning subject whats the situation if you want/need to go higher than the exemption...I assume you submit a an application and fee and put ad in papers etc etc...but if granted do you need to pay any other fees?

@OP when you say you have lots of wind did/would you consider carrying out a survey to actually get some raw data to help you choose a product and investigate the payback? Am looking at this myself at the minute and currently budget just doesn't allow me to purchase a turbine...had a few sales people call out to site and were mysteriously able to say 'oh yeah loads of wind here it'll pay for itself in 8-10 years'. Your average wind speed on the site will have a huge impact on how long the payback will be. I am thinking of investing a few hundred euro in maybe 2 anemometers and a data logger and installing onsite on a pole at 12m and maybe 16m for a couple of months to get some real data and see if its worthwhile / economic or help choosing a product / blades / alternator etc. I really like the idea of wind turbines but hate flaky sales jibber! Just a thought...

ei.sdraob

Mazotasan wrote: »

On the planning subject whats the situation if you want/need to go higher than the exemption...I assume you submit a an application and fee and put ad in papers etc etc...but if granted do you need to pay any other fees?

@OP when you say you have lots of wind did/would you consider carrying out a survey to actually get some raw data to help you choose a product and investigate the payback? Am looking at this myself at the minute and currently budget just doesn't allow me to purchase a turbine...had a few sales people call out to site and were mysteriously able to say 'oh yeah loads of wind here it'll pay for itself in 8-10 years'. Your average wind speed on the site will have a huge impact on how long the payback will be. I am thinking of investing a few hundred euro in maybe 2 anemometers and a data logger and installing onsite on a pole at 12m and maybe 16m for a couple of months to get some real data and see if its worthwhile / economic or help choosing a product / blades / alternator etc. I really like the idea of wind turbines but hate flaky sales jibber! Just a thought...

oh yep in process of getting a meter (circa 150 euro), i want to measure over a few months at least. in order to calculate an ROI (if any)

im in no rush, and sure it will take alont time to save up for one of them things

now need to find and erect a pipe long enough to mount this on at the back of the land


theres also a show in the RDS today regarding renewable energies with demonstration turbines btw if anyone is interested



main problem would be talking to neighbors to see if its ok with them and checking the planning to be sure sure

quentingargan

Taking a few months samples using a wind logger doesn't quite do it with the data currently available. I've been suggesting to students that it would be interesting to have a project which compared a site's daily wind with the report for a local station. If, for example, my house is giving 6m/sec today from the SW and Valencia is giving 7m/sec from that direction, then the next day I get 3 m/sec from the SE while Valencia has 6 m/sec, etc... then I have some idea how I compare to Valencia for each point on the compass rose.

Then, after a few months I should be able to take Valencia's annual figures and extrapolate what I could expect on my site. It would be interesting to compare that with the figures that come from the standard method used in the City & Guilds Wind Turbine training which relies on wind maps, calculators for shear forces and roughness class of the land, and then a calculator.

Anything less a whole year of figures, doesn't give a good representation. Getting a year's figures is a good idea if you are spending a huge amount of money on a turbine, but most people use wind maps and calculations, and this is standard practice in the industry. I can email a guide on how to DIY this.

All those calculators used to be available online at www.windpower.org, but they have taken them down lately for some reason which is a pity. I happen to have a cached version here of the calculator if anyone wants it.

Aidan_M_M

I would like a copy if you don't mind , please .

quentingargan

Aidan_M_M wrote: »

I would like a copy if you don't mind , please .

Have PM'd you. Anyone know if it is a breach of copyright for me to attach that to a post here? It is a calculator that used to be on www.windpower.org, but which they took down lately. This is a bit of a nuisance as this calculator was what was used in City & Guilds training for wind energy. I spoke to the course tutor about that last week and the alternative is quite an expensive bit of software. Its a pity this has been taken out of the public domain. Q