Tonn Nua wind farm ("the Waterford Coast one")

yup, green tech isnt exactly green, but its generally greener than fossil fuels, its a necessary evil, shur ev's aint exactly 100% green either, when you factor in the mining thats required for them, amongst other environmental damage done during their production and maintenance, theres also clearly a problem with our lack of abilities in recycling turbine blades after use….

yup, id have to agree in regards nuclear, its a great shame we re a very strong anti-nuclear country, its an understandable concern, but being exposed to international fossil fuel markets has already shown to be a major problem for us, and this will likely be more so for the future. its great to see groups such as 18 for 0 trying to change this thinking here, unfortunately this stance means fossil fuels are here to stay, for the reasons you rightfully pointed out

clearly both have issues, wind for technical reasons, but fossil fuels for our pure exposure to markets, as we have just experienced via inflation, its very likely international fossil fuels markets are now gonna be more volatile going forward, therefore possible causing more inflation issues into the future. obviously our recent rapid rise in inflation is actually still hurting many businesses and households, therefore it makes sense to be as energy independent as possible moving into the future, and clearly renewables are really the only game in town, due to our lack of willingness with nuclear

obviously the way to deal with wind supply issues is simply storage, so get busy building storage capacity….

im also hoping hydrogen can play a part in all of this in the future, sounds like its got some way to go yet though….

…and once again, 100% energy independence is probably not possible, and probably not a good idea, hence why having external energy supplies need to be included in our future plans, as they currently are, hence why major projects such as interconnects are critically need…..

…yes you are correct, not maintaining our energy supplies would very likely lead to catastrophic outcomes, as explained, hence the critical element of this issue….

…we can now clearly see the dangers of prolonged inflationary problems, such situations would more than likely lead to catastrophic social of economic outcomes, i.e. its best we try prevent such outcomes….

…we re already starting to build storage capacity in the country, with interests growing in approaches including hydrogen, this includes national and international investment and interest groups, so its probably not as dump an idea as suggested….

…oh and other countries are already ploughing on with their own storage capacities, as could be seen during the recent energy crisis, lpg storage etc, i.e. storage is kinna a good idea, as a protection against volatility…..

Have a read of this article and come back to us

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/259431883_RESEARCH_ARTICLE_Offshore_Wind_Turbine_Visibility_and_Visual_Impact_Threshold_Distances

@Gardner no indication of the size of the turbines in your picture

wingtip on the Sceirde rocks turbines is at 310m

more like 5km to the mainland from the nearest turbine, 10km from the furthest

Why is Cork port getting all the business associated with these wind farms off Waterford & Wexford? Are Port of Waterford and Rosslare not suitable?

Nuclear has a lot of costs which are shuffled into places other than the price per kWh. Just look at the state of Hinkley Point C.

renewables are really the only game in town for countries such as ours, i.e. countries that dont have a history of the usage of sources such as nuclear, again its not just a cost problem, its actually the fact nuclear simply isnt widely accepted here as a possibility, most would object to its introduction here, best of luck with trying to get the production of a reactor here, it currently simply wouldnt happen, it would just be knocked about in debates and possibly in the courts, with nothing actually happening on the ground. again the policies previously mentioned completely block state bodies from even considering this source, so the state cant even look into it at present, not even at the most basic levels…..

..i do think we re moving into a more expensive era in energy, largely due to the sheer physics involved, fossil fuels are simply more energy dense than others, excluding nuclear, im not convinced renewables will reduce our energy bills, yes im aware costs have been falling in regards to renewables, but…..

humans nearly always want our cake, we re just wired that way, this will help to keep pushing prices down, but…..

…but i do think its critical we become as energy independent as possible, as i suspect getting access to energy is gonna become very complicated, and those complications could very well be far more dangerous than anything else…

…and at the moment, the only way to truly do that is renewables, with all their faults and issues….

yeah would be fundamentally against nuclear power generation bar ‘cold fusion’ or some other type of ‘fusion’.. any advantages of ‘nuclear fission’ are outweighed by the treatment of the ‘waste’….and the risk of it getting into the wrong hands…..rouge dictators etc etc

I’m sure Deiseen will came back with a strong rebuttal of your research

…are humans truly put off by such things, would it truly have a detrimental effect on tourism, and other economic activities?

im some how seriously doubt it, as such supplies of energy are clearly gradually become the norm around the world….

i think this visual hysteria is a bit over played….

you ve good arguments, but the reality is, are we truly willing to pay more for our energy, id imagine there are good studies out there on the costs involved in moving further out to sea, do you know of any?

…not that surprised, it sounds like its very difficult to actually make money outta this industry, higher interest rates seem to hurt the industry really badly, i was at a talk about this a few months ago, tricky stuff…