Where the Wind Blows - A sustainable future for the Atlantic Edge? Part 1: The Aran Islands.

Summer sunset on Inisheer

Ireland’s west coast will likely feel a growing impact of the changing climate in the decades to come. Sea level rise, more frequent and more violent storms, and intense precipitation events are already happening. But according to climate researchers this is only the beginning. It is expected that these weather events will become ever more frequent and ever more extreme. 

The transition from fossil to renewable energy sources is one of the actions taken to mitigate the impacts of climate change. The plans for this transition in Ireland are outlined in the Irish government’s Climate Action Plan, and these plans bring an unique opportunity for the west of Ireland. Wind energy is one of the key components of the Climate Action Plan, and wind is plentiful in the western seaboard. It is envisaged to capture its energy with large offshore wind farms, and these developments could transform the towns and villages all along the west coast, if done in an inclusive and collaborative way.

So far, unfortunately, the renewable energy rollout has been done mostly from the top down, guided by government policies, and implemented by large development firms backed by international investors. The result of this approach is that host communities, the people who have to live close to and with the wind turbines, are left with little or no direct benefit from these industrial installations, not to mention no say in the planning process.   

Looking at media reports from the past few years it seems that communities no longer seem to accept this approach. Communities faced with a renewable energy development are taking a more critical look at the project, how it would impact their life and the future of their community, and how they are being treated by the developer. And if they feel the necessity to protect their community, they oppose the project. This leads to renewable energy projects being delayed, or not being implemented at all.

That another way is possible is currently being shown by Cormac Walsh and Lúgh Ó Braonáin, who run Energy Cooperatives Ireland, and a few visionary communities on Ireland’s west coast. They are keen to demonstrate how renewable energy projects can be a building block for both energy and local sustainable development targets when shaped by a holistic vision.

The idea for Energy Cooperatives Ireland was born in 2012. At the time the ambitious Spirit of Ireland project imagined up to five pumped storage hydroelectric reservoirs along Ireland’s West coast, and Cormac’s and Lúgh’s idea was to create local cooperatives that could supply energy to the pumped hydro storage plants. Spirit of Ireland however got stuck in the initial planning phase and, after realising that this project would not go anywhere, Cormac and Lúgh adapted their idea to suit a much broader application.

Between them, Cormac and Lúgh are not only very familiar with renewable energy technologies, including wind, solar and hydrogen, they also have a background in marketing and PR, and over many years have built a network of contacts in the energy industry and the political arena. This means they not only offer guidance for communities interested in going on their own energy journey, they also lobby for policy changes based on the feedback they get from the grassroots, and connect communities with suitable developers if needed and wanted. Energy Cooperatives Ireland is a vehicle to capacity-build communities to generate their own ideas and concepts to successfully navigate and take ownership of their local energy transition, and subsequently allow cohesive community development built around and (pun intended) powered by renewable energy. In practice this means that Energy Cooperatives Ireland offers guidance and support to communities who want to develop and create their own energy vision in line with local values and development goals. 

Aran Farm

The first community Energy Cooperatives Ireland got to work with were the Aran Islands, Inishmore, Inishmaan and Inisheer, three outliers of the Burren karst landscape sitting at the mouth of Galway Bay.  While being geologically a part of the Burren, politically the islands belong to County Galway, and have strong economic ties with southern Connemara. Because of their unique landscape, as well as for their heritage, the islands have been attracting visitors for many decades, and much of their economy is built on tourism. The islands can only be reached by boat and plane and, due to their remote and exposed location, face the full brunt of Atlantic storms, which cause cut offs from the mainland and its services for prolonged periods of time. It should come as no surprise then that the islanders are traditionally self-sufficient, and proud of it. Historically, the population of the islands has managed to create a livelihood from the limited resources available on the islands, and for many centuries the only regular import was turf, which was traded in exchange for salted fish and other goods. While this has changed - today the islands get their electricity via an undersea cable from the mainland, and most supplies from fuel to food are being imported - the islanders’ spirit of independence has not. 

One recent sprout of the islanders’ independent spirit is Comharchumann Fuinnimh Oileáin Árann, the Aran Islands Energy Cooperative. Dara Ó Maoildhia, one of the co-founders of the organisation, explains what it is all about:

“The vision we have is to become self-sufficient again, especially in our energy, but also in lots of other things. To become more in control of our own economy and quality of life.”

Comharchumann Fuinnimh Oileáin Árann is the vehicle to carry the islands back to a more independent existence and was founded in 2012. Dara recalls how it all started: 

“It's an interesting story. We have a development co-op here on the islands that responds to all the issues. It's like a mini local government. We elect the people ourselves into that development co-op and I was in that development co-op for 20 years. In the course of those 20 years we often set up a subgroup to deal with specific issues, and one of the subgroups we set up was an energy subgroup. And it was quite a popular one. There were seven or eight people on it who met regularly. And our vision was to return the islands to being self-sufficient like they used to be. We have a history of amazing self-sufficiency going back hundreds of years. We weren't, however, making much progress until a German couple came to live on the island. They were retired and for his 70th birthday Helmut invited a group of us to a luncheon. During the luncheon, he grabbed seven of us and said, ‘I'd like you to sign up to set up an energy cooperative’. We were all very agreeable to that, but we had to agree to put in a hundred Euros of our own money to get it set up. That was the beginning of the cooperative.” 

Shortly after that, the newly formed cooperative approached Cormac and Lúgh for support. Lúgh remembers how this came to be:

“They contacted us after they heard us talking about co-ops on a radio programme and we invited them to an information evening in Dublin. This was the beginning really. Then we gave a presentation on the island and from there the partnership developed.”

The Aran Islands were the first community partnership Energy Cooperatives Ireland entered into and over time Comharchumann Fuinnimh Oileáin Árann became the blueprint on how to build and empower community cooperatives. 

While energy plays a big role in Comharchumann Fuinnimh Oileáin Árann’s planning, the long term vision of the organisation has a considerably wider scope, as Dara explains: 

“We had a very expansive vision from the very start. It was to respond positively to the crisis of climate change in a way that was as holistic as possible, and to not only do it for ourselves, but to be an example for others. We also saw it as an opportunity to empower the local community so that instead of importing somebody else's energy, we'd be generating our own and owning it ourselves. Its ultimate goal was to preserve the communities on the three Aran Islands, along with our culture, heritage and biodiversity. Even though we call ourselves an energy cooperative, the energy part is simply a means to the end, to realise a much broader, more exciting vision.”

Vegetable Garden on Inishmore

The first step after the formation of the partnership between Comharchumann Fuinnimh Oileáin Árann and Energy Cooperative Ireland was what Lúgh describes as “harvesting the low hanging fruit”. After conducting an energy audit, the newly formed co-op, implemented an ongoing retrofitting initiative on the three islands. To date around 300 out of a total of 500 homes on the islands have been insulated and equipped with heat pumps or geothermal heating systems and solar PV. As it turned out this was the beginning of a very special success story. The cooperative conducted extensive research into energy options and opportunities, some of which was captured in the Clean Energy Transition Agenda and the Aran Energy Master Plan.

Part of the wider vision for the islands are the Community Biodiversity Action Plan, which includes a project to increase the numbers of one of Ireland’s most enigmatic birds, the corncrake Corncrake Project; as well as smaller, but nevertheless impactful projects like the installation of a water filling station on playgrounds to reduce the need for single use plastic bottles; beach storage boxes where beach toys can be stored and shared by beach users with the aim to cut down on the number of beach toys being bought and discarded; the planting of fruit trees to provide an additional source of food for pollinators in line with the Pollinator Plan for the area; and the old tradition of islanders having their own garden where potatoes and other vegetables are being grown is on the rise again.  

While these achievements sound impressive, it took the proverbial blood, sweat and tears to get this far, and many setbacks had to be overcome and challenges to be handled. The first challenge was to get the entire community involved. Dara recalls the learning curve Comharchumann Fuinnimh Oileáin Árann had to face:

“We had to deal with concerns and objections early on when we proposed a wind turbine to go on the lower road here on Inishmore. This is a tourist route, and there were strong objections to that. So we had to listen very carefully but we've learned from those meetings and those responses from people. We know better now what people will accept and won't accept. And we've also studied with leaders in the field on how to get the community on board for projects that we would like to run. So I think we're far more effective now in bringing the community with us.”

The bottom-up approach - the empowerment of every single resident of the islands to have a voice - is vital to Comharchumann Fuinnimh Oileáin Árann’s success. Getting the community involved and securing their support is the only way to successfully implement the wide variety of projects the organisation has in mind:

“The total population of the three islands is 1200 people, the co-op has around 130 shareholders, we have 10 directors on our committee and four employees as well. Each of the islands has their own community representative group, generally called a development organisation. And they would represent all the different interests of the various groups on the islands. We are an umbrella body focusing on energy. And we have representatives from those three community groups on our board. In that way, we're integrated into the community at that level, but you need to go further than that and be constantly consulting the locals directly. We're still learning how to do that. We have public meetings, send out letters; any way we can to keep everybody on board. We can't and won't succeed unless we have full community support. We run workshops, we invite, we're constantly engaging with the community.”

While today the community widely supports the plans of Comharchumann Fuinnimh Oileáin Árann and their overall vision for the islands, there is no lack of challenges from other sources, and the idea of energy independence faces a number of obstacles, as Dara lays out:

“The biggest challenge is to generate your own electricity at a community level. We haven't yet achieved that and it's still a very primary goal of ours to do that. We've been trying to put a wind turbine on one of the islands. One to represent all three islands was likely going to go on Inishmaan because there had been turbines there before. The restrictions to protect the environment have increased however since those turbines were put up on Inishmaan some 20 years ago. The legislation now prohibits wind turbines going up anywhere in the three islands. So we've given up on that. Now we're looking at a small solar farm. The issue is that all three islands are limestone pavement, which is now a protected environment in Europe, and you cannot damage it in any way. So you can't put a concrete base down on top of it, or screw things into it. If we do a solar farm, we'll be securing the solar panels with concrete blocks or heavyweights. We won't be doing anything to damage the limestone, and that might work.”

Inisheer Lighthouse

Another opportunity to realise Comharchumann Fuinnimh Oileáin Árann’s energy vision is offshore wind, but here also the perception is that obstacles are in the way. Dara explains:

“There's probably no option to actually power the islands directly from the wind turbines, it’ll go directly into the national grid first. But wind power could also be used to generate hydrogen, either out with the turbines or else when it comes ashore. At the moment we are lobbying to be allowed as a community group to buy shares in an offshore wind farm, which at the moment is not possible. If the government won't give us an opportunity to become shareholders in these big farms, then the next step is to have as many benefits as possible from those farms. There is a lot of movement on the extension of the pier in Rossaveal at the moment. It is partly focused on facilitating fishing and the fishing community, to keep it alive, but there's another lobby group, of which we're a part of, saying to make that extended pier suitable enough for offshore turbine construction.”

Rossaveal is a harbour sitting in the shelter of Cashla Bay, a narrow inlet extending from the wider Galway Bay, that serves both a declining fishing industry and as a ferry port for the Aran Islands. Historically the harbour has a strong connection to the islands, not only as connection to the mainland but also as an employer for the islanders. Dara continuous the story:  

“We don't want to see Rossaveal lying idle and all the services involved in offshore wind coming from somewhere else. If these services would come to Rossaveal we would benefit hugely, because it would provide employment for islanders. Rossaveal really is a part of the Aran Islands. It's the ‘fourth island’, and so much of our employment over the years has been in Rossaveal, and people who work there are prepared to come in and out from the islands to go to work. It's a one hour commute as far as we're concerned, just on a boat and not in a car. So if Rossaveal develops, all the three islands would hugely benefit.”

While it seems unlikely that the islands will gain their energy independence directly from wind, there is the hydrogen alternative mentioned by Dara, which could bring big benefits for the islands. Dara elaborates: 

“The talk on the hydrogen at the moment is that it would be delivered to or generated in Galway Harbour. We have ideas for hydrogen generation in Rossaveal, or deliver the hydrogen generated at the wind farms to Rossaveal and use that on the islands. This would allow us to convert all the fishing boats, passenger ferries and cargo vessels into being hydrogen powered. In our studies we have shown that far more fossil fuels are being used by our ferries in and out of the three islands than are used in total on the islands for heating and for transport. So that's really the big guzzler of fossil fuels, and we need to work really hard to get those boats converted to hydrogen. So if we had a hydrogen source in Rossaveal, that would be fantastic. Or better even on the islands. If we were generating it here, it would mean that the ferries would refuel here on the islands rather than on the mainland. That'd be a wonderful turnaround.”

The co-op feels that if these plans could become a reality, it would not only have a considerable impact on Ireland’s climate change targets, it would also provide a funding stream for the island which could be used to drive the islands’ sustainable development. This in turn, would align local development with the larger scale development of renewable energy off the west coast of Ireland. A win-win situation for everybody.

Read Part II: Valentia Island

Acknowledgements: This story was originally compiled as a case study for the Earning Local Support Academy (ELSA). A big thank you goes to Cormac Walsh, Lúgh Ó Braonáin, and Dara Ó Maoildhia for giving up their time to be interviewed.

Disclaimer: Quotes have been edited for clarity and readability.