By Business & Finance 
Cork County Council has granted planning approval for a new 5MW farm in West Cork for Amarenco Solar.
What is Amarenco Solar?
Amarenco Solar is an independent renewable energy power company that develops, builds and operates renewable energy power plants.
The company has already had planning permission received for 10 other sites. This is now the eleventh.
What will be new site offer?
The Ballineen, West Cork site will generate 5.6 million units (kWhrs) of electricity per annum. This will consist of a proposed solar farm of approximately 22,000 photovoltaic panels on ground-mounted frames.
John Mullins, CEO, Amarenco Solar, said:
The application approval by Cork County Council is very welcome news on the back of numerous successful and ongoing applications being prepared by Amarenco Solar for Ireland. We are keen to commence real investment in solar plant and facilities, and to see that solar energy is strategically adopted as a real provider of renewable energy in Ireland.
He continued: “However, we are still awaiting a decision on renewable tariffs and hope the government will soon follow the lead of all other EU countries. Our solar plants can be built within three months of commencement, allowing us to keep taxpayers’ money at home, in place of paying hefty fines for carbon emissions from 2020 onwards.”
The new face of energy
The likes of the RealValue initiative are looking to small-scale energy storage to combat Ireland’s energy-consumption issues going forward.
John Young, Senior Engineer, EirGrid; Muiris Flynn, Chief Technology Officer, Glen Dimplex Heating & Ventilation Ireland; Donal Finn, Associate Professor, University College Dublin; Jonathan Sandham, Smart Networks Manager, ESB Networks; Rowena McCappin, Project Director, Glen Dimplex Heating & Ventilation; David Boundy, Director of IOT Innovation, Intel; Neil Stewart, CEO, Glen Dimplex Heating & Ventilation; Jonathan O’Sullivan, Manager Innovation, EirGrid; David Noronha, Strategy Programme Manager, SSE Airtricity; and Gerard Finneran, Project Engineer – Smart Grid Technologies, Glen Dimplex Heating & Ventilation Ireland.
One of RealValue’s lead companies is Glen Dimplex. Neil Stewart, CEO of Glen Dimplex Heating & Ventilation, said:
RealValue has illustrated that there’s huge potential in small-scale energy storage, and our involvement in BRIDGE has paved the way for future collaborations with partners. By working together with utility and technology companies, we hope to further investigate new business models, helping to shape the energy landscape of the future.”
Even so, the solar sector has yet to receive a decision from the government on the Renewable Energy Support Scheme (RESS), which would enhance our solar energy capabilities going forward.
