Council raises concerns over new Poolbeg power plant

PLANS for a new ESB power station at Poolbeg in Dublin are in doubt as planning authorities have raised concerns about the location.

The ESB is seeking permission to build a new 75-megawatt flexible thermal generation plant at the Ringsend site.

However, Dublin City Council planners asked why ‘many disused buildings and brown-field areas within the ESB lands’ were not considered.

It claimed the rationale was unclear as to why the ESB planned to locate a diesel storage tank beside a beach when there was an increased environmental risk.

The council requested that the ESB provide it with a masterplan for its lands and specifically the future use of the site when the temporary ‘flexgen’ plant was no longer required.

It claimed an environmental impact assessment screening report was inadequate, as it failed to refer to EU-protected wetlands across the road from the proposed plant or that it was located within the Dublin Bay UNESCO Biosphere Reserve.

Council planners said there were ‘serious deficiencies’ in documents filed by the ESB in its application and a lack of information about the sensitive location of the site and how and when the proposed development would be constructed. They also pointed out that a 30-metre chimney stack would affect protected bird species.

The ESB said the operational nature of the proposed natural gas-fired turbine on a three-hectare site on Pigeon House Road was different to traditional plants, as it will not operate continually, but intermittently during peak periods of electricity demand.

The company said the development would facilitate an increased level of renewable electricity generation on the grid by being available as a backup supply option when demand for electricity was highest.

The company hopes the new plant will become fully operational by October 2022.