My Department is currently undertaking a focused review of the 2006 Wind Energy Development Guidelines. The review is addressing a number of key aspects of the Guidelines including noise, setback distance, shadow flicker, community obligation, community dividend and grid connections.
As part of the review process, a ten-week public consultation on the draft revised Wind Energy Development Guidelines was held from 12 December 2019 to 19 February 2020. Almost 500 submissions were received as part of the public consultation, many of which are extremely detailed and technical in nature. Further to this public consultation, the Department of the Environment, Climate and Communications (DECC), in light of its environmental noise remit, appointed expert noise consultants to inform any amendments to the noise aspect of the Guidelines in line with existing standards and international best practice.
My Department, in conjunction with DECC and its expert noise consultants, will make any further changes to the draft Guidelines which are deemed necessary or appropriate in the wake of this work to ensure that the finalised Guidelines, once issued, are fit for purpose to provide guidance in line with renewable energy and climate targets, whilst having appropriate regard to the impacts of wind energy development, including in relation to noise annoyance.
As things stand, the review of the Wind Energy Development Guidelines is ongoing and the submissions received as part of the 2019 public consultation remain under consideration in this regard. As such, my Department is not in a position to release the submissions at this time while they form part of the ongoing review process. However, it is my intention to release all submissions associated with 2019 public consultation at the appropriate juncture.
