The Clare Champion Clare news, sport, entertainment and local notes
THE Supreme Court has refused, on grounds including it does not make “futile orders”, to declare that planning decisions relating to a windfarm development on a mountain site at Derrybrien did not permit deforestation of more than 115,000 trees. The site was the scene of a massive bog slide in October 2003 when nearly half a million tonnes of peat and debris was displaced, causing considerable damage to the surrounding area and pollution to a nearby fishing river. Following a 2008 decision of the European Court of Justice that Ireland had not fulfilled its obligations under a 1985 EU Directive related to assessment of the effects of certain public and private projects on the environment, a local residents group appealed in 2009 against the 2005 refusal of the High Court to grant injunctions stopping the deforestation. The Chief Justice said, while the Supreme Court was prepared to approach the appeal “on the assumption the planning permission did not cover or …
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