In the letter, the group says it has confirmed with the Heritage Service of Cork County Council the complete levelling of two listed ringforts by a farmer in County Cork. The ringforts were located in the townland of Knockacareagh, near Killmurray in north Cork. The farm was auctioned on 24 June, 2010.

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PRESS RELEASE
6 JULY 2010

New Planning Bill protested to President

The environmental NGO Friends of the Irish Environment have written to Mary MacAlesse requesting her to convene the Council of State to consider referring the new Planning and Development (Amendment) Act 2010 to the Supreme Court to test its constitutionality.

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CALL FOR WITHDRAWAL OF FAILTE IRELAND CAMPAIGN

An environmental group has written to the Chairman and CEO of Failte Ireland seeking the immediate withdrawal of their current advertising campaign ‘Meet in Ireland'.

‘This campaign mocks tele-conferencing and instead encourages those involved in business to travel to hotels around Ireland for their meetings. This is in direct contradiction to the Government Policy published this year ‘SmarterTravel', which seeks to use broadband and modern telephone rather than contributing to Ireland's transport carbon footprint.'

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4 June 2010

The environmental lobby group Friends of the Irish Environment (FIE) welcomed today's decision of the High Court to quash Sligo County Council's grant of planning permission for a runway extension at Sligo Airport.

In August 2009 the Council granted permission to allow the airport to extend its runway by building a platform - 285m long by 160m wide - directly onto Dorrins Strand, an area of outstanding natural beauty which contains two EU protected areas: one for birds and one for threatened habitats. Following a judicial review brought by two local individuals, and supported by the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government, today Mr. Justice McKechnie rightly quashed Sligo County Council's poor decision.

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Galway By-Pass - Supreme Court decision to end ‘cosy practice'?

The environmental lobby group Friends of the Irish Environment welcomed yesterday's decision of the Supreme Court to refer An Bord Pleanála's approval for the €317 million Galway city outer bypass road to the European Court of Justice.

‘This first reference of an Irish environmental case to the European Court has the potential to greatly strengthen environmental protection in Ireland'.

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In our 2 page submission to the current review of the Environmental Protection Agency, we identify 10 key issues that must be addressed – oversight by the Ombudsman, open complaints, consolidated legislation, transparent procedures, pro active enforcement, addressing cumulative impacts, meaningful penalties, and an end to the retention culture– as well as better definition of its educational role. We quote Dan Boyle:

 "I believe that if we had a proper environmental body, a body in which the public had confidence and in which there existed a widespread belief that our environment was being properly protected, then many of our citizens should not feel the need of having to go outside and seek international support for the type of environmental protection we should be doing ourselves."

Read The Submission

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PRESS RELEASE
24 MAY 2010

GRANTS ‘FORCING FARMERS TO BURN'

New restrictions on the Single Payments Scheme to farmers are contributing to the wildfires that have devastated thousands of hectares of Ireland's countryside, according to 19 Irish environmental groups.

In a letter today to the Minister for Agriculture, the groups have claimed that as a result of a recent ‘Health Check' of the Single Payments Scheme made to farmers, there is now an economic incentive for farmers to burn scrub land.

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UK REFERENCES

Data Released by UK OS on April 1, 2010
• OS Street View
• 1:50,000 Gazetteer
• 1:250,000 Scale Colour Raster
• OS Locator
• Boundary-Line
• Code-Point Open Meridian 2
• Strategi
• MiniScale
• OS VectorMap District (available 1 May 2010)
• Land-Form Panorama

Policy options for geographic information from Ordnance Survey: Consultation
Published 23 December 2009
Closing date 17 March 2010
http://www.communities.gov.uk/documents/corporate/pdf/1411177.pdf

Policy options for geographic information from Ordnance Survey: Consultation - Government Response
Published 31 March 2010
http://www.communities.gov.uk/publications/corporate/ordnancesurveyconresponse

Models of Public Sector Information Provision via Trading Funds, commissioned by the Department for Business and HM Treasury. Professor David Newbery, Faculty of Economics, Professor Lionel Bently, CIPIL, Faculty of Law, Rufus Pollock Mead Fellow in Economics, Emmanuel College, Cambridge University, February 2008
http://www.berr.gov.uk/files/file45136.pdf

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The Report lists the sources in Ireland of Geoinfomatics - the acquiring, analyzing and visualizing of spatial electronic data. It is accompanied by a Register of contacts for these sources and includes sections on free satellite imagery and free software.

In calling for free for use and re-use of OSI raw data, FIE says ‘The new commercial online services recently announce by Minister Lenihan for the OSI will only further hold back critical economic and environmental initiatives in one of the most rapidly evolving scientific fields'.

In support of the call, the authors cite the English change in policy announced on April 1, 2010 by which almost all unrefined UK OS mapping data is now being made freely available on the internet. English research found that while their OSI would need a subsidy from central government to make up for the loss in revenue, this would be outweighed by a gain of around £168m.

REPORT ON GEOINFORMATICS IN IRELAND | REGISTER | UK REFERENCES

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They also urged the Deputies to follow the recommendations of a DKM Report to the Government in 2003 and the McCarthy Report in 2009 to end the subsides for regional airports.

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As Earth Hour 2010 looms closer, a schools ‘virtual torch relay' was launched by the Lord Mayor of Dublin last week at a school in Artane and will end with in a school in Belfast where the Lord Mayor of Belfast will be waiting. The Minister for the Environment launched Earth Hour nationally at a screening of the Age of Stupid in the Lighthouse Cinema in Dublin. And on the night, - aside from the darkening of national monuments and homes around the country - Temple Bar will celebrate Earth Hour with a Trad Night by candlelight. Visit the global Earth Hour page to sign up and help Ireland join more than 100 countries and a billion people in sending a message for climate change action to our leaders.

Read about how the Minister for the Environments speech clashes with Earth Hour   |  Earth Hour Global Page | Irish Earth Hour Page

Switch off your lights for Earth Hour 2010

Saturday 27 March, 8.30pm - 9.30pm

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The film is being launched today on YouTube to coincide with campaign events around the 2010 Winter Olympics in Canada. The Pure Salmon Campaign is on the ground to highlight the fact that 90% of Canadian salmon farms are owned by Norwegian companies. Find about the rally this Saturday.

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Earth Hour is the one hour when people across the globe turn out their lights to show how ‘by working together we can make a difference in the fight against climate change'.

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Washington DC has become the latest US city to impose a levy not only on plastic bags but on paper carrier bags as well. The US Capital city follows successful legislation in Portland, Seattle, Los Angeles, and San Francisco as more than 20 bag taxes have been proposed across American cities in the past year.

In a letter to the Minister, FIE points out that international studies that show that paper carrier bags should be included in any plastic bag levy as ‘paper bags have a greater adverse impact than a plastic bag for a number of the environmental issues'.

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Plastic Bag Levy - extension to paper carrier bags

The environment group Friends of the Irish Environment has called on John Gormley to extend the plastic bag levy to paper carrier bags.

In a letter to the Minister, FIE claims that international studies that show that paper carrier bags should be included in any plastic bag levy as ‘paper bags have a greater adverse impact than a plastic bag for a number of the environmental issues'.

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The Government has been warned that if its ‘unlawful derogations' for turf cutting in nature conservation areas are not withdrawn and enforcement steps not taken to stop the practice it will face a judicial review.

The warning comes as part of Friends of the Irish Environment's submission to ‘The Cessation of Turf Cutting Working Group' established by John Gormley when he announced the continuation of turf cutting in designated areas for 2009.

The FIE submission tracks the derogations which began following the prolonged and strenuous objection from turf cutters after the publication of the list of SAC raised bog sites in 1997.

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PRESS RELEASE
FOR WEDNESDAY 29 JULY 2009

OBJECTION TO ‘INEXPLICABLE' LIFEBOAT STATION LOCATION

An extensive objection has been lodged by a local environmental group to the proposed location of the RNLI Lifeboat station at Castletownbere, Co. Cork.

The station is proposed on recently reclaimed land beside the Bere Island Ferry jetty.

The group's submission emphasies that it has no objection to the project itself but claims that the location ignores the ‘the most congested traffic pattern on the Bearhaven peninsula'.

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Re: Minister of State launches Phase Two works at the Gortmore Tailings Management Facility, Silvermines, Co. Tipperary.

Friends of the Irish Environment welcomed Minister Lenihan's announcement of the progress with the remediation works at Silvermines, Co. Tipperary, but called on the Government to approve publication of the national risk assessment awaiting Cabinet approval.

A spokesman said that ‘A recent study of 52 countries showed Ireland to be second only to the UK in emissions of the potentially toxic lead on a per capita basis. Yet this Risk Assessment, completed in January 2008 to meet an EU 2004 Directive, remains unavailable.'

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Friends of the Irish Environment are issuing proceedings against the Minister for the Environment for holding waste at Haulbowline Island, County Cork, without a licence.

Any person or body holding waste for more than 6 months must have a licence under Irish law. A licencewould requite an environmental impact assessment and public consultation.

The current Secretary of the Department of the Environment, Geraldine Tallon, stated in the High Court grounding affidavit when seeking to recover costs from the last operator'sliquidator in 2004 that ‘there is serious environmental pollution at the site in Haulbowline as a result of holding, recovering or disposing of waste'.

This situation has not changed and now the Minister has announced another 'working group' of politicians.

We have repeatedly written to the Ministers involved requesting them to apply to the Environmental Protection Agency for a Waste Licence but nothing has been done. Our solicitors are today informing the Minister of our intentions.

 Read TOXIC ISLAND, FIE's study of this former site of the Irish steel works. In an increasing trend, none of Ireland's 'leading' papers have covered this announcement - except the Belfast Telegraph!

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