Friday 14 August 2009

Wind farms generate record power output

A record was set for the amount of energy generated by Ireland’s wind farms as the percentage of power from wind hit almost 40% during the weekend of 2nd August.

Figures released by EirGrid show that high levels of wind power were recorded on Friday and Saturday, with the output of Ireland’s wind farms peaking at 999MW on Friday (31 July). This was enough to supply over 650,000 homes.

At times over the weekend the amount of power coming from wind farms met 39% of national demand. The figures were recorded at the EirGrid National Control Centre.

Ireland now has over 1,085 Megawatts of installed wind capacity. EirGrid will be upgrading the national grid shortly, which will increase the capacity of the transmission system and enable further large increases in renewable energy.

The company is also developing an interconnector to Britain which will mean that Ireland could become a significant exporter of renewable energy.

"The progress that has been made in connecting wind energy is crucial in meeting national targets for renewable energy, reducing Ireland’s CO2 emissions and reducing our dependency on imported fossil fuels" - an EirGrid spokesman said.

The Irish Wind Energy Association (IWEA) said Ireland can be a world leader in wind energy which would be worth up to €14 billion to the economy.

www.buckplanning.ie

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