Galway Wind Park is

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...

's largest onshore

wind farm A wind farm or wind park, also called a wind power station or wind power plant, is a group of wind turbines in the same location used Wind power, to produce electricity. Wind farms vary in size from a small number of turbines to several hundre ...

. Located in Connemara's Cloosh Valley west of

Moycullen Moycullen ( ga, Maigh Cuilinn) is a Gaeltacht village in County Galway, Ireland, about 10 km (7 mi) northwest of Galway city. It is near Lough Corrib, on the N59 road to Oughterard and Clifden, in Connemara. Moycullen is now a satel ...

County Galway "Righteousness and Justice" , anthem = () , image_map = Island of Ireland location map Galway.svg , map_caption = Location in Ireland , area_footnotes = , area_total_km2 = ...

. The wind park was co-developed by

SSE Renewables SSE Renewables is a renewable energy subsidiary of SSE plc, which develops and operates onshore and offshore wind farms and hydroelectric generation in the United Kingdom and Ireland. History In October 2009, SSE announced that Airtricity woul ...

and

Coillte Coillte (; meaning "forests"/"woods") is a state-owned commercial forestry business in Ireland based in Newtownmountkennedy. Coillte manage approximately 7% of the country’s land, and operates three businesses - their core forestry business, a ...

at a cost of €280 million and consists of 58

Siemens Siemens AG ( ) is a German multinational conglomerate corporation and the largest industrial manufacturing company in Europe headquartered in Munich with branch offices abroad. The principal divisions of the corporation are ''Industry'', '' ...

3 MW SWT-3.0-101 wind turbines. The wind park provides energy to around 89,000 homes, which is equivalent to 80% of the homes in Galway.

Development

The project was development over two phases and includes four permitted wind farms which are Galway Cloosh, Lettercraffroe, Seecon and Uggool. Phase one of the project consists of 22 turbines located on the Uggool and Lettercraffroe sites and began construction in 2015. It was developed and financed solely by SSE Renewables and consists of 22 turbines. Phase two was developed and financed through a

joint venture A joint venture (JV) is a business entity created by two or more parties, generally characterized by shared ownership, shared returns and risks, and shared governance. Companies typically pursue joint ventures for one of four reasons: to acces ...

between SSE Renewables and Coillte. The second phase consists of 36 turbines located at the Cloosh and Seecon sites. The Port of Galway was used in the development of the wind park, and turbine tops, hubs and blades were offloaded in the port and transported to the site by tucks during the night. The 55 meter long blades were among some of the largest in the industry at the time of construction and a section of the Lough Atalia Road which passed under the rail bridge had to be lowered in order to facilitate the transportation of the turbine blades. Generated electricity is sent to the nearby Uggool substation where the voltage is increased to 110kV. An underground power cable joins the Galway-Screeb 110kV overhead line and connects the wind park with the electrical grid.

References

External links

* {{official website, https://www.sserenewables.com/onshore/ireland/galway-wind-park/ Wind farms in the Republic of Ireland

Development

See also

References

External links