Planning permission has been secured for a new solar farm near Dublin Airport, which will be connected directly to a nearby reservoir which supplies 500 million litres of water to the site each year.
Daa, which operates Dublin and Cork airports, has signed a power purchase agreement with an as yet unnamed provider who will develop the 109.88kW array that is to be tied directly into the airport’s electricity network through the pumping station of the reservoir.
However, the ground mounted site is intended to provide power to the reservoir’s operations itself, supplying over half of its significant energy needs.
The solar project, due to be completed by the end of May, is the second to be approved at Dublin Airport after plans for a 106kW rooftop system on Terminal 1 were given the green light in July 2016. However, this permission has yet to be activated and a spokesperson for daa said: “The project is not proceeding at the moment”.
Dublin Airport, which was recently voted among the best in the world by a survey of 65,000 passenger reviews, is undergoing a number of significant infrastructure improvements which are set to increase its energy demand.
This includes construction of a new runway and associated works, an upgrade to Terminal 1 which could incorporate the solar works, and is seeking a partner to build a new hotel.
The new solar farm follows a much larger project completed at Belfast International Airport last year which signed a PPA with developer Lightsource. The 4.84MW solar farm near the airport’s site is hard-wired into its private network, meeting 27% of the airport’s demand.
