Residents outside Midleton oppose plans to run Celtic Interconnector cable along their road

The residents in Churchtown North and Roxborough say they're concerned about the health impacts of long term exposure to electromagnetic fields

The Churchtown North and Roxborough residents committee say want Eirgrid to divert the underground cable away from their homes and are calling on Taoiseach Micheál Martin to support them. 

The World Health Organisation say low level exposure to electromagnetic fields is not harmful to health, however the group argue that recent research is showing evidence that long term exposure can cause certain types of cancers and dementia. 

Speaking to RedFM News, Mark Douglas from the Churchtown North Interconnector Group says they want Eirgrid to take a cautionary approach: 

"This is what the government just did recently with the AstraZeneca vaccine, they said 'look you know there's conflicting evidence, there's a tiny potential that this could be risk that we're going to stop giving the AstraZeneca until we know more information'. That's what we're asking for, we're saying look, there's sufficient proof that there may be a connection here. So reroute it somewhere where there's no houses, and this is the point because we're rural, there's a couple of options that you could use, which would not include housing, there'd be no housing. It's just farmland or greenway."

EirGrid Statement RE: Celtic Interconnector

EirGrid has carried out extensive consultations and stakeholder engagements on the Celtic Interconnector project since 2017, in tandem with assessments and studies to determine the best-performing project option. 

Recently, EirGrid attended two online meetings with local residents in March to listen to, and respond to, their concerns. EirGrid also met twice with the East Cork Municipal District Council in March, where many of these concerns were also raised.

At these meetings, EirGrid committed to undertake a review of our route options. This review would also consider off-road/cross-country routes that had not previously been evaluated given EirGrid’s preference to install the cables within public roads, which is standard Irish and international practice.

This review was completed at the end of last month with the findings published on March 31st.  It concluded that the Churchtown Road route is the best performing option for the following reasons:

• From a technical perspective, the option is not unduly complex in comparison with the other options; avoidance of impact on an existing watermain within the road is a standard matter of detailed design and construction methodology;
• From an economic perspective, the option is of greater length in comparison with the other options; however, it is relatively straightforward from a construction perspective relative to the other options and is likely to result in equal or lower overall construction costs;
• From an environmental perspective, the option is laid within the public road, within an area that has no flood risk. Some temporary noise, disturbance and disruption is likely to be inevitable for all options – this is mitigated by the fact that these works can be executed over a short period of time.
• From a socio-economic perspective, all options have different issues. Community sentiment, anxiety and concerns regarding the provision of an electricity cable within the road in the Churchtown area is acknowledged. Such concern is primarily articulated in terms of potential health impacts arising from the presence of magnetic fields. However, it is confirmed that levels arising in this area will be well below established international guidelines.
• From a deliverability perspective, the option is equivalent or lesser than the other options, all of which have different factors arising

EirGrid have also pointed out that the cable for the Celtic Interconnector uses the same DC technology as was laid for the East West Interconnector 10 years ago, which passes through the busy town of Rush in North Dublin. EirGrid say there are no health issues associated with this or any other underground electricity cables.