Council planning for future of heatwaves, droughts and floods

Heatwaves and droughts are going to become more commonplace in Westmeath as the effects of climate change take hold – bringing with them pressure on drinking water supplies.

Flooding of rivers is going to occur more frequently, and Westmeath County Council is in the process of planning how it can prepare for such events.

That was the message of the council’s newly-appointed Environment, Climate Change and Rural Water boss, engineer Ambrose Clarke, to councillors at their October meeting, held on Monday of last week at the council chambers in Mullingar.

Mr Clarke was updating councillors on progress on the climate action plan that is being prepared by the council to cover the years 2024 to 2029, a draft version of which has just been circulated to members.

“The mission statement is that we have is to achieve, by no later than the end of the of the year 2050, a climate-resilient, biodiversity-rich, environmentally sustainable, and a climate neutral economy,” Mr Clarke told the meeting.

With his comments coming just days after the devastating floods in Middleton, Mr Clarke told members: “[Climate change] is real, and these things are happening in our country”.

The new climate action plan has to be completed by the end of February 2024, and will be updated every five years.

“We need to prepare for the changes that are coming. We also need to mitigate ourselves and reduce our impact on the planet,” Mr Clarke said.

He pointed out that the issue is a complex one: “But it’s obvious it’s going to have impacts on our ecosystems and biodiversity and our communities.”

Within the council, there is a climate working on preparation of the plan, supported by the Eastern and Midlands CARO (Climate Action Regional Office).

They have been issued with five guiding principles: that their actions should be “ambitious, action-focused, evidence-based, participative and transparent”.

The council will be considering both adaptation and mitigation measures, Mr Clarke told the meeting, explaining that some measures would relate to the council’s own buildings infrastructure, but that the council would also have a role to play in influencing and coordinating and facilitating and advocating for changes in society.

Baseline

In order to ensure progress on climate action can be measured, the government has set the baseline year as 2018, and a consultant engaged by Westmeath County Council has produced this county’s baseline data.

Mr Clarke said the three largest influences to consider were agriculture (40%), transport (21%) and residential (16%), and the climate team has been instructed to come up with a vision and a mission; to set strategic goals with high level objectives and to list tasks beneath those.

Public

consultation

The key section is, he said, Chapter Four – the framework of climate actions, which contains 74 actions.

The draft is to go on public consultation from early November until December 18; the aim is to have it approved by the council on February 26.

Cllr Tom Farrell commented that the situation is serious: “There has to be change; there’s no denying that. And change has to be brought about in a manner where everybody is brought on board.”

He suggested that the council go out and meet the public around the county to explain it. “The farmers have to be brought on board,” he added.

“It is vital that we take this on board,” was the view of Cllr Denis Leonard, agreeing with Cllr Farrell on consultation: “This has to be a just transition. We need to bring people with us from every sector because it’s not just one sector here.”

He said the agricultural sector has led the way with “huge changes” in farming practice – more than any other sector, but he bemoaned the failure to provide enough public transport and said that to help the residential sector cuts, it was necessary to train more staff so the cost of retrofitting could come down.

Cllr Mick Dollard said he has already been noticing more flooding around Mullingar. He urged that storm traps in housing estates be kept cleaned out.

Cllr Andrew Duncan also agreed with Cllr Farrell’s point about bringing people along to avoid a “them and us” scenario. He said it was important to know what to do with excess water and what works in terms of flood management, and what are the repercussions for water quality.

Cllr Louise Heavin said she was glad to see there’s quite a bit of enthusiasm in the chamber for the climate action plan “because it’s going to be tough implementing this and actually trying to achieve our targets”, she stated.

Cllr Heavin said the key consultation that needs to happen is with the agricultural sector: “When it comes to the section on natural environment and green infrastructure, the key partner there will be the farming community. So like others said, we need to do some really good consultation work,” she stated, admitting that she was a bit concerned that the timeline for doing that work is not enough.

Cllr John Dolan said farming – particularly the dairy sector – tends to be criticised, but in his view, if the solutions make economic sense, they will happen. He said agriculture is, in fact, ahead of the game in that it has a plan to lower emissions by 25%: “I haven’t seen any other sector that was mentioned there have a national plan,” he said.

Honesty

Continuing, he said the authorities need to be honest with people on climate change: “There’s no quick solution to this. This is not going to be over in five years.”

Cllr Paul Hogan said the plan is ambitious in terms of the scale of reductions and there may be concerns over that, which was why he agreed with Cllr Farrell’s suggestion that there be some “stakeholder information evenings” in community halls around the county – not least because there are a number of positive actions within the plan.

Cllr Frankie Keena asked if there had been much engagement with the Technical University of the Shannon on climate change – and said it was also important to hear the voices of second level students.

He also said that it was important that the council lead by example and install solar panels on its offices and at locations such as the regional sports centre.

Responding, Mr Clarke said that consultation was a theme within the document, and it will continue through the lifetime of the plan: “In order to change hearts and minds we do need to get involved in the community, we need to get out there, we need to bring the message that better stuff is going to happen. It’s all innovation. There’s new things coming,” he said.

He agreed that there should be consultation with the TUS and on PV panels for the council offices said he hoped those would be in place in Mullingar by Christmas and early in the new year in Athlone.