Coillte has been refused permission by Galway County Council to fell 343ha of its conifer plantation in Connemara for peatland restoration and conversion to native woodland.
In February 2023, Coillte Teoranta sought a 10-year planning permission to restore and rehabilitate approximately 281ha of Atlantic blanket bog and heathland.
The site is currently planted with lodgepole pine and Sitka spruce forests and managed for commercial forestry. Coillte also sought to convert 62ha of forestry to native woodland.
The site of the proposed development is located on the western side of the R344, approximately 5km to the north west of Recess, at Derryclare and Cloonnacartan, Co. Galway.
While the site itself is not the subject of any designations, it sits immediately abounding the Twelve Bens/Garraun Complex Special Area of Conservation (SAC).
Coillte plantation
In its decision last week, the council said that “adverse impacts” on the integrity of the SAC and Connemara Bog Complex SAC and other European sites “cannot be excluded”.
Therefore, the development would “materially contravene” several policy objectives of the Galway County Development Plan 2022-2028, according to the council’s planning decision.
The site is an existing Coillte conifer plantation which was primary planted in the 1960s. Sections of the site have been periodically harvested in the intervening years.
The plans submitted by the applicant last year also sought to control existing invasive species on site, the blocking of drains, and deer fencing to protect converted native woodland.
Coillte Teoranta also requested planning permission for resurfacing of up to 8.23km of existing forestry roads and the resurfacing of an existing car park to facilitate public access.
The approximate total site area owned by Coillte is 571ha. The site is accessed by a single vehicle width rough access track with a rough hardstanding area at the south of the gated access.