Leitrim County Council
How do we know this information?
Leitrim was one of the Councils in the Republic of Ireland not very forthcoming with its FoI responses. We had to get some of their published data ourselves EG Financial Information
Summary
We judged Leitrim as a bit hapless, falling into wealth with rates from renewable energy but no plans for any basic aspect of the energy transition.
Renewable Energy Leitrim County Council claimed to have no renewable energy installed on its premises or any PV/Wind farm of its own to provide cash for front line services. See West Suffolk
Energy Efficiency Leitrim claimed to have no energy efficiency campaign and no system of reporting on this to allow calculation of their cumulative annualised savings. Other small Councils around Ireland were able to do this – for instance Louth where you can see savings of over E300,000pa
Leitrim had no grip on its overall expenditure on energy, referring us to its published accounts linked above and its annual Budget which has no overall figure for expenditure on energy. Its budget heading for ‘Climate Change’ was strikingly shown as ‘zero’.
Rates from Renewables Renewable energy provided 23.7% of its rates. If the National Grid is taken into account, energy made up 34% of overall rates. If their financial systems could ‘see’ the other forms of renewable energy this percentage would be higher. Leitrim’s finance department seems unaware of the impact of renewables on its finances and no plans to fix the coding issues in their financial systems either – see Donegal Council for solution.
Organised Plan The Council appears to have no plans to maximise the financial benefits to itself of the energy transition. The Council seemed unaware that ‘green energy jobs’ are forecast to grow to 125,000 in the Republic and 42,000 in Northern Ireland by 2030. An opportunity one would think would be especially useful to to Leitrim given its geography.
See the breakdown summary of the Council here:
Annual € | |
Rates Income from Renewable Energy Projects | € 1,501,272 (but probably more) |
Income from Council’s own renewable energy | nil |
Cumulative annualised savings from energy savings campaign | nil |
Savings from the electrification of Council’s vehicle fleet | nil |
Rates Income from fossil fuel/nuclear electricity plants | nil |
Rates Income from grid infrastructure and related plant | € 630,459 |
Total | € 2,121,732 or possibly more – see above |
Council’s Reply
The Councils reply to the FoI request was so poor we decided not to publish it. We are preparing a more comprehensive 22/23 EU Directive Information request to this Council on the energy transition. Based on legal and accounting advice.
We will be asking how Louth plans to maximise the financial benefits of the projected six fold increase in rates from renewable energy as well as ‘green energy ’ jobs both North and South. An opportunity one would think would be especially useful to Louth given its geography
A PDF of the Council’s EU Directive response will be here soon.