Roscrea Pastoral Council applied to Tipperary County Council for permission to install 55 solar panels in an empty field behind St Cronan’s Church in the town.
The pastoral council is also planning on replacing the church’s existing oil boiler with a heat pump system in order to make it more efficient, according to planning files.
The project aims to reduce the church’s running costs, as well as reducing its impacts on the environment, planning documents show.
“At present the church is heated by an oil boiler and lit by electricity from the grid, both partly or entirely burning fossil fuel,” an agent acting on behalf of the pastoral council said.
“By installing a solar array of this scale in an empty piece of land which can generate electricity, it will reduce, and at times eliminate the energy requirements of the church and may contribute feed in power to help supply the wider community.
“Further, in the longer term, once the installation costs are paid off, the installation will save the church money, and help sustain it into the future. These are all positive results,” the agent added.
However, planners acknowledged that the solar panels would not blend in with their surroundings, although they said their visual impact could be mitigated through landscaping.
“The architectural heritage impact assessment confirms that the proposed solar arrays will not blend in with the landscape behind the church, however are only visible when standing at certain points close to the church. It is stated that same may be screened by landscaping,” the planner said.
“The report concludes that the array would have a moderate impact on the church, however is within acceptable limits. The report found that the panels would not impact on the other two structures which were considered,” they added.
The planners said that they accepted the findings of the architectural report, and said that the panels would be located to the rear of the church and wouldn’t negatively impact it.
Planning permission for the development was granted by the council, subject to four conditions.
These include a requirement for all cables associated with the development to be routed underground, and for surface water run-off to be disposed of within the site.
Construction work will also be restricted to between 8am and 6pm from Monday to Friday, and 8am and 2pm on Saturdays.