Sign in. It’s quick, free and it’s up to you.
An account is an optional way to support the work we do. Find out more.
A DECISION TO refuse a major whiskey project in the midlands over fears it would ‘scar’ the landscape has been slammed as “unwarranted, unfounded and unsubstantiated”.
As previously reported by Fora, Westmeath County Council denied planning permission for Vault Whiskey Store to build a €138 million whiskey maturation complex in Moyvore.
The company applied to install 12 whiskey warehouses on a 100-acre site located 20 minutes from Mullingar.
The plan was to provide a facility where whiskey producers could store and mature their spirits in casks. The spirit needs to be stored and matured for a minimum of three years to qualify as Irish whiskey.
Each warehouse would have had a capacity of 12,500 casks. The project was slated for completion in early 2020.
However, Westmeath Council denied planning permission on the grounds that the development lacked “architectural merit” and would be at odds with the area’s “sensitive rural setting”.
Westmeath County Council said in its refusal that the site “would result in visual scarring of the rural landscape … and would seriously detract from the scenic amenities and setting of this rural landscape”.
Planners also rejected the project over concerns that its “visual dominance” would have an “overbearing impact” on a nearby house and diminish the property’s value.
The council’s decision has since been appealed to the national planning board.
In a document prepared by Cork-based planning consultant Harry Walsh on behalf of Vault Whiskey Store, the developer insisted that the proposed project “will not result in an excessively prominent feature on the landscape”.
Agricultural sheds
As part of its application, Vault Whiskey Store hired two companies to conduct a landscape and visual impact assessment from multiple viewpoints. The report concluded that the complex was located within a “low-sensitivity landscape”.
The company said the maturation warehouses were designed to be screened from a nearby public road “as the business does not require public profile or visibility”.
It said the large-scale warehouses would differ from many other industrial buildings and would resemble farming sheds “which are prominent throughout the Irish countryside”.
It said the proposed development would feature design elements that would have a “far less significant” visual impact than many other developments of a similar scale.
Vault Whiskey Store said it believed the local planning authority had “exaggerated” the potential visual impacts of the whiskey maturation complex.
It said criticism of the landscape and visual assessment commissioned by the company was “unwarranted, unfounded and unsubstantiated”.
National importance
Throughout the appeal to An Bord Pleanála, Vault Whiskey Store stressed that the proposed development was of national importance.
As previously explained by Fora, the whiskey industry has said it needs several large centres for maturing whiskey to hit growth targets.
Maturation is a crucial part of whiskey production. Legally, produce from distilleries can’t be branded as Irish whiskey unless it has been matured for a period of at least three years.
However, large maturation warehouses are expensive to build. Developers must also adhere to strict fire safety laws, and insurance and security costs are high because the value of the product increases every year after the initial three-year period.
“The proposed maturation warehouse facility aims to address the primary challenge facing the continued expansion of the Irish whiskey industry: maturation,” Vault Whiskey Store told the planning board.
It said larger, more established distilleries prefer to use their own maturation facilities and small- to medium-sized distilleries would benefit from central maturation complexes because such developments require significant investment.
We consider that the council’s decision did not have full regard to national policy and that the potential visual impacts of the proposed development were misunderstood and inappropriately assessed.
Written by Conor McMahon and posted on Fora.ie
This is getting hilarious at this stage. At what stage are all these supposed “intellectuals”, “intelligent politicians” and lest we forget the blessed academic insulated economists, going to get it! It aint working lads, so I know uprooting the whole system puts all your publicly paid gravy trains at risk but sher that’s just tough! Wait for Italy to go caput next and then just wait for the meltdown. Any chance the journal would get all our learned economist friends like Mr Whelan on here? Didn’t he tell us we’d have €700 billion at our disposal if we voted Yes? There’s €100 billion gone already and markets are still tearing Spain apart. You just have to question credibility at this stage! Oh dear oh dear, everyone feathering their own nests while Europe burns!
thank god for all the intuitive geniuses who write on the journal
That 700 billion alone will only last for Spain. Italy and France are in the waiting room.
Hence my policy not to invest within the Euro zone.
In the longterm the Euro will falter as we know it.
That is of course just my opinion.
What is yours?
Joe, there’s no need for any intuition here. A cursory study of economic history clearly demonstrates that there is no easy or painless slution to this crisis.
Over eighty years ago, Ludwig von Mises forewarned the Wall St. crash with this now ominous quote. “There is no means to avoid the final collapse brought about by credit expansion..”
We have just lived through the largest expansion of credit in the past 40 years. Expect a collapse of similar scale.
Just looking at Richard Bruton here on tv3 news saying that the Spanish bailout has stabilized the situation are they for real this government, we need to get out on the streets enough is enough
Sure in fairness Richard is talking bull. Sure wasn’t it the fiscal compact that was going to provide stability?
So which countries have signed up for the fiscal compact? Greece? Yes. Spain? Yes. Ireland? Yes (or soon to do so as the referendum was passed). Portugal? Yes. Anyone notice a pattern her? Have any other countries ratified it?
It’s all about the positive signals, and the stability, we’ll be graaaaaand. There are positive signals everywhere now, nothing to worry about. It’s sorted.
Economic issues like this will lead to massive social upheaval, my money’s out of Irish banks! And have started to become fully self sufficient for food … City folks will look well when the powercuts come
In 1971, the gold standard system, established at Bretton Woods, was abandoned in favour of a fiat currency system with the US dollar positioned as the global reserve currency. This allowed the US to bridge funding gaps, caused by the cost of funding both the Vietnam war and the ongoing Cold war with Russia.
The world benefitted greatly from this momentous decision.
Firstly, the US, liberated from the monetary shackles of the gold standard, could finance enhanced military expansion/adventurism without subjecting American voters to onerous levels of taxation.
Secondly, fiat currency offered enhanced economic capabilities to central planners (governments, central banks). The volume of currency supplied into the economy could be increased to stimulate growth (monetary easing) during recessionary episodes. This was particularly opportune for nations like the US & Britain as their domestic manufacturing industries were in decline in the 1970′s. In both these nations, uncompetitive businesses were allowed to fail as any economic impacts were, or would be, mitigated by a, soon to be, thriving banking and financial services sector courtesy of the enhanced monetary capabilies now available to central planners.
An anomaly of fiat currency is it’s requirement for constant monetary expansion and it’s propensity to generate credit fuelled booms and debt. As fiat currency holds no intrinsic value, to ensure monetary stability all new currency is issued as debt. Central banks issue new currency to governments and Market participants as collaterallised debt. To allow for repayment of this new currency (debt) the volume of new currency must constantly increase (constant monetary expansion). Needless to say, the rate of monetary expansion has increased exponentially over subsequent decades.
http://www.chrismartenson.com/crashcourse/chapter-8-fed-money-creation
While governments issue bonds to their central banks to access new currency, Market participants faced increasing difficulty sourcing, the expotentially increasing quantities of securities required to access new currency. The danger of a collateral drought were that the wheels would come off the accelerating fiat currency merry-go-round.
In the US, this problem was overcome by issuance of toxic securities. In many cases these were facilitated by the expanding subprime mortgage market.
European banks, as well as trading in toxic securities also, accessed collateral via the government bonds of nations, whose creditworthiness had recently been enhanced, such as Greece. Also, newly created collateral courtesy of credit-fuelled property booms in countries such as Spain and Ireland.
Ron Paul!
Bring back the gold standard
I don’t entirely agree Dmc. The twentieth century was dominated by two currency systems (or variants). Firstly, the gold standard up until 1971. This was abandoned because it did not provide enough liquidity for free-spending governments and properly functioning economies at the same time.
Then fiat currency which we will soon see disappear down a sinkhole of inflation and debasement.
The ideal solution is a currency system where the supply of currency matches the demand for currency. While there is not an oversupply as we currently have now with paper money.
Mexican Hugo Salinas Price has suggested a hybrid duel currency system. This involves the issuance of paper currency long side the issuance of silver coins.
US Professor Larry White goes a step further, suggesting complete liberalisation of the issuance of currency.
Either system could prove extremely useful for Ireland in the near future.
http://www.freebanking.org/2011/09/13/the-free-competition-in-currency-act-of-2011/
Why can’t the create a separate vehicle for bailing out banks on their own? Think we might have had a glimpse of what would happen this morning. Spanish bond yields fell until it became apparent that Spain, and not it’s banks, was on the hook afterall
The EU/ECB had a chance in 2009 to resolve this, by being radical then. They refused and dithered, looked at the German economy, saw it was doing fine and left it at that.
The problem festered and grew, growth collapsed under austerity and the debt remains. Now growth is stalling across all countries, including the so called core. Holland heading in to a recession and Germany will as well.
This is funnier than my Fr Ted boxset!!! All this crap is caused by fear and stupid clowns gambling with the stockmarkets. The funniest thing is governments know this but wont do anything about it!!!
Batten down the hatches! This is going to be a bumpy ride. The euro in its current form looks doomed. No more band aids left. The game is up. The euro political zombies have bottled it.
there is one simple, tried and tested solution and its called bankruptcy.
The conspiracy theorists think this banking crisis is to force the countries into a united states of Europe controlled by the big banks..what a ridiculous idea. Idiots!!
Although who s running Greece and Italy at t moment…hummm, nah it couldn’t be bankers??
Waterford do ur homework it’s actually not a theory anymore it’s fact . The bankers are actually sucking the world economies dry . It’s down to fiat currency and for fiat currency to survive it must always have ppl spending that’s why you have Christmas valentines day paddy s day Easter the currency must always be circulating . There’s no solution fiat currency does not work . Our civilisation is going to collapse the way it’s going so the ppl in charge may see this as a reason to create a super communist state where everything I’d controlled .
Can we have more bandaid please, the bit we thought fixed Spain has vanished, where will it all end
have your say