Scientific analysis of Irish weather patterns, now under way at University College Cork, suggests that storms are likely to become less frequent in the coming years, but far more severe along western and eastern parts of the coastline.
The work is being carried out by the Coastal Resources Centre at UCC, under Dr Robert Devoy, as part of EU-funded research which is being spearheaded at the college. In the first phase, now completed, Dr Devoy and his team looked at storms in Ireland and likely trends into the next century.
The second phase, which is now beginning, will examine the effect of storms on the coastline and where the increased storm energy is going to be felt most.
The researchers collated the existing records of Irish storms and used computer modelling, taken from available modern data, including measurable climatic changes, to predict the frequency and intensity of future storms. "What we see developing is that while the overall number of storms in the North Atlantic may be decreasing from a benchmark of the 1900s, the size is increasing so
that storms of hurricane intensity seem to be more frequent. Such storms will be felt predominantly in the bay areas of the coastline and especially in areas that have softer configurations.
"The south-west coast has more hard rock so it is likely to fare better, but the west, north-west and south-east coastlines are composed of softer materials. In layman's terms, they may be more vulnerable to heightened storm activity leading to attendant coastal erosion and this could affect Rosslare, Wexford and Dublin on the east coast, as well as Galway Bay and Donegal to the west and north-west," Dr Devoy said.
The "seasonality of storminess" is also set to change due to shifting climatic patterns on a global scale, according to the research team.
In Ireland this may mean more benign summers and harsher winters, if the modelling and analysis is correct. Dr Devoy ran his program for 10-year segments and said it can be anticipated that by the year 2060, what is now being predicted will have become the norm.
The information now being gleaned through research, he adds, will have practical implications for policy-makers and local bodies with responsibility for coastal zones.
The ability to predict the physical impact of increased "storminess" on the coastline will arm the planners with information not hitherto available. It will help them to channel expertise and resources into the areas where they can be best employed.
Future planning can have implications for where communities wishing to live near coastal zones should be sited. When published, the work will undoubtedly increase public awareness of how the environment along the coast can change and may help bring the planners and local communities into a new partnership to deal with these changes.
This was the concept behind a conference last weekend in Bantry, Co Cork, the first of its kind in the Republic. The Bantry Bay Coastal Charter was launched at the conference by the Minister for the Environment and Local Government, Mr Dempsey. He described it as a groundbreaking project which will become a model for best practice both in Ireland and throughout the EU. The charter concept, driven locally by Cork County Council, brought together Dr Devoy's unit at UCC, the Nautical Enterprise Centre at the Cork Institute of Technology and more than 60 organisations including community groups and commercial and sectoral interests.
Their common purpose was to agree on a plan that would lead to an integrated approach to the development of the Bantry Bay coastal zone. Above all, the aim was to ensure that everybody in the region with a view or a particular interest, had an opportunity to have a say and to influence policy.
Some 12,000 people live and work in the Bantry Bay region. As in other coastal zones, planning issues regularly crop up. As Whiddy Island, in the bay, is going to play an increasingly strategic role as a transhipment centre for crude oil, the future direction of a lively tourism industry will need to be mapped and managed. The need to create jobs in a satisfactory environment while at the same time allowing the coastal community to flourish and remain at home is, perhaps, the greatest challenge of all.
Dr Devoy's work involves looking at the physical changes that may occur in the coastal zones in the years ahead. The work of the other groups will be to function as a close-knit unit concerning proposals that impinge on the region, whether on land or offshore.
The project co-ordinator, Mr Kevin Lynch, of Cork County Council, says the process of bringing all the strands together in the first phase was arduous, but a consensus has emerged and now the real work of implementing proposals in policy areas will begin in phase two.