Background
Curns Energy Limited obtained permission in November 2023 for a 17-turbine strategic infrastructure wind farm. Its appropriate-assessment screening considered the Blackwater Callows Special Protection Area (SPA), 9.9 km from the site, within a 15 km zone of impact. The Commission ultimately screened the SPA out, relying on matters including distance, lack of hydrological connectivity, bird-survey results and the absence of a plausible impact pathway.
Paddy Massey challenged the permission. In 2025, the High Court dismissed his certiorari claim, finding that any error concerning the absence of site-specific conservation objectives had not affected the outcome, but left open a claim for declaratory relief and referred a question to the Court of Justice of the European Union. The CJEU’s subsequent judgment in Joined Cases C-27/25 and C-356/25 distinguished between initially delimiting the geographical area likely to be affected and assessing the risk of significant effects on protected sites within that area.
The Court’s Holding
Humphreys J held that the Commission made an error of law. It could lawfully delimit a 15 km geographical zone without site-specific conservation objectives, provided effects outside that area could be ruled out on objective criteria. But, once the Blackwater Callows SPA was within that lawfully delimited zone, the Commission could not assess and exclude impacts on that particular SPA without site-specific conservation objectives for it.
The Court granted a declaration recording that error. It did not quash the wind-farm permission: the earlier No. 2 judgment had finally held that the error was harmless on the facts and had refused certiorari. The Court provisionally directed that the applicant receive costs against the Commission limited to the declaratory-relief issue, including the relevant CJEU and reserved costs, subject to any further written application.
Key Takeaways
- Site-specific conservation objectives are not required merely to delimit the geographical area a project may affect.
- They are required when assessing whether a project may significantly affect a protected site within that area.
- A harmless habitats-law error may warrant declaratory relief even where the development consent is not quashed.
Why It Matters
The decision applies the CJEU’s clarification in the linked Knocknamona and Massey references to an Irish planning permission. It draws a firm line between broad, objective geographical screening and site-specific assessment of a protected area.
For planning authorities and developers, the ruling means that distance and pathway evidence may define the outer reach of an assessment, but cannot substitute for site-specific conservation objectives when evaluating a protected site inside the resulting area.