A concern group in north Tipperary held a meeting on Monday night to highlight their concerns about a proposed anaerobic digestion (AD) facility in the area.

Ballymackey Biogas Concern Group raised issues around increased traffic on rural roads, environmental contamination, risk of explosion, health hazards as a result of gases produced in the AD process, increased odour in the area and adverse impacts to air quality.

Former IFA president and Ballymackey native Tim Cullinan previously spoke to the Irish Farmers Journal about his plans to build the facility adjacent to his pig farm which is located near Nenagh in the north of the county.

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Cullinan plans to build an AD plant which is based completely on animal byproducts and won’t be taking in feedstuffs such as maize, grass or silage.

The primary feedstock for the plant will be pig manure with plans also to take dairy sludge from the local co-op as well as by-products from local meat factories.

One of the concerns raised at Monday night’s meeting was that the digestate produced from the plant would be harmful if it was mismanaged and spread back on the land.

Citing an issue at an AD plant in Timoleague, Co Cork, Ciara Carroll from the National Biogas Concern Group said that if mismanaged digestate is spread across Tipperary “the land will be dead in 10 years”.

Local TD and former Labour leader Alan Kelly told the meeting that it would be “bananas” to build an AD plant in this area and called for a pause on all such developments until national guidelines and consistent planning guidelines are in place.

“I have a real concern in relation to food security. I don’t want to be standing in front of a group like this in 2035 saying ‘you know what,we got this wrong’,” Kelly said.

Kelly told locals to “get in as many objections as possible” in a bid to try and influence the decision of the planning authority.

However, Tim Cullinan told the Irish Farmers Journal this week that this product will not be used for land spreading.

‘Crazy remark’

“This is the only plant in the country that is going from end to end, meaning that the volumes coming in are all going to be processed in a proper manner and we’ll extract all the energy and nutrients. This is not your conventional biogas facility.

“Also for someone to make a comment that this is going to impact food security is a crazy remark – the whole purpose of this is to ensure the sustainability of our industry into the future,” he said.

Cullinan stated that AD is of huge national importance.

“This is still only a proposal, a proposal which I have personally invested heavily in.

“No planning application has been lodged to date – I am very frustrated and annoyed with commentary around the workings of this proposed biogas plant.

“This project will alleviate a lot pressures on the targets farmers have to meet both from an emissions and a water quality point of view,” he said.

This article was updated on 26 June 2025.