Bord na Móna

Bord na Mona

Type	Public - Semi-State Company
Founded	Ireland (1946)
Headquarters	Newbridge, County Kildare, Ireland
Key people	Mike Quinn (CEO)
Products	Firepak Firelogs Firelighters Fuels Peat Briquettes Coal Peat Fertiliser
Revenue	€ 401.5 Million (2008)
Net income	€ 15.5 Million (2008)
Number of employees	2,064(2008)
Website	www.bnm.ie

Bord na Móna (Irish pronunciation: [bˠoːɾˠd̪ˠ nə mˠoːn̪ˠə] — English: Peat Board), abbreviated BNM, is a semi-state company in Ireland, created in 1946 by the Turf Development Act 1946. The company is responsible for the mechanised harvesting of peat, primarily in the Midlands of Ireland. Extensive bogland is exploited in County Offaly, County Longford and County Westmeath, mainly the Bog of Allen. Harvesting energy peat is being phased out, to be replaced by sustainable biomass, wind and solar power.

History

The company was originally established in 1933 as the Turf Development Board, Limited, to manage this relatively plentiful natural resource. During World War II it was necessary to stockpile peat as a fuel, as coal was in short supply; this helped to save and use what they had.

Harvesting

Bord na Móna milled peat harvesting in the Bog of Allen

Peat was traditionally manually harvested by operating cutaway bogs. This method (still privately used today) consists of sods being vertically cut from the side face of a peat deposit. Technology was derived to mechanically cut and remove layers of peat from blanket bogs. Today, equipment is used to remove tonnes of peat each day at suitable times of year (rainfall is a significant variable in peat harvesting). Almost all the peat now harvested is milled peat, scraped from the surface of the bog by tractor-towed pin millers. The milled peat is ridged into small piles which are then transferred by harvesters into large piles running parallel along the bog. Railways are laid alongside each pile, the pile loaded into trains and the railway lifted and moved to the next pile. This is the 'Peco' method of working. A few bogs use the 'Haku' method whereby the milled peat is loaded into tractor-towed caterpillar-tracked trailers and deposited in a single heap at the edge of the bog adjacent to a railway line. Each year, the network of drainage ditches is deepened by a few inches before the next harvest.

Bord na Móna have developed a number of products which were novel developments in their time. Today peat briquettes replace sods of raw peat as a domestic fuel. These briquettes consist of shredded peat, compressed to form a slow-burning, easily stored and transported fuel. The first milled peat plant run by the Bord was financed with a loan of £500,000 from Guinness in 1957. Another product developed was peat moss, a combination of peat and soil for use in the garden - particularly in pot plants. The company also supplies peat to power stations of the Electricity Supply Board and its own power station Edenderry Power.

Railways

An extensive 3 ft (914 mm) narrow gauge network is operated by the company in the midlands. Some smaller sections of railway were used in other bog locations, for example in County Donegal until recent years. Bord na Móna has an extensive network, which has carried up to 5 million tonnes annually, and is larger than the main network (passenger and freight) operated by Iarnród Éireann. Bord na Móna has one of the largest industrial railways in Europe. Permanent railways run from a hundred peat bogs, each covering hundreds of acres, to power stations, briquette factories, moss peat factories and roadside tipplers. On most of the bogs, temporary tracks are laid along the piles of peat the full length of most bogs. Before a pile has been cleared, another temporary line will have been laid a few hundred feet farther along. More than 200 miles (over 300 km) of temporary track are laid each year and the Bord have specialist track fabrication workshops, tracklaying machines, and a fleet of dedicated locomotives and rolling stock on hand. A few bogs are operated by the Haku process, where the peat is collected in one huge heap at the end or side of a bog, requiring only one railway line to serve it.

Part of the Blackwater bog system was also used for tourist trains - the Clonmacnoise and West Offaly Railway (colloquially the "Bog Train") for about 12 years. This service ceased permanently on October 2008 as it interfered with the heavy peat traffic heading for West Offaly Power Station. One line of the Blackwater system runs along a section of the former Ballinasloe branch canal. This includes a section where the railway runs through Kylemore Lock. The newest branch of this system runs north from existing bogs at Bloomhill to the new bogs of Kilgarvan and Bunnahinley - the latter in the outskirts of Athlone - and opened for traffic c2011.

All 3 of Bord na Mona's old steam locomotives are preserved, one by the Irish Steam Preservation Society at Stradbally, County Laois.

Each of the three power stations - West Offaly at Shannonbridge,Co Offaly : Edenderry, Co Offaly : Lough Ree, Lanesborough, Co Longford - is the hub of an extensive rail network carrying heavy traffic. As an example, 12 trains or rakes (locomotive + 16 wagons) were in daily use 16 hours a day at West Offaly in April 2009. Other, generally older locomotives, handle fuel trains, track trainloads of track, ash trains and permanent way gangs. The Edenderry Power Station is now (2012) deriving a lot of its fuel from woodchip and types of biomass and the amount of peat arriving by rail is diminishing.

The two briquette factories at Derrinlough, Co Offaly and Littleton, Co Tipperary each have rail connections to 6 or 8 working bogs. Between 4 and 6 peat trains work on each system, the trains almost always travelling in pairs as they do at the power stations.

Bord na Mona also operate several smaller bog railways delivering the peat to tipplers for transfer by road to factories and power stations. They can be found at Gilltown, Ummeras, Kilberry, Prosperous and Almhain North - all in Co Kildare, Coolnamona in Co Laois, Derryfadda in Galway, Coolnagun, Ballivor and Kinnegad in Westmeath, Monettia, Bellair and Killaun in Offaly, and Templetuohy on the Tipperary / Kilkenny border. The Coolnamona Works is largely closed but the railway system was upgraded in 2010/11 to serve a new tippler supplying peat by road to Littleton (Lanespark) Briquette Factory.

Locomotives and rolling stock, for many years bought in from outside companies, are now designed and built in-house. New locomotives are invariably 0-4-0DH (diesel hydraulic) or 4wDH (no connecting rods). Most peat wagons are of the bogie type with aluminium bodies to reduce weight, though there were still thirty or so old steel-bodied wagons in use as of 2009. Templetuohy, the Bord's last traditional sod peat operation, uses 4 wheeled open slatted wagons which end tip into waiting lorries.

Land reclamation

The company is responsible, under government action, for reclaiming spent bogland. These areas of land are usually cleared up, with trees or other suitable vegetation being introduced. Reclaimed bogland is then usually used as a wildlife preserve. Much of the bogs of Ireland have been depleted, it is likely that most peat-fired electricity stations will be closed within 25 years. Rhode Power Station near Edenderry, County Offaly, had its cooling towers demolished on 16 March 2004 as it was no longer viable, followed by Bellacorick in north County Mayo on 14 October 2007.

Future activities

In July 2008, the company announced a €1.4 billion investment plan to expand and change the group's activities over a five-year period. Changes are to be phased in over twenty years and include a combination of energy, waste-management and recovery, and horticulture ventures and will end all exploitation of peat bogs. Chief Executive Officer Gabriel D'Arcy said that Bord na Móna intended to seek a partner to develop its renewable energy business.

Wind energy

€500 million will be spent developing the group's wind farm at Oweninny in northwest County Mayo. It was the first such commercial facility in the Republic and has been in operation since 1993.

In 2009 it produced six megawatts (MW) of electricity at full capacity, the expansion will add 350MW to the farm's output. When it is completed the wind farm will have the potential to produce enough power to supply up to 350,000 homes.

Gas power

Oweninny has enough wind to produce power approximately 35% of the time. Flexible, gas-fired facilities known as "peaking plants" - which can be activated and deactivated quickly - will be used to provide energy when there is insufficient wind. Bord na Mona also will be providing landfill gas based power, a source of renewable energy from waste.

Horticulture

Bord na Móna supplies peat moss fertilisers to markets in Ireland and Britain, where its biggest customer is DIY chain B&Q. Since British Government guidelines require manufacturers to reduce the amount of peat used in their products, Bord na Móna intends to capitalise on its system of fertiliser production which converts organic waste from gardens and parks, reducing the need for peat moss.

Waste management

Bord na Móna bought the "AES" domestic and commercial waste and recycling collection service in 2007. Bord na Móna Environmental Products U.S. provides wastewater management, water reuse, and odor/VOC solutions to municipalities, industry, developer commercial and residential markets throughout North America.

Edenderry Power

Bord Na Móna bought Edenderry Power Station from E.ON in 2006 giving it control of the station that was built in 2000. Bord Na Móna are in the process of increasing the co-fueling of the plant with Bio-Mass. Currently the co-fueling mix is at 7% with a target of 30% by 2015 on target.

See also

• List of Irish companies
• List of narrow gauge railways in Ireland

External links

• Official site - Bord na Móna
• Kylemore Lock and BNM train
• Heartland, celebrating the 75th anniversary of the Turf Development Board