A big sewage and drainage scheme for Dublin remains undeveloped more than seven years after planning permission was sought for the project.
On one side, Uisce Éireann and politicians blame objectors and the courts for delay. On the other, environmentalists and lawyers insist the problem is decision-making failures in the planning process.
The scheme is held up as an example of a key infrastructural project delayed by a judicial review, a form of legal challenge now sharply criticised by some, given the number that have come before the courts as the State struggles to build quickly to ease the housing crisis and cope with a growing population.
In a judicial review, the High Court supervises lower courts, tribunals and other administrative bodies to ensure their decisions are reached properly, fairly and legally.
RM Block
A review, which is separate to the planning process and comes after planning is granted, assesses the legal validity, not the merits, of the decision.
The origin of the drainage scheme
The Dublin drainage scheme, the origins of which date back more than 15 years, is an example of how a judicial review can delay a key part of the State’s infrastructure.
In May 2008, Ireland was on the verge of the financial crash when Fingal County Council published its strategic environmental assessment for a Greater Dublin drainage strategy.
In 2012, a pre-application consultation process was begun by the council with An Bord Pleanála (ABP) which did not involve the public. In 2013, the council published a report identifying Clonshaugh in north Dublin as the preferred site for the development.
In the summer of 2017, Irish Water, now Uisce Éireann, became involved in the consultation process, which ended in May 2018.
The following month, Irish Water applied for permission for the Greater Dublin Drainage Project, comprising a wastewater treatment plant at Clonshaugh, sludge hub centre, orbital sewer, outfall pipeline and a new regional biosolids storage facility on a 30-hectare site.
The development was sought to cater for future population growth and because the Ringsend plant on the southside of the city was operating at overcapacity.
The plan was for a 13km underground orbital sewer running from Blanchardstown to the west of the city to the Clonshaugh plant, along with a 12km outfall pipeline to bring the treated wastewater to Baldoyle on the northside and out to sea.
An oral hearing was held in March 2019 and, in November 2019, ABP granted permission for the development.
Securing judicial review
In January 2020, Sabrina Joyce-Kemper, a customs and taxation consultant and sea swimmer from Portmarnock in north Co Dublin, secured High Court leave to bring judicial review proceedings aimed at overturning the planning approval.
The case was dealt with in the High Court’s Strategic Infrastructure Development List, a section of the court intended to fast-track hearings concerning strategically important projects.
The legal action was taken against ABP and the State with Irish Water as a notice party. In her challenge, Joyce-Kemper argued on a large number of grounds, including about the outfall pipeline discharges into the Rockabill to Dalkey Island Special Area of Conservation. She also questioned whether the European Union’s environmental impact assessment directive was properly transposed into Irish law.
In June 2020, ABP and the State parties put forward their case opposing the challenge. The case was heard over 12 days, ending in late July 2020, with judgment reserved.
In November 2020, Mr Justice Senan Allen upheld the challenge on one ground. He found the planning permission was legally flawed because the board had not complied with its legal obligation under the Waste Water Discharge Regulations to seek the observations of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) about the likely impact of the project on waste water discharges.
No appeal was taken.
Having later heard submissions on whether to return the planning application to ABP, the judge in April 2021 remitted it for reconsideration from the point where the court had found the process had gone wrong. To do otherwise would set Irish Water, which was not responsible for ABP’s mistake, back by 16 or 17 months, he said.
Although not minimising the seriousness of the ABP mistake, it was “a misstep” in the “minefield” of the Planning and Development Act 2000 and the Waste Water Discharge Regulations, Mr Justice Allen said.
The legal proceedings involved five judgments, including the main judgment overturning the planning permission.
Other judgments related to remittal, costs issues and an unsuccessful application by Joyce-Kemper to have Mr Justice Allen withdraw from hearing the case on grounds that he had, as a senior counsel, acted for Irish Water in a separate case. When he refused to withdraw, she appealed.
A day before the appeal was listed for hearing, Mr Justice Allen gave his main judgment quashing the permission, effectively rendering the appeal pointless and so it did not proceed.
Joyce-Kemper was awarded 25 per cent of her High Court costs against ABP, excluding costs of the withdrawal and remittal applications. She and the State had to pay their own costs of dealing with the claims against the State parties. She was refused the necessary permission to appeal the costs orders.
In August 2022, ABP met for the first time to consider the judgment remitted in April 2021. It took another three years before it gave its decision.
The board was grappling with a shortage of board members and controversies, including allegations of impropriety in the spring of 2022.
Internal files later showed that board decision-making on big housing and infrastructural developments came to a virtual halt amid the turmoil.
Since renamed An Coimisiún Pleanála under new laws, the board continues to deal with the fallout from a large backlog of cases.
Uisce Éireann started construction early last year of the regional biosolids facility and in November 2024 applied to the EPA for a waste water discharge authorisation. That consultation process is continuing.
Clonshaugh project is granted planning approval – 12 years after the location was first identified
In July 2025, An Coimisiún Pleanála granted planning approval for the Clonshaugh project – 12 years after the location was first identified.
On September 2nd last, a second judicial review challenge was initiated, this time by Wild Irish Defence, an environmental non-governmental organisation, and Catherine McMahon, another sea swimmer.
On September 15th, they secured leave to bring the case and a hearing date is fixed for December 8th.
Timeline of legal challenges and delays in the Greater Dublin drainage project
The grounds of challenge include alleged failures to carry out environmental impact assessments of overflow effects or an appropriate assessment of the effects of the scheme on a species of porpoise, the harbour porpoise.
Uisce Éireann has expressed hope the judicial review process would progress quickly to enable it to deliver this “vital” infrastructure, now running to an estimated cost of about €1.3 billion.
The second judicial review, before the new Planning and Environment division of the High Court, is expected to be decided within weeks of the conclusion of next month’s hearing.
In the seven years since the project was submitted for planning, the time taken up by legal proceedings, including the second judicial review, amounts to about two years.
The impact of the second review on the project’s operational date of 2032 depends on the outcome of that case.
