Researchers at Dublin City University (DCU) are participating in a first-of-its-kind European project to discover the possible benefits of using drones and robots for the maintenance of wind and solar farms.
The Durable project is seeking to find out whether using such technologies to automate inspection of faults can reduce costs and boost take-up of renewable energies along the Atlantic.
The DCU researcher leading the project locally is Prof Patrick McNally, co-director of the Nanomaterials Processing Laboratory in DCU and the deputy director of its Advanced Processing Technology Research Centre.
He said countries along the western Atlantic seaboard are laggards in terms of reaching renewable energy targets, with plans to reach a target 20 per cent renewable energy use by the end of 2020 highly unlikely, particularly in the Republic where use is currently running at just under 11 per cent.
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