Dr Hunter Vaughan and Dr Meryl Shriver-Rice return to Killala to research the impact of digital and energy infrastructure on the local landscape. They will hold public consultations on 9th and 10th July 2025. Such engagement is timely in that planning permission has recently been granted for hydrogen plant and battery energy storage projects at the old Asahi site in Killala.
Photo of Killala, Co. Mayo. (Credit: Bartek Rybacki and Mayo North Tourism)
In 2020, Dr. Hunter Vaughan, Assistant Professor of Ecomedia in the department of Visual and Media Arts at Emerson College, Boston, began a research project about the growth of both digital infrastructures and renewable energy infrastructures in County Mayo. The former included subsea cable landing stations and data centres, while the latter encompassed solar panels and wind turbines.
Researchers talked with local citizens about digital and renewable energy technologies
Dr Vaughan and Dr. Meryl Shriver-Rice, Director of Research at the Institute for American Indian Studies, carried out research in the Killala community over three weeks at the end of the Covid pandemic. They talked with local citizens and politicians, and hosted an event using techniques of photo elicitation and participatory mapping.
In the Killala community, the researchers gained insights into rich local knowledge and political aspirations for community revival when discussing data and energy infrastructure growth. The groups explored local needs and desires in the context of digital and renewable energy technologies, discussed geographical and aesthetic preferences in planning new infrastructure development, considering local people’s appreciation of Killala’s architecture and coastal vistas.
Two days of public events on 9th and 10th July 2025 in Killala
Now benefitting from a second round of research grant funding, additional resources and planning time, and the partnership of Moy Valley Resources IRD, the team returns to Killala in July 2025 to conduct two days of public events. These meetings will focus on local feelings and desires, as well as perceived problems and benefits of renewable energy growth alongside internet infrastructure expansion. Two open community events will take place on 9th and 10th of July at 8.30pm in Killala Community Centre, and one-to-one conversations can also be facilitated by prior arrangement.
Results of public engagement will be presented to local community
It is innovative that the findings of the engagement between researchers and the public in early July will be made available to the Killala and surrounding community in a written summary report. It will be placed at the service of interested local parties to raise awareness and visibility of the issues surrounding digital and renewable energy technology development.
It will help support community agency and voice in this area of development, and in this way, the community-based research conducted from 2020 comes full circle in that its findings may now have an impact on the place in which it was undertaken, and give back to those who contribute.
Refreshments and spot prizes will be available and an interesting evening’s discussion and interaction is assured.
How to arrange a one-to-one meeting with the researchers
If you would like the opportunity to speak to the researchers on a specific aspect of the topics at hand (biodiversity, ecology, agriculture, landscape protection, and so on) on a one-to-one basis, please contact Annette Maughan, CEO Moy Valley Resources IRD to discuss at amaughan@moyvalley.ie
Research conducted as part of the Sustainable Subsea Networks project, funded by the Internet Society Foundation and now housed at the SubOptic Foundation.
Moy Valley Resources IRD is a community development company for the Moy Valley region of north Mayo and west Sligo.