A Canadian pension fund will be provide in the region of one billion euro for the development of a wind farm 15 kilometres into the Atlanic Ocean, west of the Connemara coastline.
This project - if planning permission is forthcoming - is set to be the first offshore wind farm of the west coast of Ireland from Donegal to Cork.
The Ontario Teachers Pension Plan is a Canadian pension fund that is set to invest in the wind farm at Sceirde Rocks nine miles west of Carna.
This pension plan was started-up in 1990 and it now provides pension services to 320,000 past and present teachers in Canada.
It might have been unthinkable at one time that the teachers of Canada, and their pension fund, would invest a thousand million euros into the raging seas that sometimes hit the rock of Sceirde.
But the raging winds are a new energy and the profits from this Connemara project may pay the pensions for Canadian teachers in future generations
The Canadian ambassador is due to visit the CillChiaráin and Carna area prior to St Patricks Day.
From the windows of the Emigrants and Diaspora Centre in Carna she will see the Sceirderocks at the edge of the horizon as she looks west.
On the shore, she will see the seaweed that powers the Arramara company nearby which is also Canadian owned.
Canada has come to Connemara.
Máirtín Ó Catháin for GBFM in Connemara
