From Thursday 2nd January 2nd until – Saturday January 11th, 2025 Natural Christmas Trees, may be dropped off at the following locations in Co. Tipperary, free of charge.
[Take Note Here: Residents of Thurles Town and the surrounding areas, please note that the Christmas tree drop-off area for Thurles, per the Tipperary Co. Council website, is no longer Parnell Street Car Park, as it was in previous years, but this new site could be subject to change due to the current construction works taking place on the same Farm Building, beside ‘The Source’ on Cathedral Street.]
Clonmel Recycling Centre, Carrigeen, Clonmel. County Council Depot Cahir Business Park, Cahir. Waller’s-Lot Recycling Centre, Cashel. Recycling Centre, Donohill, Tipperary. Fair Green Car Park, Carrick-on-Suir. Nenagh Recycling Centre, Nenagh. Roscrea Recycling Centre, Roscrea. Templemore Town Park, Templemore.
Wishing all athletes and their families a very Happy Christmas and a healthy 2025.
Basketball training has been moving forward satisfactorily this season so far, with our new athlete members settling in very nicely. Thanks to all the volunteers and MrMartin Hehir, at the Presentation Sports Hall, for their support.
We held our annual Christmas party in Meitheal on Wednesday, December 11th, and a great night was had by all present.
A big thank you to the Meitheal Staff; together with Mr Paul Scully from Photo Station, who looked after the photographs; Ms Rosalie Butler for the music and dance and all the athletes who sang on the night.
Sadly, we report that two men have lost their lives in a house fire in Littleton, Thurles, Co. Tipperary. Both men; one aged in his 80s and one aged in his 50s, were both pronounced dead at the scene.
House where, sadly, two men lost their lives early this morning. Pic: G. Willoughby.
The men are identified locally as a father and son, members of the Lee family.
The blaze, which is now extinguished, is understood to have occurred at about 2:30am and Emergency Services and Gardaí remain at the scene, as investigation get underway.
It is understood that both men died from smoke inhalatation.
Ireland’s recycling rate has not improved in a decade: it is time to move away from a wasteful linear economy.
In 2022, Ireland generated 15.7 million tonnes of waste, equivalent to 8kg per person every day.
Ireland’s annual waste generation has grown by over 20% in the last decade.
Ireland is now almost certain to miss EU municipal and packaging recycling targets for 2025.
Ireland’s municipal recycling rate remains stagnant at 41% with no significant change in 10 years.
Many construction activities are highly waste intensive, accounting for half of all waste generated.
Ireland has a waste infrastructure gap with over 1.2 million tonnes of municipal waste exported to other countries in 2022.
The Environmental Protection Agency(EPA) has today published the Circular Economy and Waste Statistics Highlights Report 2022. This report identifies that Ireland generated 15.7 million tonnes of waste in 2022, which although a decrease on 2021 figures, still shows a growth of over 20% in the last decade.
Commenting on the report, Mr David Flynn, Director of the Office of Environmental Sustainability, EPA said: “Today’s report from the EPA shows that Ireland’s progress towards a circular economy is stalling. Current measures to prevent waste, to promote reuse and to encourage recycling are not enough to meet mandatory municipal waste and plastic packaging targets. The challenge for Ireland is to reverse these trends and significantly reduce waste production and increase reuse and recycling. Strong implementation of existing policies and the introduction of new measures that support investment in new circular economy infrastructure will help move us away from a wasteful linear economy.”
Summary of data from the key sectors.
Construction and demolition waste:
Half of all waste generated in Ireland is construction and demolition waste. Most of this (85%) is soil and stone waste. Construction and demolition waste decreased by 8% to 8.3 million tonnes, driven primarily by reductions in soil and stone waste.
Municipal waste:
The total amount of municipal waste is relatively static at 3.2 million tonnes. This is a 1% increase from 3.17 million tonnes in 2021 and the same level as recorded in 2020.
Some 15% of municipal waste was disposed to landfill in 2021. Some 43% of municipal waste was treated by energy recovery through incineration.
Some 66% of Irish households had access to a brown bin for food and organic waste in 2022. This is a decrease of 3% from 2021. Regulatory changes in 2023 mean that waste collectors are now obliged to provide all households with a brown bin.
Packaging (including plastic packaging)
Total packaging waste remained unchanged at 1.2 million tonnes in 2022.
Some 32% of plastic packaging generated in Ireland in 2022 was recycled, up from 28% in 2021.
Single-use Plastics
Some 30,680 tonnes of single-use plastic bottles were placed on the market in 2022. A collection rate of 49% was achieved prior to the introduction of the new Deposit Return Scheme.
The report shows that over the last 10 years Ireland’s recycling rate has stagnated and mandatory targets for municipal and plastic packaging are at a high risk of not being met. Currently Ireland’s municipal waste recycling rate is unchanged at 41%, with a requirement to be at 55% by 2025. In addition, whilst recycling of packaging waste is 60%, this must reach 65% by 2025. In 2022 the plastic packaging recycling was 32%, up from 28% in 2021, however the recycling target for plastic packaging is 50 per cent by 2025. Positively, regarding construction and demolition (C&D) waste, 82% is recovered, the majority being used or recovered in back filling for land restoration. This is in excess of the 70% recovery rate required.
The report also highlights that Ireland’s capacity to collect and treat waste is vulnerable and underperforming, with an over-reliance on other countries to treat our recycling materials and general municipal waste. In 2022, 38% (1.2 million tonnes) of all municipal waste was exported for treatment. This included 369,000 tonnes of residual waste exported for energy recovery through incineration.
Commenting on the report findings Mr Warren Phelan, Programme Manager of the EPA’s Circular Economy Programme said: “Ireland’s economy is characterised by a high consumption of raw materials. However deeper change is needed right across the economy to accelerate the transition to a more circular economy. Effective regulation, incentives and enforcement are required to influence businesses and consumers to adopt best practices in production, supply, purchasing, use and reuse of goods, products and services.” The EPA’s national waste statistics are published HERE on the EPA website. The Circular Economy and Waste Statistics Highlights Report 2022 is available HERE on the EPA website.
I have heard many emigrants declare that Christmas Eve is always remembered by those with a special nostalgia and affection and maybe with a tinge of loneliness for the joys of yesteryear, in the homeland.
Waiting For Santa. Pic: G. Willoughby.
I can empathise with them, for I remember one Christmas in London, in the World Cup year of 1966. On that Christmas Eve, I recall passing by many English homes, with their gaily illuminated Christmas trees in the windows and feeling not a little nostalgic for Christmas Eve in Thurles, my hometown and wondering what the craic might be like, ‘a long way to Tipperary’.
One of my most memorable Christmas Eve’s was as a boy of five years, trying desperately and unsuccessfully to keep awake in my bed, beside that open hearth fire and waiting for the embers to die down, so it would be safe for ‘Santy’ to descend with his presents and hoping that I could have a ‘heart to heart’ chat with him. I tried so hard to keep awake, but ‘Santy‘s’ appearance eluded me, as it continued to do for a couple of other magical years. However, disappointment always gave way to sheer delight the following morning, when I realised, he had brought me the set of trains and tracks, which I had asked for by letter, communicated to that generous giant, dressed in red, residing permanently at the North Pole. Oh what magic! Oh what joy!
Earlier, on that Christmas Eve, my excited mother had been to the grocer for the messages, and the butcher for a goose or turkey, latter that would tide us over the Christmas period. She traditionally received a nice ‘handsel’(Latter a gift given at Christmas in gratitude for continued custom and rarely practised today), of an iced, colourfully decorated Christmas cake, from the local corner shop. My father would have brought me to a pub/grocery premises, where I would have been treated to lashings of lemonade and orange and colourful biscuits. He too, received the ‘handsel’ of a free pint for his continued custom and I, a sixpenny piece or a ‘bob’ (a shilling) for just being a good boy, whatever that meant.
On Christmas Eve, my mother put up the decorations which consisted of holly and ivy and the placing of a candle in our front window, making our home seem, to my brothers and me, a jolly colourful fairyland. In not so affluent times people in the fowl business contributed to the local Christmas income, by employing “pluckers”, latter employed to remove feathers from soon to be consumed, Christmas turkeys and geese.
Down the town, this Christmas, the older townies from New York, London, Dublin, and from nearer home will be rambling around the streets of their childhood, in quest of old friends, remembering memories of other days spent in the hotels and pubs in the town. There will be music in the pubs and old melodies like “White Christmas”, which I first heard sung in a local cinema, by Bing Crosby; will be again resurrected. Carol singers in the main street will sing their carols for local charities and our wonderful Christmas lighting, all over the town, will illuminate our streets and our hearts and also the hearts of non-returning emigrants, to whom we will send photographs via social media.
Later, folks will attend midnight Mass to hear the choir sing all the old Christmas favourites, “Joy to the World”; “Oh, Holy Night”; “While shepherds watched their flocks by night” and of course, “Silent Night” which enthrals all age groups. In a hushed and emotional congregation I have known so called “hard men” to be in tears at such a hallowed gathering; though, perhaps, it might have been their first visit to a church for a long time.
Of course Christmas is a time to remember the folks who went before us and the innocence and simplicity of yesteryear. It can be a lonely time for some. But I hold, that the whole message of Christmas is ‘joy to the world’. Commercialism aside, this is the real Christmas. People say Christmas is now every day, meaning that today everybody has full and plenty all year round. However, I loved Christmas, even when I had not a penny in my pocket and my parents at times not much more. It never stopped us enjoying the ‘Spiorad of Mi Na Nollag’, (Irish – Spirit of December) and on Christmas Eve, as a child, I enjoyed watching all the toys and Annuals in shop windows on Christmas Eve and made fervent wishes and prayed to ‘Santy’ for my heart’s desire. I was always, like so many other children of that time, ecstatic with whatever little gift ‘Santy’ was good enough to bring me on Christmas Eve. I learned very early one of life’s lessons – ‘there is nothing so wonderful or exciting as looking forward to something’ and that ‘seldom’, is always truly wonderful. Maybe in life, today, ‘much is too little for some’ and ‘much today wants more’. More is never enough, but the joy of a child on a Christmas Eve, in a happy home, is more magical than anything even ‘Santy’ could bring. In the eyes of a child, Christmas should truly celebrate another Child, latter born in a humble stable two thousand years ago.
“Nollaig fe shean is faoi mhaise dhiobh”, (Irish – Merry Christmas to them), particularly to those who could not make it home to Ireland for Christmas Eve or are in prison or hospital, but who undoubtedly will carry the spirit of all their Christmas thoughts and feelings, deep in their hearts.
Tom Ryan, “Iona”, Rahealty, Thurles, Co. Tipperary.
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