Building and maintaining Ireland's vital coastal infrastructure requires facing the relentless challenge of climate change and rising sea levels. Protecting the country's six dedicated fishery harbour centres and their multi-million euro capital programme demands innovative engineering and strict public spending compliance.

This episode explores the high-stakes engineering required to adapt harbours for tomorrow, deploying modern tools like GIS and drones for efficiency, and the unexpected permitting hurdles government departments must navigate. You will also hear about the fascinating complexities of Noel’s private sector career, including the challenging Dunboyne Castle restoration and the mammoth Opera Lane basement construction in Cork City.

We are delighted to welcome Chief Engineer at the Marine Engineering Division of the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Noel Clancy, who shares his journey from Cork construction sites to leading national coastal upgrades.

THINGS WE SPOKE ABOUT
●    Career journey from private to public.
●    Restoring Dunboyne Castle from ruins.
●    Constructing deep basements in Cork City.
●    Managing Ireland's fishery harbour centres.
●    Designing coastal infrastructure for climate change.

GUEST DETAILS
Noel Clancy is the Chief Engineer in Ireland's Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine, leading the Marine Engineering Division. A civil engineering graduate and Fellow of Engineers Ireland, he is renowned for modernising public sector projects with GIS mapping and drone inspections. He manages the operation, maintenance, and capital upgrades for state fishery harbours while promoting lifelong learning and mentoring young engineers
Connect with Noel:
●   https://www.gov.ie/en/department-of-agriculture-food-and-the-marine/biographies/noel-clancy/

●   https://www.linkedin.com/in/noel-clancy-41989738

MORE INFORMATION
Looking for ways to explore or advance a career in the field of engineering? Visit Engineers Ireland to learn more about the many programs and resources on offer. https://www.engineersireland.ie/   
Engineers Journal AMPLIFIED is produced by DustPod.io for Engineers Ireland.

QUOTES
●    So the better the information that we have at the front end, the better chance we have of not getting into dispute with the contractor.  - Noel Clancy 
●    "It's very important to have a relationship, and it's very important to have no surprises, you know, so to have everything properly planned. - Noel Clancy 
●    One key thing is adaption, and essentially that's changing what you have to deal with, what you know is going to happen. - Noel Clancy 

TRANSCRIPTION
For your convenience, here is an AI transcription:

Dusty Rhodes  0:02  
Right now on AMPLIFIED, 

Noel Clancy  0:03  
You're absolutely right about climate change and sea level rise and all that. And we have to design our own that. And I suppose one of the key things is adaption, and essentially that's changing what you have to deal with, what you know is going to happen.

Dusty Rhodes  0:18  
Hi there. My name is Dusty Rhodes, and you're welcome to AMPLIFIED the Engineers Journal Podcast. Our guest today is the engineering lead behind Ireland's fishery harbours and coastal infrastructure. He's modernised public sector projects with GIS mapping drones and strict spending compliance while mentoring engineers through professional qualifications. We'll be hearing about his journey from Cork construction sites to Chief Engineer, the realities of upgrading harbours against climate challenges and advice on thriving in public sector engineering. It's pleasure to welcome Chief Engineer at the marine engineering division of the Department of Agriculture, Food and the marine Noel Clancy, how you doing Noel?

Very well. Dusty, delighted to be here.

So listen, just to kind of warm us up or to get us started, how did you get into this game of engineering at all? What attracted you?

Noel Clancy  1:07  
That's a very good question. Dusty and to reflect way, way, way back, I suppose my first indication of anything in terms of liking engineering would have been late in national school, when we were drawing plans of rooms. For what reason, I can't entirely remember, but that was my first inkling of any sense of a direction. Then in second level, I certainly recall, I spent my first year doing art, and realised at the end of that year, art was not for me. I wasn't very good at it, so I changed to mechanical drawing, and I preferred the straight lines and the angles and that. So that, then combined with I liked maths and I liked the sciences, I wasn't very fond of history and geography, so that was the subject choice at the time. So I came to my leaving cert with maths and mechanical drawing, and knew at that point in time that's what I wanted to do. So progressed then to UCC, to civil engineering in UCC, and graduated in 1983.

Dusty Rhodes  2:13  
Now listen, there's a huge difference between, you know, kind of being in school and university and then getting out into the world. Do you remember your first project where you were like proper hands on?

Noel Clancy  2:26  
I do, yeah, 1983 for any of us that remember, that was a difficult time. I suppose we came out into the middle of the deep recession, certainly in terms of civil engineering and building works, the activity level was very low. So I started with a mechanical engineering contractor in of all places, an animal by products Factory in South Tipperary. So that wasn't very pleasant, but it was my first, my first hands on projects experience. But it was useful. It was useful, and I moved quickly to that to work as an re in the wastewater treatment plant. It was still low levels of construction activity. So I'd say in the late 80s, I immigrated to the UK and joined a civil engineering contractor in Southampton.

Dusty Rhodes  3:19  
I remember the 80s as well. And you know how in Ireland, we talk about the grey cloud is just down over us all the time. The mood of the country was like that. It was like that in people's hearts at the time like, you know. And a lot of people move into the UK, and you did some time in the UK as well, but eventually you came back 90s a little bit better, and you had a really, really big job at dunboy Castle. Please tell me about this.

Noel Clancy  3:43  
That was an unusual project I'd moved that I had done a number of other projects in advancement of that. However, dunboy Castle was an old castle on the western side of Castletowbere quite close to the former site of where the O'Sullivan Bear Clan came from. It had been in dereliction for many, many years, and there was a group of investors that were very interested in developing it into essentially Dusty, we were talking about a six, seven star hotel. So it was very, very high level. You know, again, there was the old castle itself. There was a new block built to the rear of the castle. There was substantial investment. There was probably anything up to 35 40 million spent on the project. But unfortunately, it never completed, and it remains in the state of, I would say, 90% complete, but not complete and operating problem there was the investors that were involved had difficulties in raising adequate funding to complete the project, and I am aware of it now, because, funnily enough, one of the harbours that I look after for the department is Castletown bear. So I'm regularly in Castletown bear. I regularly see the. Castle out to the West, and I would be in contact with people that were involved in that project. So unfortunately, never finished, and I believe it's still on the market, but that's something I'm not involved in. Yeah, I've

Dusty Rhodes  5:13  
heard properties like that, and they will sit empty for 30 or 40 or 50 years, even then somebody will come along. Yeah, but tell me, dumb boy, Castle was you said it was a ruin, yes, essentially, yeah. So I have a picture of a ruined castle in my in my mind. Is it like that? It is, yeah. So what was going through your mind? I mean, what were you told, this is what we need to do. And then what were the problems you had to kind of like, I mean, how do you turn a bunch of centuries old rocks? Yeah, and think about a luxury hotel.

Noel Clancy  5:39  
It's very specialist. You're absolutely right. It was a ruined castle, and it was Huxley's Manor. Actually, as a puxley's worked with a family that lived there, and actually, I believe they never lived there for very long. But it was one of those houses that were probably burnt on at the early part of the century. So it was in a state room from probably the early 1920s so we had quite a group of specialist contractors to essentially restore that. So it was quite difficult from even if you think of the stone in the first place, there was a lot of cut stone in it, and we were trying to replicate the stone that was previously used, and a methodology of reconstructed stone was used. Essentially, you were trying to do trial mixes of concrete with aggregates through it that essentially replicated the stone that was there previously, but it wasn't the same. So there was a lot of trial mixing and getting the stone part of it correct. The roof was quite specialist. The slates again, remember, there were blue banger slates, again, especially imported from the UK to match what was previously there. The windows were steel casement windows. So again, trying to replicate the original windows that were in the manor. So that was the external envelope of the building. And then once you got inside, a lot of the key tricks to the old building and ensuring that it could work as a new building was understanding that it had been exposed to the elements. For many years, the walls had probably soaked obvious amounts of water. So you weren't going to be able to seal that up internally and expect no problem. So you had to allow for that in the inner parts of the building. So essentially, the building had to breathe and had to be allowed to breathe, and any dampness that was in the oil bricks had to be allowed to release itself. So that was all part of the internal fabric of the building. And then there was the floors and etc. But I suppose, like a lot of conservation expertise, both from conservation architects and conservation contractors, worked with us to try and deliver that. Now, that was the old part. There was a new part at the back, but that would have been standard new construction. You know, that wouldn't have been as interesting by comparison. It's no problem.

Dusty Rhodes  7:59  
No Exactly, exactly have you been up on any of your drives past, just to kind of see what kind of state is in. Is it still in kind of a dilapidated or an abandoned state, or is it water tighter?

Noel Clancy  8:07  
It's still holding its own? It's in probably a sad sight, in a way, because it's a building that was dilapidated. It was very close to completion. And you'd say, wouldn't it be wonderful if this could be used for something? It may be, again, sometimes timing pitching that very high end hotel operators, six, seven stars, very, very high, maybe, if a more modest ambition was there that may be operating. Look, I've heard a number of times in recent years that has been nearly sold, but it's still vacant. But no, it still looks well, and it still looks okay. It's just a pity that there's a temporary fence still around.

Dusty Rhodes  8:45  
Yeah, you spent 30 years in the private sector, and I know I'm skipping through a very, very fun another one that people might know. You were a contract director with Bowen on a big 80 million development they did at opera lane. Please tell me about that.

Noel Clancy  8:58  
Yeah, that was a difficult one, because I suppose I had come of an earlier project when similarly but this was in Patrick Street in Cork, which is the main thoroughfare in Cork city. Shopping street, high levels of pedestrian traffic, etc. And essentially, there were two blocks in the centre that were to be redeveloped. So all the phases of it, this was where the Irish Examiner newspaper, their offices were previously closed there. So all the previous buildings that were in the two blocks needed to be demolished, levelled. And then the most challenging part of it was that we were to essentially construct a two story basement. So for anyone that knows Patrick Street and cork, it's challenging in terms of the environment you're working in, but also there's a very high water table in the centre of cork. So certainly when you have high tides and the middle island of cork is between the two challenges of the Lee. So. So you could dig down one and a half, two metres in the middle of cork, and you'll be in water. You'll be in water. So we were talking about a two storey basement here that was going to dig down maybe 1213, metres in the middle of cork. So how do we do that? Right? So I suppose the first thing you have to do is to build your retaining wall around the perimeter. And there are a number of methodologies that can be used to do that. What we chose in Patrick Street was a secant pile wall. Now, for anyone that doesn't know what a secant pile wall is is essentially, it's a hit and miss rotary piles. So you have these large rigs that drill a rotary four into the ground. You fill that core with concrete and a reinforcement. Then you'll move on with a little gap, do a second one. Then you come back and you fill between the two you've done so essentially cutting into the two. So you've like two piles adjacent a third, one in between that cuts into the two, so it forms a wall and a seal. So essentially that was the methodology. There was a German company, Bower, did the works for us. They had some fairly massive piling gear on site. They manufacture and instal their own piles. So they build the piling rigs, but they also supply the crew that operate the rigs and do the piling so there was four there was Operation together at the one time that was the wall. So we say, you build the wall around the perimeter and in the first place, then you want to dig out the centre. So we start digging. Though, obviously there are archaeologists involved, and we did have some finds of bits of old boats and archaeological pieces of interest. But as you go down the water that I talked about earlier, is there. So how do we deal with the water? And what we did for de Morton, there was a system called well pointing. So essentially, outside the perimeter of the retaining wall that we had constructed, we installed well points which were drilled like a well, as if you were drilling a well open the countryside for water. We installed a number of these well points with submersible pumps within them. Then you connect those to each other, and essentially, you start pumping the water table down outside the pool that you want to dig. Once you have that control. No, I'm that's the simple explanation of it. There's a lot of technology behind, oh, that's pumped, how the water is controlled, how it's discharged, all that sort of thing. Once you have the water controlled, then you're essentially digging into dry within the hole. And that was it.

Dusty Rhodes  12:49  
Yeah, and everything that you've described there. I mean, it sounds like a mammoth job, but you have to remember, you're doing it on the main street of the second biggest city in the country.

Noel Clancy  12:58  
Correct. Correct, correct.

Dusty Rhodes  13:00  
That's a challenge. What was the one thing you learned from that? Did you kind of walked away from it and comment, ah, like a new skill, or just something that clicked in your head.

Noel Clancy  13:08  
Or, I suppose one of the things I learned from that is, we were working for a well known developer in Cork at the time, and I learned to laugh from him, and in particular, as a contractor, and that's what I was at the time. We were contracted to them to carry out the work, but the relationships that we had to have, with neighbours, with local authorities, with regulatory bodies, etc. Now, they were very expert at that. I wasn't, but I learned a lot from them. And look clearly when you're working as closely as what you are to essentially businesses that are trying to operate around you. It's very important to have a relationship, and it's very important to have no surprises, you know, so to have everything properly planned, know what you're doing, and have everybody informed as to what's doing.

Dusty Rhodes  13:56  
Did you find that simple communication with those people solved a lot of problems in advance,

Noel Clancy  14:01  
absolutely, absolutely and again, like I suppose, before we started, we had meetings with the stakeholders and the neighbours, etc, to let them know we had representatives from the neighbours. That made it easier for us in that there were one or two points of contact. Instead of multiple points of contact. We had regular newsletters. We had number of means of communicating to them. And yeah, that certainly helps.

Dusty Rhodes  14:27  
Yeah, no, let's go from your experience in the private sector, you moved into the public sector, that's a jump mentally, I would imagine. Tell me, what were the challenges that you know, working for a government department. What were they doing that was of interest to you, that you went to I think I'll have a crack at this.

Noel Clancy  14:45  
I suppose a lot of it actually was circumstance more than anything else. Again, I suppose I'd spoken earlier about her 80s experience in the 2000s and 11 twelves. We had a second experience in Ireland. So it's. Essentially, which was the crash where a lot of contractors got into difficulty with the dramatic drop in activity. Again, you know? So it was more by circumstance than by choice. It came about. I actually moved to Dublin for a while and worked for the consultant there. What came about is the Department of Agriculture, Food and marine engineering division. Have a base in clan akilty. That's where I'm from. That's where I live. So I was working in Dublin, and this opportunity presented itself so that, more than anything else, drove me okay as well as that, I suppose it was the marine I had an interest in the Marine. I had a boat. I liked fishing, you know, and all that. So I had an interest in the area.

Dusty Rhodes  15:49  
Just to give us a quick overview of the Department of Agriculture, Food and the marine, it's much bigger than a lot of people would think. I mean, there's 4000 staff nationwide just in it, but in the marine department, where you are, it's a relatively small subsection. Is about 100 people. How many of them are engineers?

Noel Clancy  16:05  
Yeah, I suppose you're absolutely right. Look, it's a huge department. The annual budget for the Department of Marines in excess of 2 billion. So it's a huge organisation with over 4000 staff the marine. And sometimes I'm not entirely sure whether that's the correct name. It's very related to fisheries. What we do, you know? Okay, but anyway, the Marine is what it's called the marine side, our element of the department is based in Planet guilty. Now the department overall is divided into divisions for various areas of responsibility. There are probably 70 odd divisions scattered around the country, mostly based in Dublin, probably port leash and Wexford. But the marine section is based in Llanelli, and there's six divisions in that area. Of the Marine divisions, we are one. So first of all, the marine area, there's probably somewhere in there is 120 250 staff based in the office and trying to kill two. That's what's there. Right. In the context of the marine engineering division, we'd have a total staff just in excess of 100 in terms of engineers, we carry some vacancies from time to time, probably no more than anybody else. We have about 30 engineers in our staff. But in addition to that, we would have, first of all, I suppose we have the operational and management of the harbours under our remit, and I should probably explain what they are. There are six dedicated fishery harbour centres in the country. They came about under 1968 act at the time, where the intent of government at that time was to develop, essentially, Centres of Excellence for fishing, the best in class in terms of landing facilities, maintenance facilities. I know that I would expect in 68 the conditions of the harbours were fairly basic, and they needed investment. So there were six. They didn't all come about in 1968 but there are six now and and they are Killy Biggs and Johnny Gaul Russell and Connemara Dingle and oran tangan in Kerry Castletown, bear car John Moor east in Waterford and Hoth in North Dublin. So the six of those arbours are essentially owned and operated by this department. So one of our roles is the operational management of those six fishery harbour centres. But in addition to that, we have a maintenance and investment role in them. So essentially, harbours, by their very nature, they're exposed to places of operation, so they need constant investment. So we manage a capital programme of approximately 35 to 40 million each year, which is invested in projects from very small maintenance projects up to quite large dredging projects in each of the six fishery harbour centres.

Dusty Rhodes  18:56  
Can you give me example of the kind of engineering projects then that you're doing at the moment.

Noel Clancy  19:01  
There are two that we are active in at the minute, both in the permitting phase, and I might expand on that in a little while. One is the deep water key in rosseville. Now it's that's an existing fishery harbour centre. But there had been an ambition for some time to essentially construct a new deep water key, which would facilitate larger vessels, deeper keel vessels, and provide better landing facilities. The piers there are old. It might also help to enhance other activities. There has been interest in the ore sector off the west coast. So there was every possibility that these facilities would be used for, certainly support or operation and maintenance of the ori installations. So that's one that's live, but it's in a plan like we had started work there. Unfortunately, we applied for a planning extension and got. But it was appealed and judicially reviewed, so that's in pause, and we're applying for for what's known as the substitute consent at the moment to try and restart, you know?

Dusty Rhodes  20:10  
So that's interesting. So even though you're a government department, you still have to go through the same planning process as any commercial operator would do, and you've the same absolute problems as everybody has

Noel Clancy  20:20  
something that when I ever talk to my private sector colleagues, yeah, they are in awe of, because, like in terms of permitting, we have the same hoops, we have the same jumps to go through and all that. So when you ever hear on the news every day of the week we're planning and permitting difficulties and compliance, we have the same problems. We have the same problem.

Dusty Rhodes  20:41  
Well, listen, let's not talk about that neither of us wants Penny. Tell me about when you're looking at a large, active harbour and you're thinking about making it so that bigger vessels can come in at the harbour itself is deeper. How do you even start considering that project? What do you have to think about?

Noel Clancy  20:57  
We'll talk maybe about the engineering side of it, because the permitting side is separate, and we've touched on that at the start of it all, we have to have a sense of what our budget is. What can we expose all our money is public money, and we have to go through the same hoops in terms of cost benefit analysis and all that as any other public body, if I take as an example, and I know it's in planning at the moment, but the Russellville project, we'll be looking at the depths that are currently there, and the size of vessels that are currently there, and what we chose, bearing in mind the types of vessels that may come in and the benefits that would accrue that the type of key structure is a so what we chose, There was a 200 metre long key wall. We chose a berthing pocket, which a birthing pocket is the pocket immediately in front of the key where vessels tie up and they need a pocket to go up and down within. So we have a birthing pocket there of minus 10 metres. Now, minus 10 metres means that at the lowest possible tide. There's 10 metres of water there all the time. So when ship operators or harbour masters look at that, they'll be looking at vessels that will have to be less than that. So in other words, they'd normally leave a metre clearance. So it's something like vessels that would take nine metres of water will fit in there. That's your berthing pocket, there's the entrance channel. The entrance channel, you will always have more flexibility on because the tides go up and down. So where a vessel will have to stay above water all the time, or floating, should I say, in the berthing pocket, in the entrance channel, if there isn't enough water there, you can wait for high tide. So in other words, the vessel can anchor for an hour or two. Then when tide is full, come in and sit into the berthing pocket. The channel coming into rosaville is about minus point seven, five minus point eight. So it's not as deep as the berthing pocket, and that's why. The other thing you have to consider then, is vessels come into these harbours, they'll have to turn so you have to have a turning circle. So again, in rosseville, we say the stern will tie to the pier and the bowl will swing around. So you need to have a pocket that's adequately large for them to turn the so that they'll be able to exit the harbour. So they're the key attributes for vessels. Now I suppose in in rosseville, the difficulty for us is, it's Connemara, it's Connemara or marble and granite. It's hard rock. So it's it's very expensive to remove. So when you think of a cost benefit analysis, we want to get the best option without spending more money than what we need to spend.

Dusty Rhodes  23:39  
How do you get that information, because technology is changing all the time, and, you know, we're using now kind of all kinds of data and satellite information. There's drones and all that kind of stuff and things that are able to detect the composition of rocks underwater, from like a mile high, or whatever. Talk me through that. What is the system and how does it?

Noel Clancy  23:58  
Yeah, we don't use satellites, but we use drones a lot. Now. We use drones in a number of areas of our work. They're always useful for recording events during construction, but we might talk about aquaculture in a while. And in terms of inspection, we use drones to do a lot of our inspectorial type work, right? But in terms of the rock like, there's two key things in the harbours that we'd be using. One is bathymetric surveys. So bathymetric surveys are essentially vessels that go out on the water with echo Saunders on the back, and they will map the seabed for us right then in understanding what's underneath, we still rely heavily on site investigations, so we will map out what we'll want to do, and then we'll tender for a site investigation contractor who essentially will bring a Regan site and drill, maybe we'll say a sample 20 holes for the area that we want to construct in it. We will look at those samples, record what's coming out. So in terms of the data. Of silt that's above the depth of rock, that's below the hardness of the rock, all that sort of thing that then in turn, feeds into our tender process. Because we will have to tender all these projects to contractors. The contractors will need to understand, how much silt do I need to remove, how much rock do I need to remove, how hard is it, and all that. So the better the information that we have at front end, the better chance we have of not getting into dispute with the contractor.

Dusty Rhodes  25:40  
And I'm sure everybody hears every day the week of disputes with contractors that I be honest about, its scope and the quality of information that you can provide a tender stage can eliminate that you know, information and communication is just so important, you don't think about it generally. When it comes to engineering, what you're doing is fascinating. I love it because it's like, it's really big projects and it's in very challenging conditions. No always in any organisation you need new blood and fresh blood coming in. And, you know, people are trying to encourage, you know, secondary school students and university people and stuff like that. When you're talking to people starting their career, and you kind of say you should come to the department because you'd enjoy how do you just sell the work and the challenges and the kind of stuff that would interest them?

Noel Clancy  26:13  
First of all, there's the lack of knowledge what we do, but there's also a perception, probably on the engineering construction side, that it's dirty work and it's messy and that sort of thing, really, I suppose, if I was to encourage anybody, it's very interesting work. It's very challenging. It's in the interface between land and marine civil engineering work on land, everybody will see this. But this isn't an interface between the marine space and the land space. You need to have a knowledge of water. You need to have a knowledge of tides. You need to have a knowledge of the land based infrastructure that ties in to that. In terms of encourage them like I suppose the best thing I would do is bring colleagues along to talk to them and tell them how much they enjoy, what they do, what we're trying, as well as to engage with third level institutions and do work placements and apprenticeships. And I think we hope to have, actually, our first couple starting shortly, and host, which it's a new experience for us. It's something that's been there for a while, but again, maybe in the past, we didn't have as much difficulty getting staff. We do know, so we have to do a bit more work and encouraging

Dusty Rhodes  27:24  
them in, you know. And you mentioned colleagues telling stories. What kind of stories do they tell them?

Noel Clancy  27:28  
It's always almost project related and challenge and what we did, I like an example that always comes to mind, and I don't have the details off the top of my head, but we have one of our areas of responsibility is Cape clear. And you'll say, Boy, we've all created that, but it's an area of responsibility department has right. So North Harbour in Cape clear suffered from a nasty wave when there were winds from the north, making it Poor shelter for vessels when they were in the harbour, particularly, not as much fishing there, but there's regular ferry vessels in and out, so it's important that they're sheltered. Yeah. So we looked at a project there in 2016 and they came up with essentially flood gates, hydraulically operated floodgates, to protect the harbour during storm events. But the challenging thing in Cape clear is it's an island. It's a number of miles off the coast. Nothing is easily done there. So you can't get concrete from your local concrete plants. You can't everything has to come there by boat and get assembled there. So what was done? And this is the interesting part, like the contractor that did the work essentially prefabricated the structure in a dry dock in Cork. So essentially a concrete base, 20 metres by 20 metres two walls, 20 metres by 20 again, and then sealed the ends. So what you had was a big lump of concrete weighing about 250 300 tonne. And then the dry dock was floated or flooded, and the the box I call it, essentially was towed from Rome Dockyard and cork to Cape clear, put into place, flooded and sunk in. So instead of building a large concrete base and large concrete walls in sight and water, which is very difficult. Always, this was done in the drying cork. But the ingenious part was floating it. Now just everybody says to me, how can you float a big box of concrete? But you can if you work it correctly, like if the buoyancy is done correctly and that so, like of that box, it was probably 20 metres deep where it sat in the water. It was probably 10 metres out of the water, maybe 10 metres into the water. It was floating. It was floating, and it had to be certified, and the marine survey office had to be happy that this one sink and block a navigation channel or whatever it is. So that's interesting, and like the buzz about things like that when it comes to site and getting into place and driving. Dropping it in, there's a bit of a high that sort of thing.

Dusty Rhodes  30:03  
You know, I'm not surprised that is a very big and bold project. I mean, you must have more things that are kind of in the back of your mind, coming up in the future. Because, I mean, the weather is changing and the sea is changing and conditions are changing, and that must be changing things for harbours and facilities across the country. Do you think kind of, as we go ahead in time, that you will have more big, bold projects like that?

Noel Clancy  30:25  
I do think so. Yeah, I think you're absolutely right about climate change and sea level rise and all that, and we have to design our own that. And I suppose one of the key things is adaption, and essentially that's changing, what you have to deal with what you know is going to happen. So for example, that Danish project in Castletown, where we looked at the sea level rise, we looked at the pier levels, and we ensured that they're at an adequate level to accommodate that. But in addition to that, we built the breakwaters, which are on the outside. So essentially, the function the breakwaters there is to provide adequate shelter, or more shelter to the harbour than what was previously there. You know, you're completely right. There's two things, I suppose. One is the climate adaption piece that we have to adapt what we have to ensure that is adequate going forward. But I suppose the other thing we shouldn't forget about, and it's not directly or remit, but we're keenly aware of in the background is the energy transition to Ori, while Ori will be probably more on the east coast at the moment, and probably the south key east coast, what is Ori as offshore renewable energy. So essentially, wind turbines. We've had a lot of wind turbine installation on land. And of course, we've had the farm off Whitfield there for many years. But this is a growing sector, and government ambition is serious for the next five to 10 years in that space. So all, all of those ore installations will require support, support vessels. Some will need construction support. I'm not of the view that our harbours are adequate in terms of construction support, because the vessels that will do that are very, very large, possibly killing Biggs, which, which is the biggest one, but certainly in terms of the support space and operation and maintenance and all that, I think we will have a very large part to play in that.

Dusty Rhodes  32:20  
So you're an engineers Ireland fellow, yes. So when you're dealing with kind of younger engineers who are coming up, is there any kind of commonality there that you notice, like a gap that younger engineers are missing?

Noel Clancy  32:31  
We talked about this earlier that I came from the private sector to the public sector. I probably had a view when I was in the private sector that the public sector had an easier time, shall I say, an easier time than it was probably more challenging and you have to perform in the private sector. But then I joined the department here, and there were 2538 existing engineers who became my colleagues. And I have to say, I was very impressed with all of their competence. Now, their drivers were different to mine. I had come from a private sector where you worked for a company and you did your best for the company, and the company was your main stakeholder in the public sector. It's much wider than that. You're working for a government department, but there are politicians. There are local elected representatives, and there's the public, and the public has a certain ownership of civil servants, I think so. And you are dealing with public money, so you have to answer for that also. I have to say when I came out, I was impressed with everything. Now, I liked to come here with a person knowing nothing about where or how things operated here, it was good to come with a very keen slate and come with my views. And I think that's a good thing, and maybe a bit of cross pollination is a good thing. In terms of younger engineers, I think they're fantastic nowadays. I reflect back when I did engineering, we didn't do work placements. And lot of us probably went abroad for the summer and either had a good time or worked in hotels or whatever it was, but most students going through now have work placements. So by the time that they have their degree, they have a better knowledge of work than I think we did in our day. You know, no, I must say, to be fair to them as well, work is far more challenging now than what was in our day. And I think of things like procurement, health and safety, all the disciplines in and around construction, they were lighter weight in 1983 and 84 than what they are now. So engineers nowadays have to grapple with a lot more.

Dusty Rhodes  34:43  
And a final question for you, no, might be a difficult one for you, all right, because you've been in both camps. You've worked private sector for a long time. You've worked public sector for a long time. Which do you prefer?

Noel Clancy  34:56  
It's very funny. You asked me that no, because I met a colleague this morning, and. And they said to me, he's going to ask you this question, okay, yeah, to compare the public and the private, because the public is my current employer, I have to be very careful with what I say. I'll compare and contrast and sit on the fence maybe, you know, there you go. One of the things that I miss from the private sector on you spoke about one of my larger projects, and I did a number of those right, and there was a sense of clear direction when you were on a large project, there was an end game target that you were heading towards. And some of the teams I would have worked on. Now, when I say teams at large sites with large numbers of staff, they're up to 400 or whatever, but everybody was driving towards that goal. And there were, of course, disputes and falling outs and all that. But generally speaking, there was a huge amount of buy in and trying to achieve that goal. And when it was, there was a massive sense of achievement, right? So I loved that, I missed that. I think in the public sector, I'm a client now, as opposed to being a contractor. So I employ contractors. I still love to get projects done, but it's far more difficult to get that buzz, you know. And maybe that's not just private, public, maybe it's just projects have become more difficult. Procurement is much more involved. Maybe there are more disputes involved. Compliance with regulatory authorities is more involved, all that. So it's probably more difficult to get that buzz, you know. But I think all that said, I'm 13 years now in the public sector, and I've really enjoyed my 13 years there as well.

Dusty Rhodes  36:50  
Do you know we're very similar in that I've spent a lot of time in the private sector. I spent a lot of time in the public sector, in broadcasting, obviously. And I wouldn't have a preference like you. I can't say that I preferred either. Both of them were really interesting. Both of them were very challenging. And what I found that I really enjoyed with our chat today Noel, is that I think a lot of people don't consider the public sector, especially on an engineering side of things like, you know, but the things that you have said today and the stories that you've shared and the mammoth projects that you're working on, I mean, it's very much a case of it's like it's engineer versus Mother Nature, and you don't get any bigger a challenge than that, you know what I mean. So listen, let me thank you very much for joining us today and sharing all your stories. If you'd like to learn more about Noel and his work in fishery, harbours and marine infrastructure, check out the links for dafn marine engineering division and engineers Ireland in the show notes. But for now, Noel, thank you so much for joining us.

Noel Clancy  37:41  
Okay, thank you dusty. Bye. Bye. For now.

Dusty Rhodes  37:45  
We hoped you enjoyed our conversation today. If you do know another engineer who would appreciate these insights, please do share our podcast with them. They can find us simply by searching for Engineers Ireland, wherever they listen to podcasts. This episode is produced by dustpod.io for Engineers Ireland, for advanced episodes, more information on the latest trends in infrastructure or career development advice. You can find a wealth of resources online at engineersireland.ie until next time for myself, Dusty Rhodes. Thank you for listening.