Europe added 8.8 GW of wind power capacity in the first half of 2026, yet the latest industry outlook still puts the EU on course for roughly 342 GW by 2030, well below the 425 GW benchmark associated with its renewable energy ambitions. Growth is continuing. The harder question is how much of the next wave can be financed, connected and used when the electricity is available. Europe’s wind future will depend increasingly on decisions made beyond the turbine factory.

An Coimisiún Pleanála has written to the operator of Trump International Golf Links & Hotel in Doonbeg, Co Clare, asking it to redo the ecological paperwork behind a ballroom. Clare planners approved the building back in February. It’s a single-storey hall of about 1,240 sq m, seating 320, replacing the marquee the resort currently throws weddings in. The approval carried a condition about Vertigo angustior, the 2mm narrow-mouthed whorl snail that lives in the dunes behind the course and is listed under Annex II of the EU Habitats Directive.

The image settles into you quietly: a single fisherman sits on a folding chair at the edge of a wide, calm shoreline, his back to the camera, his long rod cutting a clean diagonal line across the frame and pointing toward the open water. The sea is flat and muted, neither blue nor gray but something in between, as if the day itself is undecided. A string of floating buoys drifts parallel to the coast, gently interrupting the surface, while distant mountains fade into a hazy horizon that almost dissolves into the sky.