Bunscoil na Cathrach in Cahir is a merger of the Boys National School and Our Lady of Mercy Primary School.
Cahir Boys National School opened in 1964 while the neighbouring girls school took in its first pupils in 1966.
School Principal Brendan Horan says the energy costs for the new building are less than what they faced in the old Boys School despite it being significantly bigger.
“Our electrical costs were through the roof. We were using storage heaters where the electrics were originally designed in the 1960s. The costs had gone quite high and we were at the stage where we were fundraising just to meet the basic needs.
“Coming to a building that has everything measured – from the gas intake that we take, from the electrical use that we use to solar panels and the measurement of the temperature of the water that we use.”
Primary school pupils in Tipperary are far more aware of climate change than previous generations.
While our generation and those before us must take responsibility for a lot of what’s happened – it’s future generations that are going to have to deal with the consequences.
Brendan Horan is Principal of Bunscoil na Cathrach in Cahir – he says it’s something that students there are very much aware of.
“If it was history, if it was maths, if it was Irish and geography was based on knowledge of cities and countries rather than the impact of environmental change.
“Certainly our own education was more limited to facts. Whereas the current one its about improvements in the future and opinions and where to build it and trying to work around the problem rather than just solve it. Because there are some problems that we won’t easily.”
