The government is to commission an independent study on putting power cables underground.

Energy Minister Pat Rabbitte will set up a new commission to examine the options for putting the new developments by EirGrid underground.

The commission will feature a panel of experts and be chaired by an independent judge.

It comes after EirGrid received 35,000 submissions to its public consultation on a series of pylons between counties Cork and Kildare.

The group will examine the feedback from the public consultation.

Minister Rabbitte is to ask the panel to decide terms of reference for comprehensive, route-specific studies of fully undergrounded options for both Grid Link and Grid West.

The panel will be required to ensure that the studies are complete, objective, and comparable to similar studies of overhead options for the two projects.

Justice Catherine McGuinness will chair the commission 

The government says both the overhead and underground options will be published side-by-side before proceeding to the next stage of public consultation.

EirGrid will also be told to investigate the potential cost and visual aspects of putting its proposed lines underground.

The panel is to be chaired by retired Supreme Court Justice, Catherine McGuinness.

Other people on the panel are ESRI Professor John Fitzgerald, Professor Keith Bell from the University of Strathclyde, head of the school of landscape architecture in UCD Dr. Karen Foley and economist Colm McCarthy.

Minister Rabbitte says he wants to make sure that the concerns of communities are heard.