Myths about Noise, Health, & Safety
Wind turbines are machines that spin in the wind and generate electricity atop tall towers. As such, the blades, transmission, and generator emit noise when the turbine is operating. Because modern wind turbines are relatively new on the landscape, a veritable cottage industry has arisen attributing a panoply of ills to wind turbines–even when they are not operating. Consequently, there are numerous studies on the health effects of the noise from wind turbines. This section includes links to these studies and to reports on the general environmental impacts and benefits of wind energy.
Firm cited over wind farm death near Elgin, Nebraska
By
Federal regulators cited a North Dakota company for a serious safety violation in connection with the death of a 40-year-old crane operator at a wind farm near Elgin, Nebraska.
You can now get ‘wind turbine syndrome’ from solar panels and batteries
By
Ketan Joshi
As I’ve expected for some time, there’s a new effort to create and propagate health fears around solar power, given the rapid decrease in costs, and the rising threat it poses to incumbent generators like coal and gas. It’s going to take precisely the same shape as the campaign around wind farms, and unless we think deeply about the necessary ingredients for this type of techno-panic to flourish, it’s going to last just as long, and cause just as much harm.
Climate Denial and Wind Turbine Syndrome: The Inquisition’s Rejection of Science
By
Ketan Joshi
There are reasons normally-rational people will angrily reject good science, and credulously believe bad science. We twist ourselves into awkward, dissonant ideological formations, and it seems people who wield the most power are most likely to engage in this proud rejection of reality.
Wind Turbines and Health: A Critical Review of the Scientific Literature
By
Results: (1) Infrasound sound near wind turbines does not exceed audibility thresholds. (2) Epidemiological studies have shown associations between living near wind turbines and annoyance. (3) Infrasound and low-frequency sound do not present unique health risks. (4) Annoyance seems more strongly related to individual characteristics than noise from turbines. (Public Domain)
Health officer says it’s hard to blame wind turbines
By
Chris Aldridge
Gretchen Tenbusch, health officer for Huron and Tuscola counties’ health departments, said she had looked at five death certificates of individuals supposedly dying from wind turbines. Her review found that three of the people were “not even in a wind farm”; one had a heart attack and wind turbines couldn’t be linked to cause of death; and turbines could not have been blamed for the fourth person’s death.
Cosmos: Wind farm syndrome and other imaginary ailments
By
Norman Swan
From a scientific standpoint, wind farm syndrome fails the test of cause and effect, which generally has to fulfil two criteria: that harm from infrasound makes biological sense; and that there is a dosage effect. What’s reliably known about the effects of infrasound on the body cannot account for how these effects might cause the symptoms.
