Have you heard the news that wind farms may cause people ?

Question

to get sick ? Its called vibro-acoustic disease, and its caused by sounds below the frequency band of 500Hz that the wind turbines emit. Do you think that this could potentially be a problem with the future development of wind energy ?

Maybe before committing resources and money to building these farms, we should research this more.

http://www.wind-watch.org/news/2008/04/13/are-wind-farm-turbines-making-people-sick-some-say-yes/

Answer 1

Nothing surprises me anymore these days.

Everything is supposed to cause detrimental affects today.

If it isn't a hamburger, it is your cell phone, or a cell mast, or black mold.

The list is far too great to continue.

While I like the idea and use of wind power, I think it really is not viable on a commercial scale for many reasons

I do feel that many people could actually benefit from wind power generation to supplement their energy requirements, but most of the worlds population do not live in rural areas.

The ones that do generally are not located in a suitable location to make it a practical solution, and even if they are, they have to be able to afford the initial investment, and then (assuming no maintenance), the turbine requires replacement just at the time of getting to a break even point!

I think that the most effective use if wind power would be for its original intention (pumping water).

It could also be used for pumping oil and would (or should) help to reduce the cost of fuel.

Instead of using fossil fuels to extract fossil fuels.

Answer 2

Actually some scientists just developed some wind turbine noise cancellation technology.  That should solve any noise/vibration problem.  Or just don't put wind farms right next to peoples' houses.

Answer 3

Wind turbines are usually built in areas with little human population, so noise is hardly an issue.  But the devices are fairly good at killing birds.

Answer 4

Could just be an invented story by NIMBY's but could be some truth to it. The only thing that will stop wind farms from being built are their high cost and poor performance

Answer 5

Not only that, but those things can explode if it gets too windy.

Check this out:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7nSB1SdVH...

Not very cost effective are they?

Answer 6

Infrasonics might have that effect, at the very least the noise and vibration is very annoying to those close by and the strobe light effect would also be annoying.

Then there is the bird killing issue (not much of one, but wind isn't much of a power source) and the worker killing issue (wind actually turns out to be pretty dangerous for the amount of power generated) along with the problem of blade shedding (no deaths or injuries yet but some property damage and a good reason not to have a wind turbine right next door).

At the very least those who live near wind turbines probably do have grounds for compensation due to reduced property value (negative externalities have to be internalised and that applies just as much to wind as to the power sources wind proponents hate).

If wind power were a reliable source that could provide the power needed then those issues wouldn't be show stoppers (nuclear power has required exclusive zones in the US and still managed to become the dominant source of carbon neutral electricity in that country) but for the pitiful amount of power generated along with the fact that they need fossil fuel backup anyway those problems just are not worth it.

The fact that wind power can't replace fossil fuels is itself enough reason to stop throwing money away into the wind without needing valid reasons for NIMBYism.  Of course one of the main reasons wind power is promoted is because it can't send fossil fuel companies bankrupt or coal miners out of work the way that better technologies can (the natural gas industry in particular loves wind).

Of course that isn't to say that we shouldn't study what seem to be health problems from being too close to wind turbines, we might find that there aren't any (when the blades don't shed and hit you) just like we found for power lines although even if we did the almost complete uselessness of wind power means that we should stop committing resources and money to them even if infrasonics don't cause problems.

Answer 7

I don't know, but every wind farm I've come across is way out in the country with nobody around for miles. Guess we can address that possible problem later on down the line...

Answer 8

We already know that complaints of this disappear with a distance greater than 500 metres to places people normally live or work. So, we can safely proceed with installations where distance exceeds that distance.

There are people eager to stop wind power for other reasons, like wind power does not fit in well with a nuclear power base, or wind power takes jobs away from coal miners, or turbines kill birds the same way as pollution from coal plants does.

Well, Wind does not provide any base load capacity, but coal is still needed to provide the power when the wind does not blow, and coal burning pollution can be appreciably reduced with clean coal, leaving the only main concern with coal being CO2 emissions and employment.  I think Wind will provide more employment and with no more pollution than clean coal.

There is lots of world that is far enough from homes that we can safely build hundreds of times more wind power than we have thus far.

Answer 9

Problem is, when you develop a technology that answers the problems associated with fossil fuel burning power generation, you still don't make the AGW supporters happy.

Why? Because they are actually anti-technology, neo-Luddites that don't WANT answers... they just want to live in a village, drink their own urine and die of some disease that should have been wiped out two hundred years ago but came back because they refused to have their children vaccinated...

Answer 10

I have heard a number of complaints.  The issue is, if someone does something that works, someone else will figure out how it is hurting society and must be stopped/banned.

I am not in favor of lining T Boone Pickens' pockets, but if folks build wind farms, good for them.

Answer 11

It has been known for years that living under major power line, has cause problems with some peoples health.

Also that putting those little windmill cutouts in the yard will ward off snakes, because they don't like the vibrations in the ground.

And I agree, Windmills should be at least 1 1/2 miles from an residence.

There is one other option, and that is vertical windmill, no vibrations, and the run on less wind, but ar able to operate in higher winds than the blade type.