Better Plan, Wisconsin

Video courtesy of The Forest Voice-- Residents speak about life with 500 foot turbines in the Shirley wind project, Brown County, Wisconsin.

AID FOR WIND TURBINE VICTIMS SOUGHT

Brown Co. panel: State should pay medical bills for those near wind farm

by Doug Schneider,

via Green Bay Press-Gazette, www.greenbaypressgazette.com

January 26, 2012 

Supervisor Patrick Evans said the government must do more to protect citizens until more is known about potential dangers, saying at least two local families living near wind farms have abandoned their homes and others lost thousands of dollars because livestock died mysteriously. “This problem is very real,” he said.

Wisconsin should pay the medical bills of Brown County residents who were made ill by industrial wind turbines, some county supervisors say.

Saying the state allowed “irresponsible placement” of industrial wind turbines in the Glenmore area, the Brown County Human Services Committee has approved a measure to ask the state to pay emergency aid to families living near the Shirley Wind Farm.

The request, which seeks an unspecified amount until the “hardships are studied and resolved,” could come before the full County Board next month.

It is the latest attempt by county supervisors and other officials to manage an issue in which some residents began experiencing conditions such as anxiety, depression, weight loss and increased cancer risks since the wind farm was erected in 2010.

“There is a 70-year-old woman who lost 20 pounds from not being able to eat,” said Barbara Vanden Boogart, a member of the Brown County Citizens for Responsible Wind Energy, an advocacy group. “There are two adults who sleep an average of one and a half hours a night.”

Shirley’s operators insist their facility has been built and operated safely.

Wind farms have been a topic of debate in Wisconsin in the past several years. Advocates say wind pollutes less than coal and is less expensive and less potentially dangerous than nuclear energy.

Officials say the facilities’ record isn’t good enough. The County Board resolution says the state was irresponsible in allowing the Shirley Wind Farm to be built without consulting an expert on the medical consequences of living near wind turbines.

Supervisors said they had no indication Wednesday of how the state would respond to their request. They said the answer would be up to officials in Madison to resolve this spring.

Supervisor Patrick Evans said the government must do more to protect citizens until more is known about potential dangers, saying at least two local families living near wind farms have abandoned their homes and others lost thousands of dollars because livestock died mysteriously.

“This problem is very real,” he said. Being upstairs in a house near the Shirley facility, he said, “felt after 10 or 12 minutes like you were getting carbon-monoxide poisoning.”

Lawmakers also are calling on the state to adopt turbine-siting guidelines approved by citizens groups.

State Sen. Frank Lasee, R-Ledgeview, last week introduced a bill to allow cities, villages, towns and counties to establish the minimum distance between a wind turbine and a home — even if those rules are more restrictive than any the state enacts.

Statewide wind-siting rules, more than a year in the making, were suspended last March. Lawmakers sent those rules, which dealt with farms of less than 100 megawatts, back to the state Public Service Commission, where they have stayed as officials worked to reach a compromise.

Lack of regulatory agreement, particularly on the issue of how far a turbine must be from a property line, has tempered enthusiasm about wind farms. A corporation in 2011 scrapped plans for a 100-turbine development in the Morrison-Glenmore area.

On the net

» Wisconsin Citizens Safe Wind-Siting Guidelines: http://www.wind-watch.org/documents/wisconsin-citizens-safe-wind-siting-guidelines

NOTE FROM THE BPWI RESEARCH NERD: The families having trouble living with the Brown County turbines are not alone: 

CLICK HERE to see photos and read the daily wind turbine noise log kept by a resident living in the Invenergy wind project near the Town of Byron in Fond du Lac County 

SECOND FEATURE

From Ontario

LOCAL HEALTH EXPERT: LOTS OF ROOM IN CANADA FOR WIND TURBINES

by David Meyer,

Via The Wellington Advertiser, www.wellingtonadvertiser.com

January 27, 2012 

Dr. Jeff Aramini is a public health epidemiologist and former senior scientist with Health Canada and the Public Health Agency of Canada. He and his family live 2.5km from a proposed wind farm near Belwood.

He has just taken part in a study of the alleged effects of wind turbines on health in two communities in Maine, in the United States, and the results indicate the closer wind turbines are to people’s home, the higher their chance of sleep disruption and their chances of suffering depression.

C. WELLINGTON TWP. – Opponents of industrial wind turbines have been telling the provincial government for several years it needs to do some health studies before approving such machines close to homes.

Some of those opponents did not wait for the province. Dr. Jeff Aramini is a public health epidemiologist and former senior scientist with Health Canada and the Public Health Agency of Canada. He and his family live 2.5km from a proposed wind farm near Belwood.

He has just taken part in a study of the alleged effects of wind turbines on health in two communities in Maine, in the United States, and the results indicate the closer wind turbines are to people’s home, the higher their chance of sleep disruption and their chances of suffering depression.

Aramini said in an interview on Monday people opposed to wind farms in the Belwood area asked him to check health effects because of his expertise in that field.

His partners were Dr. Michael Nissenbaum of the Northern Maine Medical Center in Fort Kent, and Dr. Chris Hanning, of University Hospitals of Leicester, in the United Kingdom.

Aramini said in an interview the two communities studied are “not unlike anything here.”

He said it was “a little surprising the health effect that came across the strongest was depression.”

The study was peer reviewed, which means experts from around the world had an opportunity to comment on it. The study was published last year in the 10th International Congress on Noise as a public health problem in Great Britain.

The peer review is important for those opposing wind turbines.

Janet Vallery, a spokesman for Oppose Belwood Windfarm, highlighted a difference between the study Aramini was involved in and the studies being cited by the provincial government.

“The Ontario provincial government used literature reviews as a basis for determining setbacks,” she said. “This new research deems setbacks less than 1.5km must be regarded as unsafe.”

Aramini said the questionnaire tool used for the research “has been used millions of times around the world.”

The researchers found, “It wasn’t simply close and far … It was, the closer you get, the [more] progressively your risk rises.”

He noted, too, that only adults were considered in the study, and wondered what effects sleep disruption would have on children.

“Losing sleep is a big deal. In kids, it affects their learning,” said Aramini.

There were about 80 adults involved in the Maine study, with about half living 2 to 3km away from a turbine, and others lived farther away than 3km.

The Ontario setbacks from human habitation is 550 metres and Aramini said that increases chances of people suffering from clinical depression by 369%.

“It’s doubling to tripling the chance of you being at risk if living that close,” he said, adding if just one person is affected badly, it is too many. “We’re talking about real people.”

Aramini said people ask him regularly about how close they can live to turbines, and if he would buy a home close to one.

“If you’re within 2km, I’d think twice,” he said about purchasing a home, adding he suggests people talk to their physician prior to turbines going in if they live near where the machines are proposed.

Aramini said it is vexing the provincial government is forcing people to endure turbines when there is plenty of land available that is not anywhere near human habitation.

“The thing that disappoints me is Canada is a big place. Surely we can put them in a place away … For God’s sake, put them out in the middle of nowhere, away from people.”

Unfortunately, he said of the issue, “Clearly there’s a lot of politics and money involved.”

Despite the study’s claims to the contrary, the Canadian Wind Energy Association (CanWEA) maintains there is no “conclusive” correlation between turbines and health issues.

 

NOTE FROM THE BPWI RESEARCH NERD:

The Executive Director of RENEW Wisconsin -mentioned in the article below- is a registered lobbyist who helped write state-wide wind siting rules.

 Among RENEW'S biggest financial 'sponsers' (or clients) are

American Transmission Company, LLC , utilities Madison Gas & Electric, and We Energies, wind developers Horizon Wind Energy, LLC, enXco, Emerging Energies LLC  and Wind Capital Group, Inc.

Representatives of both Emerging Energies and Wind Capitol group, two wind companies with direct financial interest in the outcome of the siting guidelines were also appointed by the PSC to help write the wind siting rules

Other council members included representatives of WPPI and WeEnergies.

And not just the Executive Director of RENEW but also its President.

A clear majority of the council members had a direct or indirect financial interest in the outcome of the rules they were tasked to write.

CLICK HERE TO SEE WHO HELPED WRITE THE RULES SET TO REPLACE LOCAL CONTROL OVER WIND SITING

BILL WOULD LET LOCAL OFFICALS CONTROL WIND TURBINE SITING RULES

By Clay Barbour, Wisconsin State Journal,

Via www.wisinfo.com

January 24, 2012 

MADISON — The long stalemate over windmill siting rules could become a moot point if the Legislature approves a new bill that keeps the power over turbine placement in the hands of local officials.

Sen. Frank Lasee, R-Ledgeview, late last week introduced a bill that would allow officials in cities, villages, towns and counties to establish the minimum distance between a wind turbine and a home — even if those rules are more restrictive than any the state tries to enact.

“The situation now is sort of lawless,” said Rob Kovach, Lasee’s chief of staff. “Townships don’t really know where they stand.”

New statewide wind siting rules, more than a year in the making, were suspended just before going into effect last March. Lawmakers sent those rules, which dealt with wind farms of less than 100 megawatts, back to the state Public Service Commission, where they have stayed as officials worked to reach a compromise between industry supporters and their critics.

“The whole reason for statewide rules is to have consistency and regulatory certainty,” said Michael Vickerman, executive director of RENEW Wisconsin, an advocacy group focused on renewable energy. “This bill, if it passes, would essentially say the state is off limits to wind power.”

The location of windmills has been a controversial issue in the state. Critics of the industry contend the energy generators hurt property values and can lead to health problems.

The rules being worked on by the PSC would have required wind turbines have a setback from the nearest property line of 1.1 times the height of the turbine, or roughly 450 feet for an average windmill. The rules also required turbines be at least 1,250 feet away from the nearest residence.

Lasee’s bill would supersede the rules in all areas where they conflict, namely placing the power to determine setbacks in the hands of local governments. It also would change the rules dealing with wind projects larger than 100 megawatts, forcing the PSC to respect the rules established by local officials.

If no new wind siting bills are adopted by March, the rules stuck in PSC will go into effect.

From Australia

WHAT YOU CAN'T HEAR CAN HURT YOU

Graham Lloyd, Environment editor

Via The Australian, www.theaustralian.com.au

January 25, 2012

When American noise expert Robert Rand turned up to work in Maine, in the US northeast, in April to investigate the impact of wind turbines on nearby residents he was literally blown away.

Not only did Rand’s readings confirm many fears in the community, he claims to have become an unwitting victim himself.

A member of the Institute of Noise Control Engineering and a technician with 30 years’ experience, Rand was working for a philanthropic donor wanting to investigate why wind turbines were causing so much concern.

Rand told The Australian yesterday his experience had been unexpected. He had measured the noise from wind turbines on many previous occasions without difficulty but, in testimony to the State of Maine Board of Environmental Protection in July, Rand said the turbines had delivered “a miserable and unnerving experience”.

When indoors, Rand and long-time colleague Stephen Ambrose, also a Member of INCE, experienced “nausea, loss of appetite, headache, vertigo, dizziness, inability to concentrate, an overwhelming desire to get outside and anxiety, over a two-night period from Sunday, April 17 to Tuesday, April 19″.

“I know personally and viscerally what people have been complaining about,” he says. “Adverse health effects from wind turbines are real and can be debilitating.

“The fieldwork points directly to wind turbine low-frequency noise pulsations, especially indoors, as a causative factor.”

Anti-wind farm campaigners across the world have jumped on Rand’s testimony and his report as confirmation of a series of key issues of concern. They are:

• That infrasound and low frequency noise from wind turbines is being measured inside the homes of affected people and correlates with wind turbine activity.

• That turbine activity and measured infrasound correlate with the onset/occurrence of symptoms.

• That decibel sound levels do not correlate with people’s symptoms and are therefore useless at predicting or identifying problems.

• That infrasound energy is amplified inside the home.

Rand’s testimony shows that, when it comes to wind turbines, what you can’t hear can hurt you.

It puts the spotlight on whether governments and the wind industry are hiding behind the reality that you won’t find what you don’t look for.

It is difficult to reconcile Rand’s experience with confidential briefings reportedly given by NSW Health to politicians who claim health impacts from wind turbines are “not scientifically valid”.

The Clean Energy Council, an industry body representing wind companies, also rejects claims of health impacts.

“This whole infrasound stuff is completely out of the park,” says CEC spokesman Mark Bretherton. “I don’t think there is any sort of issues with infrasound whatsoever. I think they are barking up the wrong tree completely.

“If anything it boils down to standards and audible noise.

“It is a case of if you can hear something and it is disturbing your sleep then you will not be sleeping so well, which will lead to stress and pretty much all the reported symptoms,” Bretherton says.

Danish wind industry heavyweight Vestas is certainly aware of the infrasound generated by its wind turbines and keen to ensure that any restrictions are minimal.

Last year, the company successfully lobbied the Danish government to weaken proposed infrasound restrictions, fearing they would hurt the company’s business globally.

In a letter dated June 11, Vestas chief executive officer Ditlev Engel wrote to Danish environment minister Karen Ellemann claiming the proposed infrasound regulations would hit the company’s three-megawatt turbines hardest.

Engel said it was “not technically possible” to meet the proposed infrasound limits of 20 decibels 24 hours a day.

What is missing is rigorous analysis of what impact, if any, infrasound from wind turbines has on human health. In the absence of proper research, testimony such as Rand’s is dismissed by wind industry supporters and proponents as anecdotal.

The lack of evidence works in the wind industry’s favour. A position paper issued by a national coalition of healthcare groups, the Climate and Health Alliance, yesterday rejected the claims of anti-wind groups that wind power poses a threat to health.

“There is no credible peer-reviewed scientific evidence that demonstrates a link between wind turbines and direct adverse health impacts in people living in proximity to them,” CAHA convenor Fiona Armstrong said.

The alliance is made up of a range of organisations, including the Australian College of Rural and Remote Medicine, the Australian Council of Social Service, the Royal Australian College of Physicians, the Women’s Health Network and World Vision.

To assess health impacts, most people have relied on a “rapid review” statement issued by the National Health and Medical Research Council published in 2010 that says “there is no published scientific evidence to support adverse effects of wind turbines on health”. But in evidence to a federal senate inquiry into the impacts of wind farm developments on rural communities in March last year, NHMRC chief executive officer Warwick Anderson said: “We certainly do not believe that this question has been settled.

“The absence of evidence does not mean that there might not be evidence in the future; it is just that, at the stage when the review was done, it was not there,” he said.

At a conference last June, the NHMRC agreed to “undertake a systematic approach to reviewing the literature and use the results to inform any update of the public statement”.

Anderson said the review would focus on possible health impacts of audible noise and infrasound. “Depending on the result of this review, a targeted call for research in this area (would) be considered,” he said.

For anti-wind campaigners the question is whether that review will come soon enough.

High-profile campaigner Sarah Laurie says the NHMRC’s progress has been “glacial at best”.

“They seem to have no concept of a public health disaster which is about to exponentially increase, and which they could help to prevent,” she says.

“Professor Anderson clearly understands there is a problem from his comments in his oral evidence to the Senate inquiry, but has done little since to expedite either a better review of the literature or to actively encourage medical researchers.”

Equally slow has been any practical response to the Senate inquiry recommendation that the commonwealth government initiate as a matter of priority “thorough, adequately resourced epidemiological and laboratory studies of the possible effects of wind farms on human health”.

In stark contrast, there has been a steady stream of reports from industry and social groups rejecting concerns about wind turbines.

A CSIRO report released this month said there was stronger community support for developing wind farms than might be assumed from media coverage.

Another report, from wind developer Pacific Hydro, said 83 per cent of people support wind, with only 14 per cent opposed.

The onslaught of pro-wind surveys and literature is a happy coincidence for the wind industry, which considers itself to be one push away from rolling out billions of dollars of new wind farm investment to meet the government’s 2020 renewable energy target.

Australia has 1188 wind turbines and 57 operating wind farms, including one located in the Australian Antarctic Territory.

The wind industry is expected to triple by 2020, with an additional 6.9GW of wind power and between 2000 and 2500 turbines.

The industry has faced a backlash from some state governments responding to community concerns about how close wind turbines are built to houses.

Victoria’s Baillieu government last year gave landholders an effective right of veto over any wind turbine within 2km of their houses.

Proposed new laws for NSW, now out for public comment, are less strict. Under the proposed guidelines, if a wind farm developer is unable to get written permission from all landholders within 2km, it can apply for a site compatibility certificate.

The application should focus on visual amenity issues and noise, including low-frequency noise, at any houses within 2km.

Bretherton says the wind industry hopes the NSW proposals will be better than those in Victoria. “The gateway process could go either way,” he says. “It could work well or it could be unworkable.”

He says wind farm protests present a unique challenge for the industry. “The history of the protest movement is a typically left-wing thing with people agitating for change. Now you have got older people agitating for the status quo,” Bretherton says.

But for former ABC chairman, Maurice Newman, it is a simple issue of individual rights and government arrogance.

“The harmful health effects, despite peer-reviewed and anecdotal evidence, are dismissed as being unconfirmed, psychosomatic or the politics of envy.

“It’s true not everyone who lives near wind turbines experiences adverse health effects,” Newman says. “But then, not everyone who smokes contracts lung cancer.”

There is, he says, an imbalance when cash-poor residents face governments and corporations.

“Politicians are lending their support to oligopolistic insiders and, in so doing, are destroying the property rights of the very people they have pledged to protect.”

Renewables hit headwind

THE ill wind blowing in renewable energy has also cast a cloud over the global solar industry.

The price of solar panel companies has plummeted in recent days after Germany announced plans to accelerate the wind-back of feed-in tariff subsidies.

High subsidies have made Germany the world’s largest solar energy market but at an estimated cost to energy users and taxpayers of E100 billion. The cost blow-out is considered to be a threat to the German economy.

Despite the International Energy Agency’s positive outlook for renewable energy, assuming the continuation of subsidies, the German decision was enough to crash the global solar market.

German manufacturers have already been struggling in the face of low-cost solar manufacturing in China. Chinese imports have prompted a bitter trade war initiated by German solar makers in the US. In a unanimous decision in November, the International Trade Commission ruled Chinese solar panel and cell imports were harming the US solar manufacturing industry. The US Department of Commerce will soon rule on preliminary tariffs and “critical circumstances” that may mean importers will have to pay retrospective duties on these products.

And in Britain, a new cross-party campaign group is demanding the government drop its support for thousands more wind farms.

Wind turbines set to pretty music are one thing. This video first shows how turbines are presented to the public, turning on a nice day with pretty music playing in the background. Then it shows what happens once the music stops and the roar of the turbines begins.

Complaints about turbines are the same from all over the world, from Wisconsin to Scotland

Click here for source

Click here to read about daily life in an Invenergy wind project in Wisconsin

FOR EXTRA CREDIT CLICK HERE: Dear John, BASF also made casette tapes