In what must be one of the slowest EIS processes on record, the National Park Service and the Federal Aviation Administration is moving…methodically…to develop a new air tour management plan (ATMP) for Hawaii Volcanoes National Park.  After being upgraded from an EA to an EIS in 2005, the joint planning process began work on the EIS in 2007.  Four years later, rather than releasing a Draft EIS, the project planners have released a first draft of the proposed alternatives, and are asking for comment on these.  After incorporating comments, the DEIS will follow.  Sometime.

All ribbing aside, the fact is that this is actually one of the faster moving ATMP’s coming out of the seemingly uncomfortable partnership between the FAA and the NPS, which were  jointly charged in 2000 with developing ATMPs for all parks with existing or proposed flight tours.  The Park Service has taken a lead among federal agencies in addressing impacts on natural soundscapes of parks, while the FAA’s focus is more on air safety than resource protection.

“Hawai‘i Volcanoes is known for spectacular volcanic landscapes, significance of Native Hawaiian culture, Hawaiian species found nowhere else in the world, and for vast expanses of designated wilderness that stretch from summit to sea,” stated Cindy Orlando, Park Superintendent. “Whether it’s the crackling of new lava, song of a honeycreeper, or a magical Hawaiian chant floating across Halemaumau Crater or just silence—the soundscapes of Hawaii Volcanoes are unusual and valued as part of the park experience. We also protect some of the quietest places in the park service —secluded locations that are quieter than even humans can hear. Natural quiet is becoming an increasingly important attribute of the national parks.”

You can download a newsletter that shares the draft alternatives, and submit comments, from this page; see the full project planning website here; and check out a short video and news report on the process here.

The National Parks Traveller blog recently ran a great piece titled Give Us A National Park, Please, But Not its Regulations.  Here’s the lead:

We love our national parks. We love the wildlife they hold, the seashores with their sparkling sands, the forests with their wildlife and hiking trails, the soaring red-rock cliffs and plunging canyons.

But please, don’t ask us to abide by their regulations.

Uproars over managing off-road vehicles in both Cape Hatteras National Seashore and Big Cypress National Preserve, the oyster farm at Point Reyes National Seashore, air traffic over Grand Canyon National Park, snowmobiles in Yellowstone National Park, and now bike races in Colorado National Monument all seem to drive home that point, no?

The piece goes on with evocative detail and interesting historical perspective on the Parks’ struggles to balance preservation and access.  Very well done.

New wind farm permitting rules adopted in the Australian state of Victoria place permitting authority in the hands of local councils, rather than the state Minister for Planning.  During  the recent campaign, the newly elected state government had called for  2km setbacks from non-consenting landowners, and shared payment plans for all residents within 1km.  While these provisions are not included in the new rules, local authorities are granted authority to assess “high amenity noise impacts,” which could lead to noise limits lower than those currently required by the law (of course, lower noise limits lead to larger setbacks from homes).

In Australia, a fair amount of research has looked at local reactions to wind farm noise, and the concept of “rural amenity” has emerged as a likely  factor in areas where moderate noise triggers more widespread complaints than expected.  The idea is basically that residents in some areas value rural quiet extremely highly, and in these places even distant turbines can trigger complaints; several windfarms have faced widespread reaction from  residents 2km (about 1.25 miles) away.

Following up on our previous coverage now-infamous Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker’s call for larger wind turbine setbacks, the a joint legislative committee that reviews pending new rules voted to abandon the planned implementation of new wind farm siting rules scheduled to go into effect on March 1. (See PSC site detailing the work of the committee that proposed the new rules, and this opinion piece by the committee vice-chair and co-author of a minority report supporting larger setbacks)

Republican legislators, now in the majority, agreed with Governor Walker that the rules as crafted would allow turbines too close to neighboring properties; Walker and his allies frame their objections as a property rights issue. Committee co-chair Rep. Jim Ott, said. “The biggest issue we heard came from testifiers at the hearing that 1,250 ft. is too close and will result in shadow flicker and noise issues.” Some wind farm neighbors also cite health issues resulting from stress and loss of sleep caused by the turbine noise, which also influenced the legislators.

The American Wind Energy Association said the PSC rule was restrictive enough, given that it set specific noise limits and restrictions on shadow flicker in addition to turbine distance setbacks.

“These rules were developed collaboratively by the wind energy industry and all major stakeholders in Wisconsin, based on input from six public hearings and two years of information gathering, to protect the interests of all involved parties,” said Jeff Anthony, director of business development at the American Wind Energy Association and a Wisconsin resident.

“We heard nearly nine hours of testimony during February’s hearing,” Ott said. “Based on the testimony — some pro and a lot of con — we decided to hold a motion to suspend the rule. This is a situation where the legislature is exercising its oversight of a public agency.”  It is expected that the legislature will authorize a new round of rule-making, with one bill calling on the PSC to revisit the issue and submit a new proposal within 7 months.

An article from Vermont offers an unusually detailed and complete report on a Public Service Board hearing about noise at a proposed wind farm in Lowell.  I highly recommend it.

The article summarizes the testimony of two noise experts, each of whom was proposing what they felt was a proper conservative noise limit; the article presents each approach quite well, and gives a good sense of the judgment calls that regulators are being asked to make about wind farm noise.

Les Blomberg urged a 35dB standard at property lines, which would help keep noise levels low enough for folks to put a chair in the yard and relax.  He used an EPA technique to suggest that turbine noise should be regulated to a lower sound level than other noise sources.

Ken Kalinsky proposed a 45dB standard outside the home, which would protect against sleep disruption, and not limit outdoor conversation, though may interfere with quieter outdoor activities such as listening to songbirds.  He said that 45dB is more conservative a limit than those used in many other places, notably the World Health Organization standard for protecting health.

Now go read the whole article!

Renewable Energy World has just published a commentary I wrote, urging wind industry professionals to reassess their current one-size-fits-all approach to community noise standards.  You can read it in full, with links to sources and comments from others, on their site.  They’ll be seeding it into their email newsletters during the week, likely triggering a few waves of readership and comments.

Here’s a pdf if you want to download it to read it offline. I’m reproducing it here as well:

Looking for Wind Industry Leadership in Reducing Noise Impacts

By Jim Cummings, Acoustic Ecology Institute

The wind industry is at an important fork in the road regarding community noise standards. After years of successfully using relatively small setbacks in farm and ranch country, recent years have seen a surge of noise complaints, troubling annoyance-level surveys, and widespread fear of new wind development.  Though sound levels of 45-50dB have been taken in stride by many, even most, places where early industrial wind development took place, it’s becoming apparent that for some types of communities, sound levels of even 40dB are triggering high levels of community push-back.  The industry’s first responses to this emerging problem have been counterproductive: discounting the prevalence of complaints, vilifying acousticians seeking to understand the shift, and most fundamentally, insisting to county commissions nationwide that “widely accepted” community noise standards that have worked elsewhere are applicable everywhere.  It’s high time that forward-looking industry insiders take the lead in forging a more flexible, collaborative relationship with communities, acknowledging that the noise tolerance we are used to is not universal: some rural regions are far less amenable to moderate, yet easily audible, turbine noise.  Companies that accept this fact — rather than ignoring or fighting it — will build corporate reputations that could make them the go-to developers across much of rural America.

A few tidbits highlight just how counterproductive the current entrenched “everything is fine” stance has become:

Read the rest of this entry »

The town of Falmouth, Massachusetts continues to grapple with noise complaints from a large number of landowners living within a half mile or so of the two wind turbines erected at the town Wastewater Treatment Facility.  Acting Town Manager Heather Harper, who’s been the town’s point person on seeking solutions since the first turbine began operations just about one year ago, is currently dealing with fallout from the State DEP expressing concerns about the analysis presented by the town’s formal noise study, as well as tensions generated by a challenge to the initial permits granted to erect the turbines.

Harper says that while she anticipated some negative reactions to the turbines, the intensity of the response has surprised her.  When the project was proposed, and throughout the planning process, local support was solid.  “Many of the neighbors did participate in that process,” Harper notes in a recent article in the Falmouth Enterprise.

This is very similar the situation in some other communities when setbacks are in the quarter to third of a mile range, where enthusiastic local support is followed by surprise about the noise impacts once the turbines start turning.   In Falmouth, an unusually large number of residents spoke up about their problems with noise: around fifty people participated in early informal community meetings held by neighbors trying to assess how widespread the issues were, and 18 banded together to hire a lawyer to help them address their concerns with the local planning boards.  (See earlier AEI coverage of Falmouth issues)

The town is exploring options for reducing the sound at times, but doesn’t want to jeopardize the value of the turbines to the town, in generating electricity for municipal buildings.  The neighbors rejected a proposal from the town to shut the turbines down between midnight and 3am in high winds, saying that noise issues were problems outside this time range.  They are suggesting that permanent noise or wind monitoring stations be installed, that could trigger curtailments in conditions when noise is most bothersome (no details were offered in the Enterprise article about what these conditions may be). Christopher Senie, the neighbors’ lawyer, admits that there is no perfect solution, but they want to find a middle ground that minimizes neighbor’s negative experiences while making the turbines beneficial to the town.

Meanwhile, the Cape Cod Commission has approved new wind farm regulations for the region, which includes setbacks of 10x the rotor diameter, which for the Falmouth turbines would have amounted to 2700 feet.  While noise problems can persist beyond this range, most complaints about chronic noise impacts come from residents under a half mile away.  The CCC proposal also includes a so-far fairly vague provision that would allow closer siting if a noise study suggests sound will have “minimal impacts” to nearby residents; the plan is that future technical bulletins will clarify what that means.

Senator John McCain has introduced legislation that would derail the National Park Service’s recently-released compromise plan to reduce noise levels in the Grand Canyon.  McCain’s initiative, apparently included in an amendment to another bill (details are sketchy so far, with nothing on McCain’s website so far), would declare that keeping half of Grand Canyon National Park relatively free of noise from air tours is good enough.  By contrast, the NPS proposal, which increased the total number of tourist flights allowed but concentrated them in smaller flight zones, would keep two-thirds of the canyon free of any aircraft noise (including commercial jets and non-tour private aircraft) for most of the day.

McCain seeks to codify what has been the Park’s modus operandi for the past 17 years, a 50% protection standard that was achievable without making major changes.  That interim approach was adopted while Park staff, environmental groups, and air tour operators attempted to come to a consensus on how to move forward.  While the NPS does not and cannot regulate commercial overflights, the sound from high-flying jets does impact the canyon, and the NPS included these sounds in its planning of air tour routes, so as to keep aircraft noise inaudible for 75% of the day in the “quiet” parts of the park (of course, allowing aircraft noise for 25% of the day hardly creates an experience of solitude…but this is part of the compromise that wilderness advocates are being asked to accept).  By not counting commercial flights in the total noise budget of the Park, McCain is rolling things backward.

The McCain approach would also do away with two of the Park Service’s key innovations: seasonal shifts of air tour routes, so that different parts of the park are quiet at different times of the year, and most importantly, the no-fly period that would keep the canyon truly quiet for an hour after sunrise and an hour before sunset.

Ironically (or perhaps not, for those tracking the Maverick’s devolution over the past few years), McCain was the main proponent of the 1987 bill that set this process in motion, and called for “substantial restoration of the natural quiet and experience of the park.”

This short story from Australia neatly sums up the divide in many communities over wind farm development.

Black Springs resident Kerry Heinrich (above) is happy to have wind turbines in her backyard. At yesterday’s launch of the Waterloo wind farm – 30km from Clare – Ms Heinrich said the 37 wind turbines created only “background noise”.

“I think they are quite stunning,” she said. “They are just part of the landscape now.”

Yet others were far less happy on the first day of operation. Stop Industrial Wind Turbines chairwoman Ally Fricker said the community was “bitterly divided” about the farm.  A small group of protesters concerned about turbine noise and sleep disruption held signs including saying “turbines kill rural communities” and “more research needed.”

It all comes down to how much, if any, background noise someone is ready for, it seems.  Time will tell whether the homes in this particular community are close enough to the turbines to cause ongoing problems, or only occasionally audible noise.

The biannual Wind Turbine Noise conference, sponsored by the Institute for Noise Control Engineering Europe, is being held from April 11-14 in Rome.   This week, conference organizers announced the line up of papers that will be presented, and as always, it looks to be a greatly informative few days.  I can hardly wait until the proceedings CD is prepared, ordered, and arrives on my doorstep!

See Wind Turbine Noise 2011 website

See list of papers to be presented

Just came across a fairly detailed article looking at wind energy in Holland, and more generally, in Europe.  The article focuses on local resistance to a large windfarm being planned on the coast of Holland, but it included this section, citing the European Wind Energy Association on the long project timelines and high rate of local resistance and legal challenges:

“In Holland, there’s hardly any project that doesn’t get delayed,” said Michiel Muller, the wind unit manager of Ecofys, a research and consultancy firm on sustainable energy, who is not connected with the Urk project.

Across Europe, each installation faces a slew of hurdles, starting from the required Environmental Impact Assessment to regulatory approvals by often more than a dozen authorities. It takes an average of 55 months to wade through the bureaucratic tangle before work can begin, the European Wind Energy Association said.

Of some 200 wind energy projects studied in 2007-8 in Europe, 40 percent were ensnared in lawsuits, and 30 percent more faced slowdowns because of local resistance or questioning from nonprofit environmental groups, the association said. It had no figures on how many projects were killed before they got started.

Down East magazine, a Maine institution, has published a series of stories on wind power in Maine, with enough detail to be valuable to people in any rural state who are trying to find the proper balance on wind development.  The series includes in-depth articles on the University of Maine’s leadership in developing floating far-offshore wind farms and on controversy surrounding the potential for many ridgetop wind farms in the relatively wild mountains of western Maine, and an editorial noting the quick and fearful reactions of many communities to just the thought of a new wind farm.

In the article detailing facts about Maine’s current wind power sites and proposals (which reads as generally supportive of wind development), the short section on noise impacts, noting both the moderate noise levels and big impact reported by some neighbors, was followed by a surprisingly blunt recommendation about setbacks: “Half a mile, at minimum. But most agree that a mile is more advisable, as virtually no complaints have been lodged by neighbors this far from a wind turbine.”

The wildlands article makes the case for protecting Maine’s highest ridgetops (over 2700 feet) from development, and focusing on smaller-scale, distributed alternative energy generation, including solar as well as wind, built closer to existing power infrastructure.

The article on the future of floating offshore wind is especially inspiring.  The UMaine team plans to test three 1/3-scale turbines in 2012, with comprehensive environmental monitoring, including subsea impacts, and follow that with a full-scale 3-5MW turbine by 2014, the first “stepping stone” multi-turbine 25MW wind farm 20-50 miles offshore by 2016, and expansion to 500MW or more by 2020.   Here’s an excerpt:

“This is a one thousand-megawatt farm covering an eight-square-mile area,” says Habib Dagher, the man who created this vision and is now leading a team of engineers, environmental scientists, government policymakers, and offshore construction and energy industry leaders called the DeepCwind Consortium who hope to make it, the world’s first floating wind farm, a reality. “In the Gulf of Maine, that’s like an outhouse in the corner of a football field.”

Make that three outhouses. DeepCwind’s goal is to have three such wind farms bobbing twenty to fifty miles off the Maine coast and generating enough energy to power three million homes by 2030. It’s a breathtaking idea, and still it doesn’t fill the frame that has been drawn by Habib Dagher. He envisions Mainers converting to electricity to heat their homes and power their cars (the cost makes no sense now, he concedes, but it will in two decades, given the price increases predicted for fossil fuels) and the state becoming the Silicon Valley of offshore energy. Towers, blades, and other components will be manufactured right here, using technologies and materials pioneered by the University of Maine’s AEWC Advanced Structures and Composites Center, which he founded and directs.

A group in Maine has petitioned the state Board of Environmental Protection to amend the noise rules in the state Site Location Law to set lower limits for wind farm noise than for other sources of community noise.  The group, the Citizen’s Task Force on Wind Power, is formally asking the state to consider a question that has become central to siting controversies nationwide: is the nature of wind turbine noise different enough from road or factory noise to warrant lower noise limits?  The BEP will hold public hearings to consider the question.

A growing number of acousticians and medical professionals have raised concerns that standard community noise standards are not likely to provide the same level as protection from wind farm noise as they do from other noise sources.  There are several reasons put forward for this, including:

• The prevalence of amplitude modulation.  The pulsing quality to the sound, rising and falling slightly in loudness at about once a second, adds to its noticeability and annoyance (this is often related to the presence of a wind shear, or higher wind speeds at the top of the turbine blade rotation than at the bottom).
• The low-frequency character of turbine noise.  Separate from the controversial question of direct health effects from exposure to moderate levels of infrasound, wind turbine noise is weighted toward lower frequency audible sound as well, which travels farther than higher frequencies, penetrates homes better, and is not fully represented in A-weighted dB measurements.
• The unpredictable 24-hour nature of the sound.  Other common community noise sources quiet down at night, often becoming totally inactive, rather than continuing at the allowed 45dB.
• Large difference of turbine noise and natural ambient at night is disruptive. Night time wind farm noise at current 45dB standard can easily be 15-25dB louder than quiet rural ambient noise level.

Currently, state regulators are relying on the state’s generalized community noise standards in approving wind farms.  According to Cynthia Bertocci, an analyst for the BEP, a public hearing will be held to address the petition to change the regs for wind farms, though a date has not yet been set.  The Citizen’s Task Force proposes nighttime noise limits of 35dB at homes; while turbines would still be audible outside in many cases (night time ambient in rural areas is often 20-25dB, and sometimes even lower), noise inside should be minimal.  This would like require setbacks of close to a mile.

The Wisconsin legislature has moved quickly to enact most of newly elected GOP governor Scott Walker’s job-creation bills during a special session he called after his inauguration, with one glaring exception: Walker’s proposal to increase wind turbine setbacks from 1250 from homes, to 1800 feet from property lines.  As noted in this earlier post, and in a more detailed commentary on the Renewable Energy World website, Walker’s proposal seems to AEI to be a step in the right direction toward forging a new social framework that will actually support the long-term success of the wind industry, by helping avoid long, costly siting debates, lawsuits, and property-value claims. The proposed larger setbacks would come along with provisions allowing closer placement of turbines if the company works out an agreement with nearby neighbors.

According to the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, negotiations are underway to perhaps come up with some sort of middle ground between the existing regulations and Walker’s proposal, with leaders of the GOP majority sharing Walker’s concerns that the 1250 standard is insufficient.

UPDATE, 2/11/11: The Wisconsin legislature held a hearing to consider suspending the statewide wind farm regulations adopted by the state PSC last year, scheduled to go into effect shortly.  While the GOP-led legislature did not move forward with Governor Walker’s bill to increase setbacks to 1800 feet from property lines, they are considering revisiting the question.

The National Park Service has released its proposed air tour management rules for the Grand Canyon.  Key features of the plan include increased flight altitudes near North Rim overlooks, reducing flights in Marble Canyon, moving routes away from some key visitor use areas, and establishing an hour-long flight-free period for an hour after sunrise and an hour before sunset.  This last change will be especially appreciated by backcountry hikers and river-runners, for it provides two hours a day of true extended natural quiet, at the times when the soft, rich light brings the canyons walls most subtly and dramatically alive.

The proposal caps nearly 25 years of work, initiated in the wake of a 1987 congressional mandate to come up with a plan that “provides for substantial restoration of the natural quiet and experience” of the Canyon.  The proposal would allow slightly more flights than are currently operating, but would largely concentrate them in one long and one short flight loop. The plan is now available for download and public comment through early June.  The NPS press release notes that the plan should increase the area of the park experiencing substantial natural quiet for most of the day from just over half to close to two thirds.  The objective measurement standard used by the Park Service defines substantial natural quiet to mean that in these areas, no aircraft will be audible for at least 75% of the day; so, you might hear a plane for up to one minute of every four, or fifteen minutes of each hour, though undoubtedly there will be some areas of the park far enough from the flight routes that the noise will be very faint and far less common.  Once we have time to read the full Draft EIS, it may become clearer whether there are some areas in the park that are virtually free of air tour noise (commercial airline flights regularly pass directly over the park; the plan does not suggesting shifting these routes).

The busiest year on record, 2005, saw 57,000 air tour flights provide birds-eye-views of the Canyon to over 400,000 visitors annually; the new plan would allow up to 65,000 flights annually, and up to 364 flights a day, 50 more than the busiest day on record.  Initial reactions from the National Parks Conservation Association and the Sierra Club, both of which have pushed for flight regulations, has been supportive.

Update, 2/4/11: Steve Bassett, president of the U.S. Air Tour Association, characterized the National Park Service’s recommendations for the Grand Canyon as “unconscionable” and the document as “designed to drive the industry out of existence.”  His objections are largely centered on the requirement that within ten years, all planes must be modern low-noise aircraft. He also objected to the annual cap of 65,000 flights, claiming that the annual number of “possible flights” is now 94,000 (presumably this totals all current operators, if they all flew the maximum number of flights possible per day; in fact, as noted above, the busiest year on record saw a demand for just 57,000 actual flights).

Update 2/6/11: Good article from Las Vegas newspaper, stressing the role of Grand Canyon tourism as part of what Vegas visitors want to experience, often by air.

Update 2/7/11: Good detailed post from National Parks Traveller, including longer response quotes from Park staff and conservationists.  One key piece: the plan continues the practice of allowing flights over the canyon near Hermit’s Rest, a popular spot for short hikes into the canyon:
“We had advocated that they move the Hermit flight path a little bit further to the west so that it really didn’t affect people who would take a quiet stroll down from Hermit’s Rest, down that little canyon,” said NPCA’s Mr. Nimkin. “That’s where you can sit there and every 90 seconds have a helicopter or a plane flying overhead. It would seem like that’s a pretty highly visited area, maybe one of the only times that people who are taking a shuttle out to the end of the road there would sort of stroll down into the canyon. To have that be the flight path seems inconsistent.”

See earlier AEInews coverage of Grand Canyon overflights here.

The Pedestrian Safety Enhancement Act of 2010, championed by John Kerry and the National Federation for the Blind, was signed in early January by President Obama. Spurred by concerns that new, near-silent vehicles may pose a danger to both the blind and those not paying attention visually, the law will eventually require all vehicles on the road to make some sound to help keep pedestrians safe. For now, the law calls on the Secretary of Transportation to “study and establish a motor vehicle safety standard that provides for a means of alerting blind and other pedestrians of motor vehicle operation.”

This year’s new entrants in the electic car sweepstakes already include features that help with this problem. The Nissan Leaf makes a sound to warn pedestrians when traveling at slow speeds (at higher speeds tire noise is sufficient), and the Chevy Volt includes a chirping sound that can be triggered by the driver (as a subtler alternative to the horn).

For a look at some sound design concepts for electric vehicles, see this AEINews post from about a year ago.

Today in Toronto, an Ontario Superior Court will begin hearing a challenge to wind farm siting provisions of the province’s new Green Energy Act, which set a minimum distance from wind turbines to homes at 550 meters.

The Ottawa Citizen has a good, detailed article about the legal challenge, which you can read here.

UPDATE: Here’s a new Citizen story on the day’s proceedings.

What could be interesting about this case is that they are directly challenging the claimed comprehensiveness of key previous studies of the health effects of wind farms. These literature reviews, the court challenge claims, were incomplete, and failed to provide necessary medical evidence of the safety of the current setbacks. The litigants hope to submit expert testimony from two doctors whose own studies have led them to recommend much larger safety zones to protect citizens from sleep disruption, stress, and other health-related effects. Perhaps the most important witness Read the rest of this entry »

Note: See a longer article on I wrote Walker’s move, which was published on the Renewable Energy World website

When Scott Walker was inaugurated as Wisconsin’s new Governor earlier this month, he called a special session of the state legislature, dubbed the “Wisconsin in Open for Business” session.  All bills will be focused on improving the state’s business climate, something that is always a GOP priority, and which in these tough economic times, has widespread support.

But his regulatory reform bill has a wild card tucked inside: a new and stricter setback standard for industrial wind farms.  While the proposal is being attacked as a job-killer, it appears to AEI that the Governor has his pulse on one of the key ways that the wind industry might gain easier acceptance in the years to come.

In response to tough local rules that were seen as anti-wind, the Wisconsin legislature called for statewide standards that localities cannot exceed; after a couple years of meetings, the state’s PRC recently adopted a new statewide standard of 1250 feet from homes.  Governor Walker’s bill would increase setbacks statewide to 1800 feet from property lines.

While this would still not protect neighbors from hearing wind turbines, which are often quite audible at a half mile and can be heard to a mile or more in some situations (many suggest setbacks in these larger ranges), it is a substantial increase.  Wind industry spokesmen immediately slammed the change, claiming that it would basically preclude new wind farms in the state and kill jobs.  These critiques ignore a key provision of the Governor’s proposal: neighbors closer than 1800 feet can agree to let turbines go up, presumably in exchange for some compensation from the wind company.

It appears that Governor Walker understands that what will move the wind industry forward is regulations that may help local communities to feel more comfortable about the likely impacts of new wind farms, rather than standards designed primarily to ease the placement of new wind farms.  The combination of larger setbacks, and provisions for neighbors to sign waivers, is the right direction for growing this industry without sacrificing the quality of life of rural communities.

Here are three articles in the local press on the proposal: Simple announcement of the bill, and statement from Governor A fairly balanced article that includes comments from developers and those supporting the measure Longer, also balanced report, with quotes from AWEA, the Governor, and local supporters of the proposal

A few months back, there was a bit of a news and comment flurry when the Shepherd’s Flat wind farm announced plans to pay neighbors $5000 for noise wavers, in order to build turbines closer to homes than Oregon’s unusually strict 36dB noise limit would allow. While the plan was dissed by many as an attempt to buy off neighbors, it seems to me that agreements like this are a valid way of addressing concerns about noise, especially in that they provide local authorities an avenue that may help them justify larger set-backs (or lower decibel limits) to protect residents who don’t want to hear turbines, while allowing developers to arrange exceptions with people who either don’t care about noise or feel that a payment is fair compensation.

But of course, noise waver or easement provisions don’t guarantee that the developer can build turbines closer to every resident.  Caithness Energy is dealing with this in Oregon now, as this unusually frank article details. The entire article is important reading for nearly anyone working on this issue, but here are a few highlights:

Richard and Joanne Goodhead were clear from the start that they were not willing to live with turbine noise of up to 50dB, as the waiver would allow, and told Caithness, the developer, they wanted to be bought out. “(The Caithness representative) said ‘We’re not in the real estate business,’ Goodhead said. ‘I said, fine — I’m not in the windmill business.’” After a month of negotiations, which included offers of $6000 per year for 20 years, and later, the revenue from one turbine, Caithness relented, and bought the Goodhead’s land and home.

Two other homes near the Shepherd’s Flat wind farm, which is still under construction, have been sold; one was bought by an attorney who works for Caithness, acting on behalf of another local landowner who is part of the wind project.

Invenergy’s Willow Creek wind farm, just south of Shepherd’s Flat, has also been struggling with noise issues, finding it difficult at times to meet the 36dB limit.  According to the Goodheads, the local antelope population has noticeably declined since it began operating.

Read more: http://www.statesmanjournal.com/article/20101227/UPDATE/101227031/Wind-farm-splits-neighbors-who-take-cash-or-leave#ixzz19WgqwrR2

A new but long-simmering front has opened in the push-and-pull struggle between wind companies advocating the status quo and communities uncertain about how to deal with reports they hear from elsewhere that suggest industrial-scale wind farms have unintended consequences, including chronic noise impacts and reduced property values.

This may not be the first time it’s bubbled to the surface, but it’s the first one I’ve noticed: the Hammond, NY Town Council is considering a ordinance that would require wind farm developers to compensate property owners who see drops in their land values because of the presence of wind turbines. The proposal also requires the company to buy out any property owner who objects to living near a turbine. Iberdrola Renewables says these provisions in the rules “would eliminate any possibility” for a planned wind project in town.  Read the rest of this entry »

A new study of property values in the vicinity of a large wind farm in Illinois provides reinforcement for both sides in the debate.  I first saw mention of the study in an American Wind Energy Association press release that touted its consistency with previous studies that found no significant price impact in homes near wind farms.  After downloading and reading through the report, I find that the results do indeed match previous studies, though in my reading the results are subtler than the overall averages suggest, just as they were with the big DOE-funded study that came out about a year ago.

The new study, entitled “Wind Farm Proximity and Property Values: A Pooled Hedonic Regression Analysis of Property Values in Central Illinois, 2010” used complex multi-factor statistical analysis to compare many factors that affect the sales price of a home (that’s lay-speak for the “pooled hedonic regression analysis with difference-in-differences estimators” that were used).  The bottom line is interesting and potentially reassuring: Read the rest of this entry »

Alec Salt, a Washington University scientist who studies the inner ear, has discovered that outer ear cells may respond to very low frequency infrasound, well below the frequencies that are audible or otherwise consciously perceptible.  Salt suggests that his discovery may help explain why some individuals seem to be more dramatically affected by low frequency wind turbine noise than would be expected.

The study, funded by the National Institutes of Health’s National Institute on Deafness and other Communicative Disorders, is a literature survey that looks especially at the physiological responses of guinea pigs exposed to infrasound down to 5Hz.  Humans can generally hear sounds as low as 20Hz; sounds below this frequency are called infrasound.  Guinea pigs are often used in lab studies, since their hearing mechanisms are similar to those in humans; in fact, human ears are more sensitive to low frequencies than are guinea pigs.  The crux of his findings center on the ways that hair-like cells in our ears, the Outer Hair Cells (OHCs) and Inner Hair Cells (IHCs), work together to translate sound pressure at various frequencies into the perception of sound in our brain.  For audible frequencies, the OHCs amplify the vibrations they receive from sound waves, triggering hair-like structures on the IECs to ripple and bend; it is this movement of IHCs that create the electrical (neural) impulses that our brain perceives as sound.

The surprise in Salt’s study was that OHCs also react to infrasound.  Rather than, as might be expected, simply not being affected by infrasound, OHCs are “highly sensitive” to it, Read the rest of this entry »

I just came across this fascinating article from the Martha’s Vineyard Times that discusses a recent trip by local residents and planners up to Maine to participate in a Sustainable Island Living conference sponsored by the Island Institute, which catalyzed the construction of the controversial wind farm on Vinalhaven.

The entire article is well worth reading, but I’ll highlight these two thoughtful comments from experienced local planners after they visited the Vinalhaven turbines:

Bill Veno, senior planner for the Martha’s Vineyard Commission, talked to some Vinalhaven residents about their concerns, and noted, “Something that strikes me is that the way communities have traditionally looked at noise and have a noise limit with decibels, that tool wasn’t really designed for the type of noise that seems to be involved with wind turbines. Because it’s not really the decibels so much, and it’s not exactly a pure tone situation, and so we’re really trying as a society to figure out where that appropriate level is.”

Veno’s wife Aubyn noted that “When we were at the site, it sounded to me like airplanes flying overhead. But then we stopped at the bus driver’s house, who lived about three-quarters of a mile away, and got out of the bus and listened from there, and it sounded really just like ocean waves do in the distance from our house on the Vineyard.” (Ed. note: this confirms that the turbines are indeed audible, even at three-quarters of a mile; if your rural home does not, in fact, have ocean waves or a constant road noise in the distance, the turbines will be a new sonic presence.)

Nick  Puner, a former Westchester County planning member now living on Martha’s Vineyard, said, “The Vinalhaven turbines dominate the landscape, and they’re awesome. They’re not ugly, but they’re right on top of everything. I definitely think it’s a mixed bag.”  He also felt that the sound was very close to that of the background noise that day, though clearly audible: “I didn’t think it was that dramatic, but on the other hand, I don’t dismiss that somebody could be seriously upset by the constancy of it,” he said. “One person’s music is another person’s noise.”

Two of the “hot button” wind farms of 2010 are headed into the new year with continuing local rancor, despite conciliatory talk from authorities in each town when neighbors began to raise noise issues a year ago.

In Vinalhaven, Maine, where three turbines went online in October 2009, providing power for the local electric co-op, the State Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) has agreed with neighbors that the turbines are exceeding state noise limits at times (see this detailed Bangor Daily News article and this recent OpEd by a neighbor)

Fox Islands Windfarm, Vinalhaven (courtesy Bangor Daily News)

The DEP ruled that recordings paid for by local residents suggest the turbines are “likely to exceed” night time noise limits of 45dB when the wind speed is higher at the top of the turbines than the bottom; the recordings found noise levels up to 47dB.  George Baker, CEO of Fox Island Wind, the local LLC formed to build the turbines, notes that FIW’s noise consultant “absolutely doesn’t agree” with the finding, suggesting that ambient noise contributions to the overall sound mean that the turbines themselves are operating at just under the acceptable noise limit.  The DEP gave FIW until January to submit an operational plan that will slow the turbines when wind conditions match those during the recordings.

Baker contends that the conditions are rare, and occur only in summer.  However, many locals have reported Read the rest of this entry »

The State of Oregon has begun an assessment of possible health effects experienced by wind farm neighbors.  The state Public Health Division held “listening sessions” in three communities over the past few days, to hear from citizens.  “With any development, you start learning more about potential concerns as more people start experiencing it,” said Sajata Joshi, an epidemiologist for the state. “Our goal now is to hear what people have to say, and see if we can find solutions that work for communities and for the state’s goals.”

UPDATE: Check out this comprehensive article on the Oregon health impact assessments and wind turbine noise in general, published in early 2011.

While the Health Impact Assessment will “use the best available science to evaluate public health risks,” the Oregon process is also including anecdotal reports from neighbors, such as those received in these listening sessions.  A limitation of most previous state and industry-funded health impact reports has been that they considered only “direct, causal” impacts: that is, their focus was narrowed to studying previous research to address the narrow question of whether the sound levels being experienced can directly cause physiological symptoms to appear.  It is very likely that many of the reports of health problems, such as headaches, dizziness, and the like are indirect effects of sleep disruption or stress caused by moderate levels of audible wind farm noise at relatively close ranges, and it’s promising that Oregon is taking into account the actual experiences of wind farm neighbors who have been affected.

Jae Douglas, Oregon Public Health’s moderator, said the most frequent wind-farm concern she’s heard is about stress. Her office is charged with writing an assessment of any health impacts from turbines for consideration by the siting council, Oregon Department of Energy and county commissions — agencies that make the decisions on wind-energy projects. A draft will come in March and the final assessment in June.  You can stay current on the process at this Oregon DHS website.