Falmouth wind turbines vs Guantanamo torture techniques
How Much Sleep Deprivation Is Acceptable -None
Falmouth residents have lost sleep and property rights
The United States government used sleep deprivation in the U.S.-operated military Guantanamo Bay detention camp. Sleep deprivation is a very effective torture technique primarily used to break down the will of the detainee. Sleep deprivation causes impaired memory and cognitive functioning, decreased short term memory, speech impairment, hallucinations, psychosis, lowered immunity, headaches, high blood pressure, cardiovascular disease, stress, anxiety and depression.
Sleep deprivation is the major complaint from the wind turbine victims in Falmouth, Massachusetts and other communities with megawatt turbines placed in residential communities. Falmouth residents were made to file written certified noise complaints to the town in an effort to try and make the residents jump through hoops like a circus act in an effort to make them give up and go away.
Recently a letter dated August 3, 2010 from the manufacturer of the turbines Vestas wind company had warned the town prior to the installations of the megawatt turbines about noise. The turbines generate 110 decibels of noise or what is equal to a hard rock band playing outdoors. Falmouth officials had always known about the excessive noise yet acted like the wind turbine victims had wild imaginations and it was NIMBYism . Not In My Back Yard
Today we know how reckless Falmouth planning authorities allowed the town to site industrial-scale wind turbines in residential neighborhoods., The state and local health authorities ignored consistent reports of sleep deprivation from neighboring residents. Falmouth and other Massachusetts towns are violating fundamental human rights. Again according to the August 3, 2010 letter from Vestas town officials had known about the excessive noise long before any wind turbines were installed
Sleep deprivation at Guantanamo was authorized under the 2002 Department of Defense Memo in the form of 20 hour interrogations. The U.S. military authorized sleep deprivation for its prisoners for up to seventy two hours. Falmouth residents were subjected to two distinct types of noise 24 hours a day -7 days a week . The noise is regulatory and human annoyance or what today is called infra sound.
In 2014 no commercial megawatt turbines were built in Massachusetts despite a wind turbine renewable energy goal of 2000 megawatts of commercial wind by the year 2020.
Government agencies have admitted siting mistakes while the news media has been placed in an embarrassing position after reporting press releases from former Governor Patrick as if it was real news.
The question now whether those who ordered the wind turbines into residential neighborhoods will be held accountable.
NOISE from a school wind turbine likened to a helicopter continues to cause problems – more than a year after a fight to have it removed.
High winds yesterday led to more noise coming from the blades on the 20m turbine at Ysgol Rhos Helyg in Rhosesmor – just as youngsters tried to concentrate for important exams inside.
And one man living nearby said vibrations from the turbine in high winds is making things in his kitchen shake.
The latest problems come despite the blades on the turbine being changed last year in an attempt to cut the noise problem and more than a year after parents and residents petitioned for the turbine’s removal.
At that time school headteacher Gareth Roberts said the structure, which was installed by Flintshire Council, would be taken away if the noise persisted.
Yesterday parents voiced concerns about children at the school taking national curriculum exams being disturbed by the noise.
Flintshire Council staff say the new blades are less noisy than the old ones and Mr Roberts said there was no impact on pupils taking the tests, but parents said they did not know how their children would be able to concentrate.
Julia Weigh, 53, whose 11-year-old daughter is taking the tests, said: “The turbine is making a horrendous noise.
“It is ridiculous for them to be taking important tests with that racket going on.
“People aren’t going to let this lie. It has been up for a long time now and been dogged with problems.
“The headteacher promised it would be taken down if the problem persisted, but nothing has happened.”
Resident David Wright, who lives near the school, said: “The turbine howls a lot and the ground vibrates when the wind changes direction, causing things to shake in my kitchen.
“It shouldn’t have been put up this close to houses. I can’t imagine what the children in the school are thinking when they are trying to concentrate.
“It has never been quiet but it really comes alive when the wind gets up. I can’t sit outside and enjoy my garden because it makes such a racket.”
Deprive someone of a decent night’s sleep and the wheels start to fall off pretty quickly.
In the absence of quality sleep, it’s not long and people start suffering mood swings, impaired mental function, lose capacity for abstract thought and – if operating heavy machinery or driving – become a danger to workmates and/or fellow road users.
Depriving anyone of a decent night’s sleep is tantamount to cruel and unusual punishment; to inflict that punishment on people trying to sleep in their own homes is an invasion of their property rights; and, therefore, amounts to a form of theft, as well:
But stealing someone’s ability to get a solid 8 in the sack, has particular consequences for those who work with dangerous tools, machinery; or those who jump behind the wheel of a 60 tonne B-Double, and thunder off on days long treks, on Australia’s endless highways.
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Australian heavy vehicle drivers are all subject to very strict rules about the maximum time behind the wheel, rest intervals and sleep. The assumption is that if the driver is off the road, then he or she will be catching some ZZZs; and, thereafter, be refreshed for yet another 8 hour slog down the road, before taking another scheduled break. All of these common sense rules are aimed at road safety – the driver’s own, and every other road user. And fair enough, too.
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Farmers often jump behind the wheel of trucks in the wee-hours to get stock to markets or grain to silos; and spend endless hours on tractors during cropping activities. And there are a range of other dangerous activities that require a farmer to have their wits about them: operating post-hole diggers; and hanging onto a whirring handpiece while shearing or crutching a thumping big wether keen to avoid losing any part of its fibrous coat, to name a couple.
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So, to deprive this class of people of a decent night’s sleep creates a health and safety problem, with the potential for some very serious impacts.
Ron and Chris Jelbart are farmers who live next door to AGL’s Macarthur wind farm disaster in Western Victoria. Chris has detailed, in graphic terms, her suffering, caused by the incessant low-frequency noise and infrasound generated by 140 3MW Vestas V112s, since they kicked into operation in October 2012, in hundreds of complaints to AGL; and as set out in this letter to the local rag:
From: Chris JelbartSent: Tuesday, September 10, 2013 7:05 PM
To: editor@thestandard.net.au Subject: wind farm noise
Dear Sir,
I write in answer both to Nick Thies (Saturday letter), and to AGL (Tuesday Standard article). No-one who has not lived next to a wind farm can speak about the effects.
Multi-disciplinary scientific research has NOT been carried out. Any evidence is usually produced by groups or individuals who don’t want the truth known. Any evidence contrary to their views is ignored.
The extensive testing done by AGL by “independent” acoustic companies rely on parameters set by AGL so that full spectrum testing is not done. Sounds or noise that they don’t want are filtered out. Their testing could be compared with Collingwood being able to choose their own umpire on Saturday. I am sure the result would have been to Collingwood’s advantage.
The Senate recommended TWO years ago that research should be done, but nothing has happened. Now people surrounding the Macarthur Wind Energy Facility are suffering the consequences.
Why should we have to put up with disturbed and broken night’s sleep? Why should I have to hang over the sink dry-retching as I get lunch organised for the day? (I am 58 and not pregnant.) Why should my friends and neighbours suffer headaches, palpitations and head pressure? Why should families have to leave their homes to escape the effects of both audible and inaudible noise?
Not all people suffer from these problems. Some began experiencing symptoms immediately, for me it took at least 6 months. Others around the district are becoming more aware of problems as time goes on. It is NOT Simon Chapman’s nocebo effect. Some of those suffering believed we were talking utter nonsense 12 months ago.
We have to put up with the ridicule of people who live in their cities and towns with no clue of what is happening in our homes, expressing their disbelief at our suffering.
If AGL truly believes that their WEF at Macarthur is compliant, and not causing the distress that the surrounding residents are suffering, then it should encourage totally independent research to refute our suggestion to the contrary. Chris Jelbart Penshurst
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Ron, and their son, Peter recently gave evidence to the Senate Inquiry into the great wind power fraud at Portland (see our post here) – evidence of the kind described by Senator Bob Day as “harrowing”:
This is my submission in regard to the senate enquiry to wind farms.
My name is Peter Jelbart, I am 31 years old and grew up at our home property, where mum and dad farm to this day. It was a great place to grow up and my upbringing, although it was not perfect, was very good.
I remember as a young child dad working away shearing 5 days a week and farming on weekends, to hold onto the dream of farming grandpa’s block.
I remember them having to sell land up the road, and only just holding onto the home block. I remember as a primary school age kid feeding hay and grain to sheep after school, while dad was away for, at times, weeks.
I remember sheep being pitted and being told to play while the crack of 22 bullets rang out and truck load after truck load of sheep got dumped in a pit. This was in the early 90’s, wool was bad, land was worth nothing and interest rates were running into the 20% region.
However, as bad as things were at home mum and dad did everything they could for us. Obviously education was a priority, as was being involved with local football and cricket. The farm and home means everything to us. It is my parent’s life’s work, superannuation and life savings, all in one neat block of Western Victorian dirt.
From the age of 19 I moved to Port Fairy to play football and fell into work driving trucks, which I have loved from as early as I can remember. I lived in town for 3 years, and then moved to Portland for a year before ending up in Western Australia.
Since I started driving trucks I have been very focused on firstly building a career and secondly trying to work toward financial security. I have been quite successful at this early stage.
As I sit here writing this I am financially secure, happy and healthy. But there is a big problem. I am back at home after working away and the Macarthur Industrial Wind Turbines are driving me mad. I have had disrupted sleeps since day one of operation, but only when I stay at home. I am not neurotic or psychotic, I do not suffer from “The Nocebo Effect”, I have very disrupted sleep at home.
As a truck driver I have become used to sleeping in different environments. I have worked big hours in the past. I have slept beside busy highways often, and in Western Australia I regularly slept with an “Ice Pack” running, which is basically a diesel motor that runs a refrigerated air con unit and an alternator, which is used when the truck is parked, to cool the bunk. Initially these take a lot of getting used to. They are noisy and they cycle. They cut in and out but once I’m asleep they don’t worry me. I have become very aware of the way I sleep since I started to be disrupted by the Macarthur IWF.
My parent’s farm is within a couple of kilometres from the nearest tower, not that that means anything to you or to us, as we may as well have a tower on the back lawn.
From an aesthetic point of view they are unattractive. It is not this that that worries me. The Industrial Wind Turbines are not necessarily noisy, although they are audible most days. The problem is the sleep disruption, the inaudible noise and the “un-feelable” vibration.
We are suffering a very real and serious problem at home. Dad is suffering from severe sleep disruption; I have severely interrupted sleep, mixed with lucid dreams. I have been fortunate to spend most of my time away from home since the Macarthur IWTs started.
I have recently ended up living at home again and this has only reinforced what I already knew, that there is a serious problem coming from the emissions of the IWTs next door.
As a professional heavy vehicle driver I know about fatigue. I have sat through courses related to fatigue management yearly for the last ten years. I have worked big hours, illegal hours, and I know what tired is. I know what sleep is. I know the principals of circadian rhythms, how to handle shift work, what to eat, what to drink and what to avoid.
I also know that the sleep, or lack of, that happens at home, is completely foreign. It is not a problem with my head, my mind, my body, or anything else. It is a problem from being externally stimulated by the IWTs close to home. It is a combination of infrasound and low frequency noise. “Noise” that doesn’t get measured by planners, government, hosts or acousticians. “Noise” that doesn’t exist. “Noise” that is all in our heads. “Noise” that is completely denied by wind farm companies.
For years I have dreamed of running a truck of my own. Ideally I would use home as a base. This is no longer a viable option because of the sleep issue. How can I as a heavy vehicle driver, whose fatigue is measured in 15 minute intervals, with fines starting at $600 for minor breaches, work out of a place where I can’t sleep? What am I to do when I can’t turn up fit for duty, even if I spent 8 hours in bed?
Wind is a dirty industry, built on lies, mistruths and hypotheticals. It is an unsustainable industry. It will cost Australia dearly, not just now but into the future. We at home are merely political road kill. We don’t matter. As the great green con rolls on, our lives have been disrupted to a level unimaginable to almost all. Unless you personally experience the disruption, the sleepless nights, the constant battering, you don’t get it.
I have only touched on the most personal issue to me, the disrupted sleep. There are far more qualified people out there who will hopefully make submissions outlining the political and financial failings of wind farms. I can live in the shadows of a wind farm, I can put up with the industrialisation of the landscape. The thing I can’t handle is not being able to sleep at home.
My submission is to outline purely the fact there is a real and proper concern as far as sleep deprivation and sleep disturbance go as neighbours of a wind farm. I realise there are too many people investing too much money and I realise that politicians and policy makers don’t like knowing or admitting that they have been lied to, conned and bluffed by wind energy, and as such I doubt any real outcome will be achieved by this senate enquiry, although I thank anyone who holds real concern for us.
The only thing that I can realistically relate wind energy to is asbestos, and maybe tobacco. For how long have we heard the proponents claiming all the upsides with no side effects, at all, EVER!!
Wake up to the con, the lies, the bullshit, that is wind, before more disruption to good everyday people takes place. There is a reason a senate enquiry is taking place and it is about time some real answers were heard from people affected by wind farms.
Peter Jelbart Submission 270 Select Committee on Wind Turbines
Last month’s announcement by Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne that her province would link up with the existing Quebec and California carbon dioxide cap-and-trade systems prompted an editorial in this newspaper headlined, “Is this Green Energy Act Round Two?”
Ontario’s Green Energy Act offered so-called “feed-in rates” almost four times existing electricity rates for wind and more than 10 times for solar power. Like bees to honey, wind and solar companies rushed in. By the time the government realized that these subsidies were driving Ontario from one of the lowest to one of the highest power cost jurisdictions in North America, the province had signed myriad 20-year-locked-in-rate-guaranteed contracts that will drive power rates up a further 40 per cent to 50 per cent in coming years. Adding salt to this self-inflicted wound is the reality that much of the green power comes on stream when it isn’t needed. This unneeded electricity is dumped into the United States at bargain-basement prices that Ontario’s Auditor-General found has already cost Ontario power consumers billions of dollars, with much bigger losses yet to come before those 20-year contracts expire.
Given these disastrous results, one would think that Ms. Wynne and her cabinet colleagues would have carefully studied experience in other jurisdictions before implementing green policy two. The first and largest carbon cap-and-trade scheme is Europe’s 10-year-old system. As in Ontario, the story begins with huge subsidies for wind and solar power that drove up electricity prices precipitously. Cap-and-trade handed wind and solar power companies a second windfall by creating a “carbon trading market” that allowed them to sell “carbon offsets” from their low-emission projects.
On the other hand, many factories and industrial plants, already struggling with high power costs, found it more profitable to shut down and sell their carbon credit allocation in the carbon trading market. As a result, the bulk of Europe’s emissions reductions have been achieved by the departure of energy-intensive industries to overseas locations. Many of the products consumed by Europeans are now produced in countries without emissions limits, demonstrating the futility of imposing local carbon cap measures without global commitments. And since European industry was already among the world’s most energy efficient, the emissions embedded in most of those imported goods are higher than when the same goods were produced domestically.
Adding irony to this job-exporting fiasco, some European countries, including Germany, have implemented subsidies in an effort to keep the remnants of their industrial sector from shutting down. German electricity consumers paid some €20-billion ($27.2-billion) in green power subsidies last year, while at the same time their government spent billions of euros to help industrial plants survive the combination of high electricity and cap-and-trade costs that made them uncompetitive in the first place.
The Ontario announcement has promulgated a debate as to whether cap-and-trade is a tax. Clearly, for those having to buy carbon credits, it amounts to a tax. But for those who have credits to sell, it amounts to a subsidy.
But what most commenters have missed is that former premier Dalton McGuinty’s Green Energy Act created what is, for practical purposes, an indirect tax on energy consumers. Now comes Ms. Wynne’s equally ill-considered cap-and-trade tax. In mirror image to Europe’s green-power-driven levy on electricity consumers followed by cap-and-trade, Ontario’s ill-considered green scheme No. 2 could strike the final blow that drives industry elsewhere.
This leaves the question as to why Quebec so warmly welcomed Ontario’s decision to join its cap-and-trade system. Quebec’s electricity comes almost entirely from cheap, emissions-free hydropower, mitigating much of the competitive impact of cap-and-trade. Quebec has just announced a massive expansion of its hydropower capacity and is looking for markets. The net effect of signing Ontario onto its cap-and-trade system may well be the export of jobs from Ontario to Quebec businesses and the export of electricity from Quebec to Ontario consumers, along with the added bonus of selling carbon credits to Ontario businesses unable to meet cap-and-trade targets.
Ontario generates just 0.5 per cent of global carbon emissions. Even a giant 20-per-cent reduction would knock just a tenth of 1 per cent off global emissions. A minuscule gain for the globe, at a potentially enormous cost to the people of Ontario, and all Canadians.
Gwyn Morgan is a retired Canadian business leader who has been a director of five global corporations
It called its new public relations model “Act on Facts” – we covered some of their “facts” in this post.
Well, as is often the case, the facts eventually surface; and, when they do, the ‘unhelpful’ ones have a nasty habit of working against those that, like Vestas, have worked hardest to suppress them:
Danes complain about precisely the same effects from the incessant turbine generated low-frequency noise and infrasound that Vestas’ victims at Macarthur in Victoria do (see our posts here and here).
And the Danes’ complaints have seen victims awarded substantial compensation for the sonic torture being inflicted unnecessarily and endlessly by Vestas & Co:
Danish wind power outfits have had to concede that human beings and giant fans simply don’t mix, and have taken to buying up huge numbers of homes, and even whole villages; bulldozing them in order to carpet the entire country in their blade-chucking, pyrotechnic, sonic torture devices:
Now, the Danish government has gone into legal liability damage control by refusing to issue any further permits for wind farms. Here’s NoTrickZone on the Danes’ latest lament.
Under Fire Due To Health Impacts From Infrasound … Danish Permitting Halts!
NoTricksZone P Gosselin
21 April 2015
Beleaguered Industry: Wind Parks Coming Under Fire Due To Health Impacts From Infrasound … Danish Permitting Halts!
The debate on the effects of infrasound on the health of people and animals living near wind parks has been raging on with more intensity than ever – especially since Denmark unexpectedly halted the permitting of new wind parks due to “health concerns” from infrasound.
Infrasound is defined as low frequency sound under 16 Hz – below the threshold of human hearing. Wind farms are notorious for generating these potentially harmful sub-audible frequencies. It is said that infrasound can be sensed as pressure to the ears or to the stomach, or as a slight vibration.
There’s a Swedish report available on the hazard, click here. It calls for the legal framework for the creation of wind parks to be revised.
German NTV public television reports recently that in Denmark mink farm operator Kaj Bank Olesen from Herning is a neighbor to four large-scale wind turbines only 330 meters away. Olesen and other neighbors had protested the planning of the wind turbines, fearing negative consequences from their noise and shadows.
However the community rejected their claims, basing it on a lack of credibility. The turbines were installed. Now it seems that Olesen’s earlier fears may have had merit as he claims that the infrasound generated by the turbines are making the mink animals on the farm aggressive and is leading them to die. After one night he found 200 dead minks the next morning. The incident has since sparked the Danish government to take action. Permitting of wind parks in Denmark is now on hold.
In Schleswig Holstein, Germany, the Hogeveens have been forced to sleep and eat in their basement in a desperate attempt to find refuge from the maddening infrasound emitted by recently installed turbines near their home.
The wind industry and many government authorities deny there’s a connection between infrasound from wind turbines and health impacts on humans. Hermann Albers of a wind lobby group says there’s no connection between the turbines and the irritation sensed by those living close by, claiming that it is a “subjective” perception or that it’s “politically motivated”. In other words, people living close to wind turbines are just making it all up and they should instead just shut up and live with it.
The German government says it will study the matter further and consider if infrasound should be taken into consideration during the wind park permitting process.
In Australia a link has also been found between wind turbines and health in the so-called Cape Bridgewater report. Steven Cooper investigated the possible link, saying that availbale data so far is very small, but adds:
“There’s definitely a trend. There’s definitely a connection between the operation of a wind farm and what the residents were identifying as disturbances, and so it’s definitely open to debate as to what the cause or link is in terms of that data.”
Data from comprehensive studies are difficult to come by. Wind farms are reluctant to share their data with researchers, fearing unfavorable results and consequences.
The impacts from infrasound on human health will continue to be debated in the future. But other things are already sure and beyond debate: Wind farms are rapidly losing their attractiveness and support from the public due to their poor performance, hazard to birdlife, ruining of property values, and their blighting of the natural landscape.
An adverse connection to human health would be yet another large nail in the coffin of the now increasingly controversial wind industry.
In the piece above it’s said that “Permitting of wind parks in Denmark is now on hold“.
STT’s Danish operatives have confirmed that that is, indeed, the case. Not that you’ll read about in the Australian press; or see or hear it on your ABC.
Governments – Federal, State and Local – around the world are getting jumpy about their legal liability to their citizens, for having set up planning laws so lax as to be risible and/or for manifestly failing to enforce even those derisory rules. Moreover, the very existence of the wind industry is the direct result of massive subsidies and/or mandated government targets, fines and penalties, so governments are in it up to their necks; and can’t possibly hope to get out of trouble by pulling the Sergeant Schultz defence:
In liability terms, governments that continue to allow turbines to be speared into peoples’ backyards, or which fail to shut them down wherever neighbours can’t sleep, are sitting ducks as defendants in negligence actions. The evidence of harm and personal injury is clear enough; and those in power can no longer claim to be unaware of it (seeour post here).
Having set themselves up for compensation claims that will run into the hundreds of $millions, governments (and their insurers) are keen to limit their exposure by pointing to others: for example, wind power outfits and their pet acoustic consultants who claimed the noise standards they wrote were the gold-standard in protecting public health (see our post here). Or, in the case of Brown County, Wisconsin making it clear that it’s not game to rely on the lies pitched up the wind industry’s mercenary acoustics acolytes by coming out publicly:
“To declare the Industrial Wind Turbines in the Town of Glenmore, Brown County. WI. a Human Health Hazard for all people (residents, workers, visitors, and sensitive passersby) who are exposed to Infrasound/Low Frequency Noise and other emissions potentially harmful to human health.” (see our post here)
Now, it seems that the Danish government is also out to draw a line between it and the wind industry; if only in an attempt to quarantine its liability to thousands of its victims.
Prior to Wind Turbine Installations Falmouth had the Octave Band Data / Sound performance for the V82 turbine
Falmouth Wind Turbines & RICO Act
Did the Town of Falmouth violate the RICO Act ? They all knew the turbines would break state noise laws !
The Commonwealth of Massachusetts
Department of Environmental Protection (DEP)
Noise Control Regulation 310 CMR 7.10
310 CMR 7.10 Noise
(1) No person owning, leasing, or controlling a source of sound shall willfully, negligently, or through failure to provide necessary equipment, service, or maintenance or to take necessary precautions cause, suffer, allow, or permit unnecessary emissions from said source of sound that may cause noise.
Prior to the installations of the Falmouth wind turbines it appears Vestas Wind Company forewarned the Town of Falmouth, Town of Falmouth contract engineers and construction contractors. The manufacturer ( Vestas )also needs confirmation that the Town of
Falmouth understands they are fully responsible for the site selection of the turbine and bear all responsibilities to address any mitigation needs of the neighbors.
The turbines operated full time until May of 2012. State officials shut down the wind turbine in Falmouth after measurements showed the machine generating more than 10 decibels above ordinary background noise.
The turbines operate 12 hours a day during daylight now and are shut off on Sunday
Passed in 1970, the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) is a federal law designed to combat organized crime in the United States. It allows prosecution and civil penalties for racketeering activity performed as part of an ongoing criminal enterprise.
To convict a defendant under RICO, the government must prove that the defendant engaged in two or more instances of racketeering activity and that the defendant directly invested in, maintained an interest in, or participated in a criminal enterprise affecting interstate or foreign commerce.
Political Corruption
Politicians :
. UNITED STATES V. CIANCI
Providence Rhode Island
For twenty-one years, from 1975-1984 and from 1991-2002, Vincent A. “Buddy” Cianci was the mayor of Providence, Rhode Island.
Ultimately, Cianci was only convicted of one RICO conspiracy count.
The First Circuit notes—for a RICO conspiracy conviction, a defendant simply “must intend to further an endeavor which, if completed, would satisfy all of the elements of a substantive criminal offense, but it suffices that he adopted the goal of furthering or facilitating the criminal endeavor.”
Buddy Cianci was therefore found guilty of a §1962(d) RICO conspiracy violation and sentenced to five years and four months in prison.
Falmouth noise letter recently released through a Freedom of Information Request
August 3, 2010
Mr. Gerald Potamis
WasteWater Superintendent
Town of Falmouth Public Works
59 Town Hall Square
Falmouth, MA 02540
RE: Falmouth WWTF Wind Energy Facility II “Wind II”, Falmouth, MA
Contract No. #3297
Dear Mr. Potamis,
Due to the sound concerns regarding the first wind turbine installed at the wastewater treatment facility, the manufacturer of the turbines, Vestas, is keen for the Town of Falmouth to understand the possible noise and other risks associated with the installation of the second wind turbine.
The Town has previously been provided with the Octave Band Data / Sound performance for the V82 turbine. This shows that the turbine normally operates at 103.2dB but the manufacturer has also stated that it may produce up to 110dB under certain circumstances. These measurements are based on IEC standards for sound measurement which is calculated at a height of 10m above of the base of the turbine.
We understand that a sound study is being performed to determine what, if any, Impacts the second turbine will have to the nearest residences. Please be advised that should noise concerns arise with this turbine, the only option to mitigate normal operating sound from the V82 is to shut down the machine at certain wind speeds and directions. Naturally this would detrimentally affect power production.
The manufacturer also needs confirmation that the Town of Falmouth understands they are fully responsible for the site selection of the turbine and bear all responsibilities to address any mitigation needs of the neighbors.
Finally, the manufacturer has raised the possibility of ice throw concerns. Since Route 28 is relatively close to the turbine, precautions should be taken in weather that may cause icing.
To date on this project we have been unable to move forward with signing the contract with Vestas. The inability to release the turbine for shipment to the project site has caused significant [SIC] delays in our project schedule. In order to move forward the manufacturer requires your understanding and acknowledgement of these risks. We kindly request for this acknowledgement to be sent to us by August 4, 2010, as we have scheduled a coordination meeting with Vestas to discuss the project schedule and steps forward for completion of the project.
Please sign in the space provided below to indicate your understanding and acknowledgement of this letter. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to call me.
Sincerely,
(Bruce Mabbott’s signature) _____________________
Bruce Mabbott Gerald Potamis
Project Manager Town of Falmouth
CC: Sumul Shah, Lumus Construction, Inc.
(Town of Falmouth’s Wind-1 and Wind-2 Construction contractor)
Stephen Wiehe, Weston & Sampson
(Town of Falmouth’s contract engineers)
Brian Hopkins, Vestas
(Wind-1, Wind-2’s turbine manufacturer, and also Webb/NOTUS turbine)
STT likes to go in hard, call it early and keep on backing it up. Sure we descend to colourful language, and polish it off with a healthy smear of good old-fashioned sarcasm. But the idiom and imagery we use sits atop a pile of festering wind industry generated lies, deception and common garden variety fraud.
Back in January this year, we likened Steven Cooper’s groundbreaking acoustic study into the harm caused by Pac Hydro’s Cape Bridgewater wind farm disaster, to the detonation of a small, but effective, nuclear device:
Earlier this week, a small, but very effective, nuclear device was detonated at Cape Bridewater, which – before Union Super Funds backed Pacific Hydro destroyed it – was a pristine, coastal idyll in South-Western Victoria.
The bomb that went off was a study carried out by one of Australia’s crack acoustic specialists, Steven Cooper – and some typically solid journalism from The Australian’s Graham Lloyd – that put the Pac Hydro initiated pyrotechnics in the International spotlight.
Over the next few posts, STT will analyse just what the detonation, its aftermath and fallout means for an industry which, in Australia, is already on the ropes.
And we’ll look at what it means to the thousands of wind farm victims here – and around the world.
Three months on, and we don’t shy away from any of that. Oh no. If anything likening events at Cape Bridgewater to the wind industry’s very own Hiroshima, was mastery in understatement.
You see, Cooper’s work became the central focus of day one of the Senate Inquiry into the great wind power fraud – which kicked off on 30 March, at Portland, Victoria; right next to Cape Bridgewater.
Not only did Cooper impress the Senators (save Anne Urquhaut – a wind industry apologist and mouthpiece for Friends of the Earth’s propaganda parrot, Leigh Ewbank), the subjects of Cooper’s study gave evidence to the Committee in camera (privately); and a number of the Senators (save Urquhaut, of course) visited them in their homes the night before the hearing. A number of other wind farm victims laid out the suffering they’ve been forced to endure by wind farm operators, like AGL at Glenthompson and Macarthur, as well.
From what STT hears, to say that the Senators were “moved” is to put it mildly.
The gut-wrenching evidence of the symptoms and sensations experienced by these people and caused by incessant turbine generated low-frequency noise, infrasound and vibration, left a group of seasoned political performers and parliamentary knuckle men, including libertarian tough-nut, David Leyonhjelm, with watery eyes and lumpy throats.
And, so it was, that South Australian Senator, Bob Day came to describe their evidence as “harrowing”: thankfully, not a word that gets much of a run these days; but, given the gravity of the harm being caused, and the genuineness and obvious sincerity of the victims, one that’s right on the money.
The real significance of the day was not only what Day had to say, but that he, and the other Senators on the Committee, including David Leyonhjelm from NSW and Matt Canavan from Queensland have had their eyes opened to the scale of the wind power fraud; and the entirely unnecessary suffering it continues to cause.
These boys have uniformly stiffened their opposition to the wind industry; and have joined forces to call for a halt to the greatest rort of all time.
‘Wait for wind inquiry before changing RET’: Bob Day
The Australian
Rosie Lewis
22 April 2015
Family First senator Bob Day has asked Tony Abbott and Industry Minister Ian Macfarlane to delay a vote to change the Renewable Energy Target for six months, until the conclusion of a Senate inquiry into wind turbines.
Any lengthy delay to the scheme is likely to frustrate the renewables sector and energy intensive businesses, which have urged the Prime Minister to end the RET stalemate.
Senator Day said he had heard “harrowing” evidence about the impact of wind turbines on humans and animals during the inquiry’s first hearing last month and wanted to know all the “facts and figures” before a RET deal was reached. “I think it’s not unreasonable to ask that we don’t come to any agreement on the Renewable Energy Target until such time that we get to the bottom of this,” he said.
“I’m not talking about ending the RET, I’m just talking about ‘let’s defer the decision on it’. Nothing’s going to happen in the next six months anyway. It’s more important to do this right than do this quick.”
Labor has backed a compromise from the Clean Energy Council, which would cut the large-scale RET from 41,000-GWh by 2020 to 33,500GWh, but the government’s final offer remains at 32,000GWh.
Without support from Labor or the Greens the government needs six crossbench votes to see legislation pass the Senate.
Liberal Democrat senator David Leyonhjelm, who is also on the wind turbine committee, said he had given the government’s RET offer conditional support.
Senator Leyonhjelm said he was much more likely to support the government’s target if there was less of a “big leg up” to the wind power industry.
“Ian Macfarlane is doing the rounds in an effort to get six votes,” he said. “I think he probably will get six votes. (The government) will have my vote, with conditions. I’m not a fan of wind turbines, they are killing birds and they are also making some people sick.
“My support for 32,000GWh relates to not giving a particularly big leg up to wind and giving more scope for other sources.” The Australian
Bob Day followed up with this letter to The Australian on 27 April 2015.
No rush on RET
Because I have asked Industry Minister Ian Mcfarlane and the Prime Minister to defer a vote on the Renewable Energy Target until a Senate inquiry into wind turbines has handed down its report, Kane Thornton of the Clean Energy Council tells me I have little regard for the many thousands of people whose jobs are at risk every day this review remains unresolved.
This inquiry held its first hearing on March 30 and heard evidence about the adverse effects of wind turbines on humans and animals. The evidence was compelling. There was also evidence on the efficacy of wind turbines to reduce carbon dioxide given the amount of the gas required to manufacture and install them.
Since that hearing, information has been provided regarding reports from the 1980s about the adverse effects of wind turbines. The enquiry is keen to understand what wind turbine owners know, and how long they have known it.
The inquiry hands down its report in August. Given the seriousness of the evidence so far, I do not think it unreasonable to request deferring a vote on the RET until then. Bob Day, Senator for South Australia
The claim by the CEC’s head spruiker, Kane Thornton that “thousands of jobs are at risk” is utter bunkum.
It’s the installation of domestic rooftop solar that’s created the thousands of jobs he’s referring to; and none of them are under threat. No-one is out to scrap the Small-Scale Renewable Scheme (SRES) – which provides the subsidies for rooftop solar – it’s got plenty of backers and – unlike the wind industry – no sworn enemies.
Contrary to the CEC’s wailing, there are no wind industry jobs under threat. Construction activity has ground to a standstill, simply because retailers stopped entering Power Purchase Agreements over 2½ years ago, in November 2012, long before the RET Review kicked off in April 2014 (see our post here).
In the absence of PPAs, wind power outfits have been unable to obtain finance to sling up any new fans. And it’s that fact that means that there are no construction jobs under threat – jobs which are fleeting, in any event. And the handful of wind industry jobs that have any permanence – such as changing oil, replacing generators and blades etc – are under no threat at all from the RET Review. No the CEC’s “case” is all about conflating domestic solar and industrial wind power, when they have absolutely nothing in common – in its efforts to ensure the LRET remains untouched, the wind industry has been using the domestic solar business as a kind of political “human shield”:
As to the claims about the LRET creating thousands of “groovy green” jobs, to debunk that myth you need look no further than Germany, where its insane rush into wind power has seen major energy intensive industries head to the USA to avoid rocketing power prices, while at the same time the millions of so-called “green” jobs, promised by the wind industry there, simply failed to materialise:
So, Bob Day needn’t worry too much about the CEC’s last ditch attempts to save the LRET; and to avoid the unavoidable: the wind industry is on its last legs, and the CEC knows it.
Matt Canavan – who hails from Rockhampton in Queensland, and was another on the Senate Inquiry Committee whose eyes and ears were opened at Portland – has now taken a keen interest in the disaster planned by one of Queensland’s cheesy “white-shoe brigade” for the pristine, tropical wilderness of Mt Emerald, on the Atherton Tablelands:
STT’s covered the politically stinky relationships and wheel greasing that’s gone on behind closed 5 Star Resort doors in the developer’s efforts to side-step the obstacle to his plans to wallow in the REC Subsidy trough, created by a thousand or so dedicated pro-farming and pro-community advocates:
SENATOR REQUESTS DELAY TO DECISION ON MT EMERALD WIND FARM
Media Release
23 April 2015
Senator Matt Canavan has requested the Queensland Government to delay making a final decision on the Mt Emerald wind farm proposal west of Cairns.
This follows a decision by a Senate committee inquiring into wind turbines to hold a public hearing in Cairns on May 18.
Senator Canavan is a member of the Committee and has written to Deputy Premier Jackie Trad requesting a decision on the Mt Emerald proposal be deferred until after the Cairns hearing.
“One of the purposes of the Committee’s hearing in Cairns will be to hear from the local community, and the proponent, about the proposed wind farm at Mt Emerald,” Senator Canavan said. “My understanding is that the Queensland Government is currently considering whether to approve this project.”
“In the interests of wide stakeholder consultation and best-practice policy-making principles, I have requested that the Queensland Government delay making a final decision on the Mt Emerald proposal until it has the opportunity to hear the evidence presented to the Senate Committee.”
“Previous hearings have heard compelling evidence from residents living close to wind turbines about their impact on residents’ health and wellbeing. Unlike other States, Queensland has no specific regulatory guidelines on the minimum distance turbines can be from a place of residence.
“Parliamentary committees provide witnesses with a range of protections. As a result, the evidence provided at this public hearing may add to the statements made at other public consultations that the Queensland Government has already conducted in regards to the Mt Emerald wind turbines proposal.”
Senator Canavan said the Senate Select Committee on Wind Turbines confirmed on Wednesday that it will conduct a public hearing in Cairns on May 18. The Committee is tasked with inquiring into and reporting on the application of regulatory governance and economic impact of wind turbines. Senator Matt Canavan
Despite Matt’s more than reasonable call for a little public health prudence, Labor wind industry shill, Jackie Trad went ahead and gave planning approval, in accordance with the Labor Party/Union Super Fund business model.
Were Trad to have canned the project, it would have cut across Labor’s cash cow, by further threatening the Ponzi scheme in which Labor/Union heavy owned and (badly) run outfits, like Pac Hydro are well ensconced. In a cunning move, Trad’s press release giving the disaster the nod, was slipped out on Anzac Day, so that there would be no way the media would give it any oxygen at all.
STT thinks that it’s no surprise that the Senators on the wind farm Inquiry Committee have turned sharply against the great wind power fraud. And, with Jackie Trad’s sly little move at Mt Emerald, we expect Matt Canavan will come back swinging just that little bit harder.
Human beings, possessed of a modicum of empathy and decency, generally don’t like to sit back and watch the common law rights of hard-working people to live in, use and enjoy their homes get steam-rolled. And much less so, when there’s no justification at all for the harm and suffering being endured by the wind industry’s victims – which it regards as “road-kill” – and which the mock-medicos that spruik for it sneeringly call “wind farm wing-nuts“.
However, as we’ve pointed out before, the endless lies tossed up by the wind industry and its parasites just don’t wash anymore. These days, people are becoming switched on to the fraud; and angry for having been taken for gullible dupes.
Once reasonable people are introduced to the facts about the insane costs of intermittent and unreliable wind power they cease to support it.
When they learn of the senseless slaughter of millions of birds and bats, and the tragic suffering caused to hard working rural people by giant fans, reasonable people start to bristle.
But when they learn that – contrary to the ONLY “justification” for the$billions filched from power consumer and taxpayers and directed as perpetual subsidies to wind power outfits – wind power INCREASES CO2 emissions in the electricity sector – rather than decreasing them, as claimed – their attitude stiffens to the point of hostility to those behind the fraud and those hell-bent on sustaining it.
In our travels we’ve met plenty of people that started out in favour of wind power and turned against it. But we’ve yet to meet anyone who started out opposed to wind power, who later became a supporter. Funny about that.
Present the facts to reasonable people – and they’ll want to know how the scam got started in the first place, and why it hasn’t been stopped in its tracks already?
Watching the Senators on the Inquiry arriving at that point, provides STT with more than just a little encouragement: from here-on, the wind industry hasn’t got a hope in hell of convincing them as to any part of its pitch.
As seminal mod-rockers, The Who, wailed in 1971, STT thinks it’s a case of we Won’t Get Fooled Again:
Glen Brand’s recent Earth Day OpEd and his passionate embrace of renewables fails to address the big problems associated with grid-scale wind and solar. Neither are dispatchable on demand, and their intermittent energy production cannot be stored, which means traditional power plants must be kept running to back them up.
Grid-scale solar installations don’t take into consideration the massive amounts of heat being generated by acres of black panels blanketing the earth, heat intense enough to incinerate birds flying overhead. The sprawling industrial wind “farms” being constructed along Maine’s mountains and ridge lines do not address the ecological and environmental impacts of blasting and road building at high elevations, clear cutting of forests, spraying of herbicides, building of large transmission corridors from remote mountain locations and the loss of critical habitat for our winged friends.
Three hundred miles of 500-foot tall blinking turbines stretching from north to south will impact 12,000 square miles of scenic viewsheds, which represent priceless economic assets in a state that relies on tourism as its biggest industry. Government-subsidized, grid-scale wind and solar do not pass the real cost-benefit analysis, and worse they siphon much needed funds away from finding truly clean solutions for a power-hungry planet.
Our energy policies should be based on science, not symbolism.
Open letter on wind turbine noise and action
in response to this letter
Dear decision-makers, politicians, Members of the EU Parliament, EU-Commission and other responsible public officials,
1) 29th April, 2015 is the 20th anniversary of International Noise Awareness Day, so we would like to warn you about the dangers of wind turbine infrasound and low frequency noise (ILFN) which have been largely and intentionally ignored by the global wind industry, politicians and even health authorities. Worldwide the wind industry has been trying to force their wind turbines (WT) as close to people’s homes as possible, for the sake of profit but at the expense of the health of the local residents, by deliberately ignoring the known sleep disturbance and serious health problems caused directly by impulsive wind turbine ILFN. Government authorities have been complicit in ignoring the existing scientific evidence, and the harm.
2) We therefore request you do your own due diligence on this issue, and investigate for yourself. There is an abundance of acoustic, scientific and clinical information independent of wind industry influence at websites such as epaw.org;na-paw.org; waubrafoundation.org.au and scientific evidence found there, and books as Wind Turbine Syndrome by a medical doctor Dr. Nina Pierpont, MD PhD, 2009 (see also: windturbinesyndrome.com) and The Wind Farm Scam by a Reader in Ecology at the University of Wales Dr. John Etherington, 2009).
3) The facts are that wind turbine noise: audible (low frequency noise LFN – under 200 Hz) and inaudible, but sensed very much (infrasound– under 20 Hz) results in serious adverse health effects, and is extremely dangerous to human health. Direct causation of symptoms and sensations from wind turbine generated impulsive infrasound and low frequency noise was established by US scientist Dr Neil Kelley in the 1980’s. More recently Steven Cooper’s work in Australia at Cape Bridgewater for wind developer Pacific Hydro has confirmed many aspects of Kelley’s research thirty years earlier.
4) The lifetime span of wind-turbines is from 20 up to 25 years and there are another 25 years to be expected with new turbines at the same place, therefore there is no escape from them for people in their lifetime. People are mostly exposed to pulsating infrasound. These pulses arise as the wind turbine blades pass the pillar.
5) Therefore we firmly demand that you, as one of the decision-makers:
5.1. Start considering the scientific evidence on the dangers of wind turbine noise, which go back as far as 30 years (NASA study, others and a historical overview on the wind turbine noise). These studies have shown that especially infrasound penetrates through closed windows and walls, and even resonates and amplifies within rooms to cause even stronger effects (cdn.knightlab.com ),
5.2. Stop ignoring so many people all over the world crying for help and even leaving their homes due to the wind turbine noise (for example: epaw.org; na-paw.org),
5.3. Recognize that wind farms are one of the worst night time noise pollutants of today and that prolonged sleep deprivation is also considered to be a method of torture by the ‘’The UN Committee against Torture (CAT),
5.4. Recognize what the wind industry does not want the general public and responsible public officials to learn, that there is much evidence on infra- and LFN wind turbine noise including the facts that:
– More megawatts produced by more powerful wind turbines means a greater proportion of infrasound and low frequency noise is generated,
– Infrasound is known to travel very, very long distances,
– Noise-pollution by wind power developments with many wind turbines is much, much stronger than one with only wind turbine, although serious health damage can occur from just one wind turbine if it is too close to homes and workplaces,
– Infrasound from wind turbines on hills will travel greater distances,
– Stronger winds, higher air moisture, lower background noise in rural areas, temperature inversion, etc., can mean greater adverse impacts from relatively higher levels of infra- and LFN noise pollution,
– No current models exist which accurately predict real wind farm infrasound and low frequency noise pollution,
– Children, older people, pregnant women are especially sensitive and threatened,
– Safe setback distances for different sized wind turbines in different terrain have NOT yet been established and demonstrated to protect the surrounding population.
– Change the current noise measurements to full spectrum measurement inside homes and recognize that A-Weighted Sound Level (dBA) is inappropriate and unsafe because it does not include low-frequency noise and infrasound,
– Stop the use of dBA for wind turbine noise assessments immediately,
– Stop the wind power subsidies immediately.
We look forward to hearing from you soon. Thank you in advance.
Yours faithfully,
Jean -Louis Butré
European Platform Against Wind Farms
EPAW : 877 organisations from 24 European Countries
President 3 rue des eaux Paris 75016 France contact@epaw.org www.epaw.org
+33 6 80 99 38 08
Sherri Lange
North American Platform Against Wind Power
NA-PAW, USA-Canada : 106 organisations
CEO 416-567-5115 kodaisl@rogers.com www.na-paw.org
Sarah Laurie
WAUBRA FOUNDATION
The Waubra Foundation is a national Australian organisation formed to facilitate properly conducted, independent multidisciplinary research into the new health problems identified by residents living near wind turbines
BMBS CEO PO Box 7112 Banyule VIC 3084 AUSTRALIA +61 474 050 463 sarah@waubrafoundation.org.au
www.waubrafoundation.org.au/
Thursday night, Ms Sturgeon on the TV looking relaxed in her home, life is good… Now, in the words o the great Max Bygraves.. “Let me tell you a story”… Most people on here know me, some don’t, some girls need a lot o loving an some girls don’t… Naw, only kidding (could not help it)… Having (this is the real story by the way) been up for several nights due to this horrendous noise and it’s effects, I stupidly pleaded with Ms Sturgeon to do something about WLC and NLC, things were pretty bad and the question had to be asked “are these turbines worth more than my sanity and my life”..? My response from Ms Sturgeon was sending two police officers to my door to check on my well being, when they realised I wanted to discuss why I’m being kept awake they did not want to know so said ” thanks very much and tried to close the door which they kicked open, handcuffed me and held me by my throat saying I was mentally ill and frogmarched me into a van and yes they said they had been contacted by Ms Sturgeons office… Well, I was taken to St Johns hospital where I was mentally assessed, they asked me why I had not slept and was contacting various organisations about wind turbines, I told them what I know as I have discussed with many of you here, they brought a guy in from WLC mental health who asked me (an this’ll crack ye up as it did me) “what do the turbines say to you”… Well you can imagine my response, I explained it’s a humming and that it was now widely known that the LFN does indeed effect certain people and does not effect others, I was then deemed “fixed delusional”, I was immediately seized and given certain drugs against my will, this was done first orally then by syringes thrust into my legs through my clothes, put in a wheelchair carted backwards to a secure mental health ward where I have been for over a week now, if you think that these places have changed since “one flew over the cuckoo’s nest” then be rest assured they ain’t…!!! Earlier today I had a top consultant come to see me and having had her assistant look into this “noise”, I was released with immediate effect, she said I should not have been put there as everything I said was indeed true.. The mental health order revoked, the whole time apart from when they forced me into the ward I had no drugs apart from painkillers due to the injuries inflicted by so called nurses… This is the length these people will go to to silence we sufferers of this god forsaken noise, I will continue this fight regardless of this blatant abuse of my civil liberties, let this story be told and never give in….
"Mothers Against Wind Turbines™" Phoenix Rising... 