5 ms·

> Wind produces noise Don't live in the middle of a grain field surrounding a wind turbine then. Seriously, I live around tons of these and you can't hear it u

> Wind produces noise Don't live in the middle of a grain field surrounding a wind turbine then. Seriously, I live around tons of these and you can't hear it until you get near and they're almost always in the middle a field or between several fields, so you can't really get near. Are there louder ones in different countries that can be heard further away or something?

sschueller 5y ago
Noise doesn't only affect humans.
- elric 5y ago
  Funny how people are suddenly concerned with other species when a wind turbine is placed near their home. But when an out-of-sight coal plant belches out tons of pollutants which affect thousands of species, that concern seems to vanish. Quaint.
  - Smithalicious 5y ago
    The discussion is comparing solar to wind, nobody is suggesting coal as an alternative, so this complaint seems out of place.
    - elric 5y ago
      Not really. It's an observation on human nature. It's about how certain problems are only problems when they fit a narrative, and can be conveniently ignored otherwise. It seems like the toxicity of solar panel production is also conveniently being ignored, or how much water it requires. Certainly less than coal, but more than wind turbines.
      - mensetmanusman 5y ago
        It’s less water over the life of the product though.
- guerrilla 5y ago
  Well, let me know when you have a study showing how the mice and vipers in those fields are affected.
  - DocTomoe 5y ago
    Well, there is a DLR (essentially Germany's NASA) study about the effect of wind turbines on insects [1]. It's not pretty. Neither is the study on the effect on birds [2] by NABU, one of our "Sierra Club"-style organisations. [1] https://www.dlr.de/content/en/articles/news/2019/01/20190326_dlr-studies-interactions-flying-insects-wind-farms.html https://www.dlr.de/content/en/articles/news/2019/01/20190326... links to an English-language interview. [2] https://bergenhusen.nabu.de/imperia/md/nabu/images/nabu/einrichtungen/bergenhusen/projekte/windenergie/impact_of_repowering.pdf https://bergenhusen.nabu.de/imperia/md/nabu/images/nabu/einr...
    - cinntaile 5y ago
      It's not pretty is not what the research concluded. "From the currently available figures and the DLR model calculation, we cannot conclude either that wind energy plays a significant role in the reduction of insect numbers, or that it has no impact. " Needs more research.
    - guerrilla 5y ago
      There's no mention of sound or noise in either one of those.
      - DocTomoe 5y ago
        The insect study focusses on getting hit by the turbine wing, that's right. The bird study only talks about effects, without specifying effects, and takes note about bird-specific things like "avoidance distance", which is linked to - among other factors - noise. Tbh: it does feel like you are moving goalposts because the studies do not show what you'd like them to show, that wind energy is green and ecologically friendly. We see that a lot.
marmarama 5y ago
No. I live near a large onshore wind farm with 2.5MW wind turbines and go walking near them regularly. They are inaudible from more than 200m away.
- DocTomoe 5y ago
  Could that be related to other maritime noises, like waves or seagulls? I walk through one of these eyesore fields regularly, and I can hear them easily from 200m away.
  - pas 5y ago
    I like the wind farm views. It's very subjective of course. Though most people don't like change, and since old power generating stations were high density (eg. a coal plant, just a big building and a smokestack) the new low-density things are naturally running into this change resistance.
SuoDuanDao 5y ago
Some people seem to develop an allergy to the frequency, the way some people are sensitive to MSG or Gluten while others are unharmed. There haven't been many studies that I'm aware of but I've met enough people who reported these symptoms that I don't think they're making things up.
- guerrilla 5y ago
  Is there evidence that that is a real thing opposed to completely made up nonsense like many other "sensitivities" [1] that are popular right now? Real question; I'm not qualified to know the difference. 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electromagnetic_hypersensitivity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electromagnetic_hypersensitivi...
  - hannob 5y ago
    No, it's a classic nocebo. There recently was a bit of a scandal in Germany because for years a major government authority has reported levels of "infrasound" from wind turbines far above what was physically plausible. A lot of the fearmongering relied on those numbers - yet it turned out they were due to a calculation error.
  - SuoDuanDao 5y ago
    It's a bit of a hot take, but I think there's insufficient understanding of just how much of our everyday health complaints are psychosomatic, and just how much of our mental activity doesn't take place in the brain. An allergy to subsonics is certainly a made-up complaint, the only question being whether it's made up by the brain or the immune system. And the only practical difference between those two is that the brain is more plastic. If the subject doesn't practise deliberate reprogramming of their mental architecture, it doesn't matter much whether the illness is in the more or less pliable medium, because they don't have the tools to reshape it either way. I guess one could run an experiment by seeing whether it's amenable to talk therapy and categorise the issue that way, but it would still depend a lot on the therapist in question and the subject's willingness to participate.
friedturkey 5y ago
India’s demographic distribution is very different from America’s. May as well tell them to avoid tundras.
- arihant 5y ago
  Also the land distribution is vastly different. 60% is agriculture, 24% is forest cover. Compare that to US where most of the land is cow pastures.
frostwarrior 5y ago
You people talk about changing where you live as if replacing your house was cheap and easy.
- guerrilla 5y ago
  I don't know who "you people" are but I wasn't talking about anyone moving. People don't live in the middle of grain fields, so nobody needs to move.
  - s_trumpet 5y ago
    The average size of an agricultural holding was 1.08 hectares (2.67 acres) in 2015-16 and declining over time [1]. A lot of Indian land is small farms with houses clustered among them. That’s not to say that India doesn’t produce a lot of wind energy, though - it’s the second largest source of renewable energy after solar according to the most recent source I could get (Feb 2020) [2]. [1] https://pib.gov.in/newsite/PrintRelease.aspx?relid=199780 https://pib.gov.in/newsite/PrintRelease.aspx?relid=199780 [2] https://cea.nic.in/dashboard/?lang=en https://cea.nic.in/dashboard/?lang=en check “Renewable Energy” under “Generation”
    - guerrilla 5y ago
      Is 1.08 hectares enough for a sustainable grain farm? I would imagine those smaller ones are for vegetables but I could be wrong...

sschueller 5y ago

Noise doesn't only affect humans.

elric 5y ago
Funny how people are suddenly concerned with other species when a wind turbine is placed near their home. But when an out-of-sight coal plant belches out tons of pollutants which affect thousands of species, that concern seems to vanish. Quaint.
- Smithalicious 5y ago
  The discussion is comparing solar to wind, nobody is suggesting coal as an alternative, so this complaint seems out of place.
  - elric 5y ago
    Not really. It's an observation on human nature. It's about how certain problems are only problems when they fit a narrative, and can be conveniently ignored otherwise. It seems like the toxicity of solar panel production is also conveniently being ignored, or how much water it requires. Certainly less than coal, but more than wind turbines.
    - mensetmanusman 5y ago
      It’s less water over the life of the product though.
guerrilla 5y ago
Well, let me know when you have a study showing how the mice and vipers in those fields are affected.
- DocTomoe 5y ago
  Well, there is a DLR (essentially Germany's NASA) study about the effect of wind turbines on insects [1]. It's not pretty. Neither is the study on the effect on birds [2] by NABU, one of our "Sierra Club"-style organisations. [1] https://www.dlr.de/content/en/articles/news/2019/01/20190326_dlr-studies-interactions-flying-insects-wind-farms.html https://www.dlr.de/content/en/articles/news/2019/01/20190326... links to an English-language interview. [2] https://bergenhusen.nabu.de/imperia/md/nabu/images/nabu/einrichtungen/bergenhusen/projekte/windenergie/impact_of_repowering.pdf https://bergenhusen.nabu.de/imperia/md/nabu/images/nabu/einr...
  - cinntaile 5y ago
    It's not pretty is not what the research concluded. "From the currently available figures and the DLR model calculation, we cannot conclude either that wind energy plays a significant role in the reduction of insect numbers, or that it has no impact. " Needs more research.
  - guerrilla 5y ago
    There's no mention of sound or noise in either one of those.
    - DocTomoe 5y ago
      The insect study focusses on getting hit by the turbine wing, that's right. The bird study only talks about effects, without specifying effects, and takes note about bird-specific things like "avoidance distance", which is linked to - among other factors - noise. Tbh: it does feel like you are moving goalposts because the studies do not show what you'd like them to show, that wind energy is green and ecologically friendly. We see that a lot.

marmarama 5y ago

No. I live near a large onshore wind farm with 2.5MW wind turbines and go walking near them regularly. They are inaudible from more than 200m away.

DocTomoe 5y ago
Could that be related to other maritime noises, like waves or seagulls? I walk through one of these eyesore fields regularly, and I can hear them easily from 200m away.
- pas 5y ago
  I like the wind farm views. It's very subjective of course. Though most people don't like change, and since old power generating stations were high density (eg. a coal plant, just a big building and a smokestack) the new low-density things are naturally running into this change resistance.

SuoDuanDao 5y ago

Some people seem to develop an allergy to the frequency, the way some people are sensitive to MSG or Gluten while others are unharmed. There haven't been many studies that I'm aware of but I've met enough people who reported these symptoms that I don't think they're making things up.

guerrilla 5y ago
Is there evidence that that is a real thing opposed to completely made up nonsense like many other "sensitivities" [1] that are popular right now? Real question; I'm not qualified to know the difference. 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electromagnetic_hypersensitivity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electromagnetic_hypersensitivi...
- hannob 5y ago
  No, it's a classic nocebo. There recently was a bit of a scandal in Germany because for years a major government authority has reported levels of "infrasound" from wind turbines far above what was physically plausible. A lot of the fearmongering relied on those numbers - yet it turned out they were due to a calculation error.
- SuoDuanDao 5y ago
  It's a bit of a hot take, but I think there's insufficient understanding of just how much of our everyday health complaints are psychosomatic, and just how much of our mental activity doesn't take place in the brain. An allergy to subsonics is certainly a made-up complaint, the only question being whether it's made up by the brain or the immune system. And the only practical difference between those two is that the brain is more plastic. If the subject doesn't practise deliberate reprogramming of their mental architecture, it doesn't matter much whether the illness is in the more or less pliable medium, because they don't have the tools to reshape it either way. I guess one could run an experiment by seeing whether it's amenable to talk therapy and categorise the issue that way, but it would still depend a lot on the therapist in question and the subject's willingness to participate.

friedturkey 5y ago

India’s demographic distribution is very different from America’s. May as well tell them to avoid tundras.

arihant 5y ago
Also the land distribution is vastly different. 60% is agriculture, 24% is forest cover. Compare that to US where most of the land is cow pastures.

frostwarrior 5y ago

You people talk about changing where you live as if replacing your house was cheap and easy.

guerrilla 5y ago
I don't know who "you people" are but I wasn't talking about anyone moving. People don't live in the middle of grain fields, so nobody needs to move.
- s_trumpet 5y ago
  The average size of an agricultural holding was 1.08 hectares (2.67 acres) in 2015-16 and declining over time [1]. A lot of Indian land is small farms with houses clustered among them. That’s not to say that India doesn’t produce a lot of wind energy, though - it’s the second largest source of renewable energy after solar according to the most recent source I could get (Feb 2020) [2]. [1] https://pib.gov.in/newsite/PrintRelease.aspx?relid=199780 https://pib.gov.in/newsite/PrintRelease.aspx?relid=199780 [2] https://cea.nic.in/dashboard/?lang=en https://cea.nic.in/dashboard/?lang=en check “Renewable Energy” under “Generation”
  - guerrilla 5y ago
    Is 1.08 hectares enough for a sustainable grain farm? I would imagine those smaller ones are for vegetables but I could be wrong...