There was an interesting article in The NY Times the other day on some folks up in Vinalhaven, Maine, who are disturbed by the noise emanating from the three wind turbines that were installed there last year.
I don’t think I’ve ever been to Vinalhaven, but I have taken the boat cruise around Penobscot Bay (outside of Portland), so I’ve probably seen it.
If it’s like the other islands off the coast of Maine – and I’ve visited a few – it’s a little bit o’ heaven.
So I do feel a bit bad for the folks who settled up there because it’s this side of paradise, and because you could hear the peepers peep, the crickets crick, and yourself think.
Now there’s the hum of environmental consciousness and, to some ears at least, it ain’t all that pleasant.
While initially on board with the idea of wind turbines – it’s green, it’s clean, and it produces lower cost energy: what’s not to like? - some residents have decided that there’s plenty not to like:
“In the first 10 minutes, our jaws dropped to the ground,” Mr. [Art] Lindgren said. “Nobody in the area could believe it. They were so loud.”
Lindgren is joined in his complaint about the unbearable noisiness of being green by a number of others who live within a mile of the facility. Most Vinalhaven-ers are happy with it. (Our of earshot, out of mind.)
Apparently pockets of anti-turbine insurgencies are cropping up around the country, with residents claiming that they’ve seen their property values decline, their health (mental and physical) impacted, and their general peace and tranquility violated, by wind farms.
There’s little evidence to back up the allegations
Numerous studies also suggest that not everyone will be bothered by turbine noise, and that much depends on the context into which the noise is introduced. A previously quiet setting like Vinalhaven is more likely to produce irritated neighbors than, say, a mixed-use suburban setting where ambient noise is already the norm.
As with porn, those bothered know when something fits the definition when they see, or, rather, hear it.
So forget a mixed-use suburban setting, or even the country. How about right in the middle of the city?
Why not throw a couple of these suckers up on Boston Common, and a few more out along the Charles River. I’d exempt the Public Garden – way too pretty – but how about City Hall Plaza. A total wasteland, with plenty of wind in the vicinity.
Our neighborhood’s not screechingly noisy – at least not to me it’s not, but, then again, I am a city girl who’s more creeped out by the eerie quiet of the country than I am by city surround-sound – so what’s the difference if we add a bit of turbine hum onto the commuters, the cabs, the sirens, the delivery vans, the garbage trucks, and the flyovers? Oh, yes, and the neighbor kids who walk on our grates running a stick over them.
Is the turbine hum going to be any louder than the concerts from the Hatch Shell? The occasional parades that have floats with boom boxes and chanting marchers? The First Night drummers? The Advent Church bell-ringers?
Sure, none of those are going 24/7, but what’s a little more ambient noise if you’re already dealing with plenty?
Richard R. James, an acoustic expert hired by residents of Vinalhaven to help them quantify the noise problem, said there was a simpler solution: do not put the turbines so close to where people live.
Mr. James is no doubt correct. But you could also just put them where there’s plenty of noise already.
So to hell with NIMBY: put a couple of these suckers In My Back Yard.
IMBY! Yay!
Honk if you love alternative energy!
5 comments:
Hi Maureen,
Mary sent me your Blog; she really knows how to get my goat.
These suckers do not just emit a hum similar to traffic on the X way or cars passing through Webster Square. It's frequently a rhythmic thumping that doesn't go away and vibrates through you until the wind stops. If you want to recreate the effect, cup your hands over your ears and move your hands on and off for several hours.
I've been to both Vinalhaven and Falmouth to talk with residents who are assaulted (annoyed is too mild a word) by turbine noise. In Falmouth, several people have moved into their basements to escape the sound, one woman has left her home to live with her daughter, others cannot work in their yards.
Can one seriously believe that property values near industrial wind turbines are not being devalued?
You do not want one of these in Maine, Cape Cod, or on Beacon Hill. Do some research and you might learn that the entire enterprise of industrial wind is a colossal scam. (No, I haven't gone over to the dark side; I'm still a liberal Democrat)
Consider becoming a NIABY - not in anybody's back yard.
Cousin Jim
Jim - Thanks for stopping by Pink Slip. Could it be that wind turbines are yet another one of those "too good to be true" thangs? Sigh! I really do like the idea of energy that is renewable and doesn't destroy the atmosphere. Double sigh!!
I think it must depend on the brand of turbine. The town of Hull MA, a narrow peninsula jutting into Boston Harbor from Hingham and Cohasset, was an early adopter of wind turbines, putting a large one behind the high school at the very far end of town. Although we moved from Hull eight years ago, we lived pretty close to the turbine, and could easily see it from our house. It makes very little noise, or at least it didn't in the couple years it was operating before we moved. You could walk very close to it while it was spinning merrily around and not have to raise your voice to be heard. Tomorrow we will be seeing our friends who bought our house, and will ask them whether the noise level is still very low. I wouldn't be surprised if over time the bearings start to wear out and maybe it gets noisier until they are replaced. My sense is that with the right design and proper installation they shouldn't be that noisy.
Perhaps someone could argue that any noise is an imposition. Perhaps any town that has one should give a property tax abatement to anyone living close enough to have any reason to complain. But we can't take one characteristic of a wind turbine, that it is not absolutely silent, and use that as a reason not to use them in windy places. Everything that involves gathering energy for human use has risks and problems. Oil involves the trillions of dollars of expense and thousands of lost lives caused by our military involvement in countries that otherwise would be useless desert that we would completely ignore if they didn't have oil. Coal involves air and water pollution, and thousands of lost lives over the years in unsafe mines. Natural gas, although probably the best of the bunch, has numerous issues as well, as of course does nuclear. No alternative is trouble free or cost free. Why does the hum of a turbine make it so much worse than the alternatives?
Maureen,
Triple sigh!!! I'm afraid it's like Santa; a belief hard to give up but one that just isn't so. Remember the famous Mark Twain quote:" It ain't the things I don't know that get me in trouble, but the things I do know that just ain't so."
Rick ,
I've been to Hull and visited both the turbine by the high school (Hull 1) and the newer one (Hull 2) on the Hull/Hingham line. On the day I was there Hull 1 was not turning,but even if it had been, any noise would probably have been drowned out by the swift moving channel nearby. Hull 2 was turning slightly and there was only a slight swish audible.
I spoke with both the Town Manager and the editor of the paper ( I believe it's called the Hull Times) and both men conceded that there are complaints of flicker and noise from residents near Hull 2. Again, this IS NOT A HUM, but a rhythmic pulsing or thumping that can drive people nuts. it isn't caused by gears in the nacelle (or box) up on top, but by the compression of blades passing by the pillar of the machine. It depends upon wind conditions but it's not a trivial sound that one can adapt to. Just for the hell of it, Google wind turbine noise and wind turbine syndrome.
You're right all forms of energy production do have their down side, but oil, coal, gas, and( quadruple sigh!!!! ) nuclear actually work and wind does not. The basic problem is that it's too sporadic. If you can explain how wind makes any significant difference in the power grid, I'm all ears.
I feel that it's up to you to show people like me that industrial wind is a good idea and a good use of our country's money and resources; not up to me to reflexively believe in a faith based energy system.
Jim
Jim
Jim, I don't know whether anyone (even Maureen) reads the comments on a few day old Pink Slip, but here goes anyway:
I checked with friends who live in our old house in Hull. They say noise still seems like no problem, but when the sun is at certain angles, its reflection off the blades does create a strobe effect that some residents hate.
I don't mean to imply that I am a big fan of wind power. I think it probably does pay its way in certain niche locations (Cape Wind might be one of them), but it may not be economic in enough to get any big savings from high volume production. And these things aren't semiconductors - steel isn't going to get any cheaper no matter how many windmills are produced. So I would say, use it where it pays its way, and don't where it doesn't. To the extent that people nearby have lower property values as a result, they deserve some compensation, such as tax abatements.
The problem with evaluating whether or not wind power is economic is distorted by the massive subsidies given to some of the alternatives. For example, oil has benefited from trillions of dollars of subsidies in the form of the military expense we have to protect some otherwise worthless countries that sell us oil, and all the money taxpayers spent building roads and bridges and subsequently maintaining them, which benefits oil burning cars and trucks. We need a large and rising tax on gasoline, heating oil, and diesel fuel to compensate us for those subsidies, with the proceeds used to reduce broad based taxes like income and payroll. If we took away the subsidies for oil (nuclear has plenty too), then the question of whether wind or solar or anything else are economic or not in a given location could be fairly evaluated without comparing them to alternatives that get massive taxpayer subsidies.
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