This is the tiniest of most preliminary studies on the health effects of wind turbines, but it made it to the front page of a major newspaper. It is really just laying the groundwork for setting up a proper study. But at the end of 2012, according to the Global Wind Energy Council, there were 225,000 wind turbines operating around the world. So the real question is why has it taken so long to do an eight week study on six people in three houses looking at the effects of very low frequency ultrasound?
The Greens and Labor Party are supposed to be concerned about the effect of industry on people and cuddly animals, so where was their angst? If wind turbines ran on uranium, or the turbines were erected in inner-city areas, would the Greens have been so quiet?
Pacific Hydro deserves credit for funding and cooperating with the study which took place at Cape Bridgewater in Victoria.
Turbines may well blow ill wind
Graham Lloyd, The Australian
PEOPLE living near wind farms face a greater risk of suffering health complaints caused by the low-frequency noise generated by turbines, a groundbreaking study has found.
The study by acoustics expert Steven Cooper is the first in the world in which a wind turbine operator had fully co-operated and turned wind turbines off completely during the testing.
As part of the study, residents living between 650m and 1.6km of the wind turbines were asked to diarise what they were experiencing, including headaches, pressure in the head, ears or chest, ringing in the ears, heart racing or a sensation of heaviness.
The effect that impacts the most on residents is not noise or vibration, but the sensation of infrasound. The threshold of sensations at four to five hertz was felt at 50 db and above.
Survey participant Sonja Crisp, 75, said the first time she experience discomfort from the wind turbines, “it was like a thump in the middle of the chest.
“It is an absolute relief, like an epiphany to have him (Mr Cooper) say I was not crazy (that) when I am doing the dishes I feel nausea and have to get out of the house.”
One hearing-impaired participant had been able to identify with 100 per cent accuracy the performance of wind turbines despite not being able to see them.
Earlier this month the Warnambool Standard reported the residents of the area were looking forward to hearing the results:
Another resident on Blowholes Road, who did not want to be identified, said residents had been pro-wind energy before the project was constructed, but now realised there were alarming side effects.
He said as well as health concerns, property values had plummeted to the point where some were almost unsaleable.
Acoustics expert Steven Cooper is expected to present his final report on February 9 in Portland, with Senator John Madigan also likely to attend.
There is a full list of preliminary findings on the Waubra Foundation August 31, 2014. The study measured noise levels both inside and outside homes, and during times the wind farms were both on and off.
Some of the many points that caught my eye:
- There is a direct correlation with the external dB(A) level and the power output of the wind farm.
- Where the dB(A)LF exceeds 20 dB there is a corresponding identification of noise in the diary observations.
- At none of the house has the dB(G) been above 85 and therefore if that level has taken as the hearing threshold of infrasound then there is no audible infrasound in any of the houses
- The use of 1/3 octave band information to compare infrasound generated by turbines and the infrasound in the natural environment does not contain the required information to identify any difference. When supplemented by narrow band analysis of the infrasound region the results clearly show that the natural environment of infrasound has no such periodic patterns.
I wonder what the health effects of a changed climate will be on millions of people?
588
What are the health effects of the change of climate when I fly from winter Adelaide to tropical Bali? Ahhhh! Beautiful
550
AC
according to the latest news, the average World temperature has risen by 0.04 Degree Celsius, so by flying from Winter Adelaide to tropical Bali, then I’m afraid that there will be no change whatsoever, as the world average is the same there as it is here. Same for Antarctica, umm, no change there either I’m afraid, as the average is still the same, same for Equatorial Africa too, no change there either as the average is the same there as for here.
(Do I really need to add /sarc?)
Tony.
540
Well Tony, if you can tell the difference between .04 degrees C, you have incredible sensitivity to temperature. Since you CAN’T probably tell the difference, but you CAN tell the difference when you leave one climate zone and go to another, I would suspect that you probably are normal after all. Of course, that doesn’t help your ability to read and comprehend what is being said apparently, and sarcasm isn’t being stated here, only what appears to be the truth. Final comment regarding the .04 degrees – I am certain that the stated change is not larger than the margin of error, so the stated change is meaningless.
40
Now there’s the answer of a simpleton. Not that I’m suggesting you’re a simpleton of course, please don’t take it that way. Ever heard of global average temperatures, polar amplification?
469
Say,
nice ad hom response there from someone who quite patently obviously cannot even read, so let me just highlight one part of what was actually written.
Hmm! And where you say this:
If you didn’t mean it, then I’m wondering why you even took the time to write it it in the first place.
Tony.
420
The answer was FOR a simpleton… you !
138
Another substanceless post from Griss.
34
Another empty post from Craig.
You are really acting your pre-teen mental age, little child.
53
Richard Lindzen’s latest YouTube video from last month is excellent
91
Was it as “excellent” as his failed predictions for a steep fall in global temperatures?
314
Source?
81
Do you deny that Lindzen asserted a laughable low sensitivity of 0.5 degrees in a long-debunked paper he published?
Do you deny Lindzen asserted an imminent global average temperature drop of 0.5 degrees?
34
The sensitivity to extra atmospheric CO2 will be shown to be basically zero.
There is NO PROOF otherwise.
Otherwise you could provide some.
32
Some very solid proof from one of the world’s top physicists.
Quote,,
“Many authors have proposed a greenhouse effect due to anthropogenic carbon dioxide emissions. The present analysis shows that such an effect is impossible.“
22
No, what is laughable is to assert that a sensitivity of 0.5 is laughable.
Despite a massive increase in co2 there here has been no warming for over 18 years.
Remember the hypothesis is that large doses of co2 cause catastrophic warming.
Well, we have the co2, but we have no catastrophic warming.
Probability of co2 causing catastrophic warming is basically zip, zero, nilch, nada…
Which was your original assertion (assuming 0.5 is a ‘steep fall’) that you have again failed to provide a source for.
Instead you have led with a red herring (fallacy) about the Lindzen Choi paper.
It’s pretty simple: where did Lindzen make this prediction of a 0.5 degree fall in temperatures?
21
In 2000 the IPCC predicted a rise of 1°C by 2010.
That turned out correct, didn’t it. NOT !!!!! roflmao !!!
72
Source?
45
Yawn !!
Empty childish post.
Primary school tactics.
52
the Griss,
Give Ms Thomas a break, reading what is written on graphs is not a strong point for them.
Couldn’t you just do it in crayon like they are use to?
22
Do you reckon Craig would lend me a crayon so I can help him..?
I used mine up in primary school, but I’m sure he would still have some left. 🙂
62
🙂
52
What graphs? Please, do share….
34
Empty post from Craig.. still !
31
Here we go again. 🙁
10
I looked at this today and realized I accidentally attached it to the comment by A C. It was intended to be a comment to the original comment #1 by FIN.
Sorry about that. Was in too much of a hurry. Nuts! 🙁
10
Not much since we’ve been adapting to changing climate throughout our history as a species. But of course you know that right?
I’m sure for people, and perhaps you are one of them, that go from an air conditioned or centrally heated home to an air conditioned or heated car to an air conditioned or centrally heated office or shopping center it will be a shock to their systems to deal with a real climate but the rest of us will manage just fine. It is after all how we got here in the first place, adaptation, something it would appear alarmists are truly afraid of.
410
Well the climate hasn’t change much for 18+ years, and even over the last 10000 years has been well within the range of human experience. (a tad on the cool side at the moment).
So.. NO ADVERSE HEALTH EFFECTS !!
382
Now, when the temperature starts to drop in the next couple of years or so, the destroyed electricity production systems, (due to CO2 demonisation), will have trouble providing adequate electricity at a reasonable price.
Then… there will be adverse effects.
432
See http://euanmearns.com/
Energy Matters – UK hits minus 13˚C and wind hits “zero” output.
They are just getting by, nuclear, coal and gas at maximum and using up hydro. Lucky they had a warmish lead into winter, so gas stocks are reasonable. They won’t want the cold to continue too long, any hiccup and there will be blackouts.
170
Was bound to happen sooner or later.
They can’t say they weren’t warned !!
101
That is of course, the sad part about it all.
It was bound to happen.
50
FIN,
If you want a wind farm stick it in your own yard, oh wait, you probably live in Canberra…
311
Yep, probably Canberra..
They want to go 100% “non-alternative, non-energy” sources…. all located in NSW.
Standard greenie BS.!!!
261
Yes please, I’d love a wind farm, a friend of mines gets $6000pa per wind turbine on his farm. Do you think he’s making up some mumbo-jumbo about some non-existent disease? No, he’s counting his cash instead. Just like the farmers in Kansas.
453
“Yes please, I’d love a wind farm” Ok then you get one, I’ll give you a pair of wings and you can jump into the blades like the Numbat you are.
Don’t worry warmists aren’t considered endangered unlike….well anything else I guess.
291
So….you’re saying Numbats fly into turbines where you’re from?
Is it something in your water supply, maybe, do you think?
313
Any Australian worth their salt would know the slang term ‘Numbat’ and recognize my clever link to bats and turbines, says a lot about you.
Our water supply has been contaminated by all the fracking in the area of course, it’s stuffed much like your fracking ugly photo.
81
“clever”.
Methinks that word does not mean what you think it means…
36
Methinks , you don’t think Craig.
ZERO sign of it so far.
31
Great philosophy, Bizarro Spock,
The good of the few ahead of the good of the many:
“Do you think he’s making up some mumbo-jumbo about some non-existent disease? No, he’s counting his cash instead. ”
And I bet he’s just makin’ out like a bandit, right, it’s not about the planet it’s about the wallet.
251
By his own admission, Fin is the parasitic far-left greenie, there for all to see.
302
Oh FIN, you people really just don’t even realise what you’re writing do you.
So, for a typical large scale Wind Plant of 500MW, or 200 towers, then that’s $1.2 Million a year and over the projected 25 year life span for the plant, that’s $30 Million.
Now I wonder who pays for all that?
Why, the consumers of course, those people who actually pay for the electricity which comes out of the proverbial hole in the wall. That gift to the farmers has to be recovered over the life of the plant in the increased cost per unit for the electricity it generates.
It further raises the cost of electricity.
Now, just imagine if they didn’t have to pay the farmers that bribe to have the turbines on their land.
Maybe then you might be able to add some credence to the patently false statement that Wind power really is cheaper than traditional forms of power generation.
Every time you write something like this it’s a case of this:
I’m just so glad you guys come to this site and provide the comedy relief we all need, and you do it without even realising it.
Tony.
531
“Maybe then you might be able to add some credence ”
Sorry Tony,
Fin has and will only ever subtracted from the already near-zero alarmist credibility.
173
All peanuts compared to the cost of not cutting carbon emissions. But you already know that don’t you?
449
Ahh! How easy is it to say this when it’s other people’s money, eh!
Like I said ….. change feet.
Tony.
320
“All peanuts compared to the cost of not cutting carbon emissions.”
What is that cost?
250
Gosh, it’s amazing that new people are joining this community, people who have clearly not been exposed to any information about climate change yet.
Here’s a starter:
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/12/books/review/the-climate-casino-by-william-nordhaus-and-more.html?_r=0
and:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stern_Review
So next time somebody mentions the cost of climate change, you won’t have to ask what they mean, because you will know all about it.
28
“people who have clearly not been exposed to any information about climate change yet”
Ah so that’s why you are here !!!
To learn some facts and get some real information.
Good choice…
22
There is ZERO cost to not cutting carbon dioxide emissions.
CO2 is wholly beneficial to all life on EARTH.
Allowing the current CO2 concentration to drop would be a real problem…
..but fortunately China, India, Germany and probably new growth in Africa will mean that the CO2 level keeps climbing.
To the benefit of all life on Earth.
342
Weirdly, real economists say the opposite to “Griss”, who is not an economist, seems unable to base his beliefs on any facts, and whose assertions are patently laughable.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stern_Review
36
Correction for Craig
He means….. every “alarmist” economist shill who has been SUCKED IN by the lies and non-science of the climate change agenda.
And really ?????? quoting Wiki on anything to do with climate .. roflmao. !!!
You really have been well and truly brain-washed , haven’t you, little mind. !!
62
Lets just say we don’t know what the cost of not giving your mate money is for peanuts return in power.
Could you give us some examples. There must be some obvious big ones.
What is the cost of NOT using wind and solar?
70
“What is the cost of NOT using wind and solar?”
You should be asking ..
What is the SAVINGS of NOT using wind and solar?
Answer: Million or maybe billions of dollars that could be spent on something worthwhile like health, third world development, education. etc !
121
But Tony, wind power is cheaper than coal (according to the IEA) so the consumer paying for their power is entirely normal, especially if you believe in a user-pays principle.
Currently, the users of coal-fired power are not paying for their power – many hundreds of millions of government subsidies are transferring the costs onto others, not to mention the non-user-paid externalized costs that coal-power benefits from.
Of course, if you believe in communism, then perhaps subsidized, dirty, coal-power would be perfectly acceptable to you – I well remember how soot-covered all of Eastern Europe used to appear, and how filthy the Danube was, ah, the joy of externalized Communist costs.
315
Wind power, when measured by the cost per the amount of actual power delivered is not cheaper. It is unreliable, will never be able to provide base load capability, and the subsidies for wind power go to the developers not the consumers.
So when you argue that coal subsidies result in the user not paying for their power, that is the point of the subsidies, to make the power more affordable to the consumers. Go look at the “others” those costs are being transferred to, you will find that those “others” are often industries and large consumer who pay for it through taxes.
However with “renewable” power the subsidies are there to prop up the producers not to aid the consumers, a subtle difference that I’m sure will escape you.
As usual, nothing of substance from you. At least you’re getting good at something.
101
And yet here in the real world, electricity prices are being pushed down by the increase in wind capacity:
http://www.irishexaminer.com/business/wind-energy-eases-cost-of-power-255088.html
““The substantial contribution of wind energy helped reduce the monthly average wholesale electricity price by 5%. ”
What is your personal reaction to finding that your personal belief is contradicted by the facts? Acceptance? Or…..something else…?
27
Well lets see, when you divide the subsidies by the amount of power actually produced then something that gets, oh lets say 400 billion and produces 100% of the time vs something that gets say 100 billion and only produces perhaps 20% of the time under ideal conditions on it’s best day then it becomes apparent that the subsidies for something that only produces 20% of the time if you are lucky cost more than those that go to something that produces all of the time.
Renewables Get 25 Times The Subsidy That Fossil Fuels Do
It really depends on your frame of reference.
Why do fossil fuels need any subsidies? Good question, why do renewables? Tell you what, lets get rid of the subsidies, tax breaks, etc. for all energy production and see which ones survive and don’t go bankrupt. It wouldn’t be renewables.
81
Again the underhanded lying and deceit from Craig.
The return of the road tax on petrol is NOT a subsidy. Like any other returnable tax, it is tax that should not have been paid in the first place.
The sped up depreciation allowance… again, do you really think that mining equipment doesn’t depreciated very quickly ?? DUH !
Wind power, and solar power, WOULD NOT EXIST without massive unwarranted subsidies and ludicrous feed-in tariffs and scheme.
They are a NON-viable, UN-reliable, waste of time, money and a bane to avian wildlife.
(But you are obviously a far-left non-environMENTAL greenie, so almost certainly don’t care one tiny bit about that bird life.)
82
Yes along with his little emotional reminiscence about eastern Europe and how soot covered it used to be while ignoring the fact that there is still plenty of coal power there. So with coal still providing power how is it that eastern Europe used to be soot covered, if coal was as Craig would try and convince everyone it wouldn’t be a case of used to be.
Apparently he’s to emotional over this issue to be able to see the details.
81
“The IEA’s latest estimates indicate that fossil-fuel consumption subsidies worldwide amounted to $409 billion in 2010, up from $300 billion in 2009, with subsidies to oil products representing almost half of the total.”
http://www.iea.org/publications/worldenergyoutlook/resources/energysubsidies/
Why do fossil fuels need any subsidies?
26
Craig,
Economics of renewable energy schemes:
Coal/gas fired plant provides 100% energy requirement to user = user pays 100%.
Wind Turbine provides 8% energy contracted + user subsidises balance 92% to renewable provider under contract + coal/gas provides makeup supply 82% energy to provide total 100% required = user pays 200%.
101
What’s this gibberish masquerading as maths?
27
“What’s this gibberish masquerading as maths?”
Obviously way beyond your primary level ability !
71
See? Griss can’t explain Bradley’s blather either…
26
Poor Craig, I do understand what he is saying.
You are obviously too thick to get the message.
Not my problem.
Not here to teach people who don’t want or have the capability to learn.
61
There must be a parallel accounting universe out there where the Green Left resides.
Referring the IEA site where these ‘subsidies’ are mentioned, the following additional comments can found:
“The IEA estimates subsidies to fossil fuels that are consumed directly by end-users or consumed as inputs to electricity generation. The price-gap approach, the most commonly applied methodology for quantifying consumption subsidies, is used for this analysis1. It compares average end-user prices paid by consumers with reference prices that correspond to the full cost of supply. The price gap is the amount by which an end-use price falls short of the reference price and its existence indicates the presence of a subsidy.”
All very logical sounding, and backed by simple arithmetic, except that the method for calculating the reference price to establish the ‘gap’ which constitutes the ‘subsidy’ is some mumbo-jumbo about an ‘international price’ which has absolutely nothing to do with the market price at which these fuels are traded.
There is much talk amongst our ‘green left other’ friends about subsidies on this or that. If a government decides to reduce the tax on a particular industry, usually to stimulate that industry with the intent of attaining an overall increase in government revenue, everyone shouts ‘subsidy, subsidy’. But there is a difference between deciding to tax less and providing money directly, which is a subsidy. For example, if the government, in its wisdom, one day decides to reduce personal income tax, will everyone be shouting ‘susbsidy’?
The other questions that goes begging with this talk about the monstrous ‘subsidies’ is ‘Who is funding these subsidies? And who is directly receiving these subsidies.
When there is discussion in the populace as to why petrol prices at the pump do not move up and down with oil prices, the government stays very quiet, in the hope that the lag between an oil price drop and petrol prices at the pump is longer, rather than shorter. This is because a very significant amount of our governments general revenue is from a percentage of the price at the pump.
Subsidy?
Pull the other one!
21
If you don’t like gibberish masquerading as math then quit posting it Craig as that is all that your links contain.
21
Craig seems to inhabit the highest of the high alarmist agenda sites.
Exaggerated propaganda pap is all he seems to be able to produce.
21
FIN your friend must have the older shorter turbines to be getting such a small price per tower. Hope he or she is saving that money to pull the towers down when the companies flee at the end of the subsidies. If in Victoria, he or she also cannot build any new dwelling on their property within 2kms of any tower. That includes all property owners in this zone, not just the ones with towers.
70
Fin, you well dam pay part of the Farmers $6000 per turbine per quarter! Via electricity you use from the grid! From were ever the electricity is generated from!
What pee’s me off more, is Im also paying for part of it as well!
Lets drop EVERY subsidy from every environmental scheme and let market force’s determine what’s the most efficient means to generate electricity!
By three or four generations, they will have sorted any issues out of any climate variability, if there is a need to! (Im sure our great grand kids will be much smarter than us?)
71
I agree – only a communist would support the taxpayer providing subsidies to inefficient industries:
“The IEA’s latest estimates indicate that fossil-fuel consumption subsidies worldwide amounted to $409 billion in 2010, up from $300 billion in 2009, with subsidies to oil products representing almost half of the total.”
http://www.iea.org/publications/worldenergyoutlook/resources/energysubsidies/
Let’s ditch all subsidies.
26
“Let’s ditch all subsidies.’
So coal electricity increase 5%,
Wind and solar increase 4 fold.
Let’s also remove the mandate to pay ridiculous feed-in and all extra payments to farmers etc for wind turbine.
Let’s also remove the embargo for fining wind turbine owners for every bird and bat.
Let the REAL cost of this junk be known
Then wind and solar would die the natural economic death that it should have in the first place.
Coal could exist without subsidies because it is the cheapest way of producing RELIABLE electricity. The small subsidies just help reduce the cost.
Wind and solar WOULD NEVER EXIST in a free market, only the MASSIVE subsidies, 25 time that of coal and gas, prop it up.
71
Exactly Griss. Lets remove all the “subsidies” then we can sit back and watch the renewables fail, regular power costs increase and as a result the cost of everything will increase because that food on the table, the clothes one wears, the gadgets they play with, etc. all have to be transported to the consumer and that transportation cost will go up.
I wonder how many of these cheerleaders for renewables would have died in child birth if the hospital they were delivered in didn’t have reliable power for the operating rooms, medical monitors, infant care system, etc.
You certainly don’t see hospitals looking to power themselves with solar or wind, somewhere on their property they have either diesel, LP, or NG generators ready to kick in if the grid power goes. If all they had was wind and solar to rely on their backup systems would be running all the time.
70
Most susidies occur in the poorer nations or those hemmed in by politics (e.g. Iran)
This is easily seen here –
http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/68171 in particular this image –
http://canadafreepress.com/images/uploads/IER120814-2.jpg
Removing all subsidy would play havoc in the third world as without such the cost of living in these countries would lead to disruption and loss of life. But I take it that is what the Malthusians would want.
30
gees tom, it must be my eyes, or maybe the very blurry pic,
…. but I can’t see Australia, USA, or any of the major EU countries on that second list.
They all look like poor countries that desperately need subsidies so the people can actually afford some energy.
Of course, Craig would NEVER want these poor countries to get any of the massive benefits from coal and fossil fuels.
He and his deceitful ilk want them to remain in poverty.
That is what their loathsome agenda is aimed at.
Keep the poor countries poor.
Bring the richer countries down to match them.
Easier to control by a world government. !!
Trouble is….
….. its working !!!
31
No wind power when its cold and there’s no wind.
The graph on the first comment speaks loud and clear of the NON-VIABILITY of wind power except as a fad and a toy. !
Poor Craig, scared of a bit of warmth, so perhaps you should go over to the UK and bathe in the freeze of wind power in the UK.! Putz !
60
Craig says….”I agree – only a communist would support the taxpayer providing subsidies to inefficient industries” (Like wind and solar)
Coal is NOT an inefficient industry so obviously he wasn’t talking about coal.
He has just admitted, for all to see, that he is a rabid communist as well as a rabid alarmist twerp.
The two seem to go hand in hand together. (or is that his boyfriend?)
61
It must be inefficient or it wouldn’t need subsidies.
Your bizarre nonsense about a “fourfold increase in price” for wind power if subsidies are withdrawn is utter gibberish.
The IEA demonstrates that if considering a new investment, the price of wind power is now lower than for any other form of electricity generation.
So whose maths should I trust? An international body with formal expertise in the area? Or the innumerate ramblings of kooks on the internet?
Gosh, what would a sceptic do?
26
“It must be inefficient or it wouldn’t need subsidies.”
Again the base level ignorance displayed by Craig is hilarious. 🙂
Keep up the display so we can all laugh, mindless one.
In poor places, VITAL industries such as coal fired power need to sometimes be subsidised to allow their development.
Wind power and solar are certainly not “vital”.
They are a toy, a passing ineffective fad.
And they get 25 times the subsidies that coal gets.
It really is utter and complete stupidity.
50
FIN,
On millions? Here is a funding opportunity. The Canadian Snowbird Association (CSA) has approximately 80,000 members. There are 10s of thousands of US folks that also go to warmer places for 3 to 5 months each year but getting a list might be hard. Besides, the change in climate is usually greater going from Canada to Florida than from, say, New York City. So, get in touch with the CSA and do a study.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadian_Snowbird_Association
Even the Snowy Owls like to head to warmer areas:
http://www.mnn.com/earth-matters/animals/stories/high-tech-backpacks-reveal-the-secrets-of-snowy-owls
200
Two words FIN,
Net Beneficial
170
I wonder what the health effects of a changed climate will be on millions of people
Well if the planet turns cool then billions will be affected,starvation famine disease,freezing winters short crop seasons,and of course a greater reliance on fossil fuels,wind turbines will ice up and solar forget it.
If it warms even more than now then there will be more food available more rainfall longer cropping seasons,the planet will be a much better place than a cool one,less reliance on fossil fuels.
But we know that the green types want to ban all fossil fuels which will lead to the deaths of billions,and that will make them happy,a planet with a pop of 500 mil – 1 bil,this is the yardstick that they want,and here we are worrying about the Muslims,all they want is for us all to be Muslims,whereas the green types want us to be compost!
330
We will all be healthier as it gets warmer, of course.
160
Fin, There has been a couple of times in recent recorded history that the climate changed. The Roman warm period followed by a cold patch then the Mediaeval warm period, followed by the Little ice age which we have only just warmed out of. Guess which times were the best for people?
If you have no understanding of recent history and are brain washed by the global warmanistas you are indeed a fool, and not as bright as you think.
301
Milder winters, warmer nights, more agricultural production, fewer people dying from fuel poverty. I’d say it’s a win-win outcome, except for academic parasites, pseudoscientists, and liberal media trying to advance Marxism.
310
all available evidence shows that it is highly beneficial
110
I wonder also how these negative effects that Nova is trying to play up will be compared against the negative effects ( in addition to causing climate change) of coal and coal-based electricity generation? How many fires and, as a result deaths, have been started by electricity wiring. how many deaths are there in the coal and mining industry generally? Imagine the number of deaths over the years arising out of mining accidents?
Then, what about the subsidies? How many tax dollars have been pumped into geological exploration. Subsidies in the form of tax concessions. Roads and rail built, to service mining towns and industry? Taxes invested in government owned energy infrastructure?
Deaths, noise and other pollution? Is Nova interested in the negative effects from the fossil fuel based car industry?
And yet this is the lettuce leaf study that Nova is putting forward about wind turbines – noise complaint?!
Utterly lacking in sceptical appraisal.
Utterly laughable.
235
Are you serious? Are you really that poorly educated that you think the electricity from wind or solar would be any less lethal in an improperly wired circuit? That has to be one of the most ignorant things I’ve seen anyone say regarding electricity and I’ve heard some real winners. It’s a new level of dumb even for you which is impressive.
281
It’s like jamming his head in a doorway and having someone repeatedly slam the door on his head, while he asks “this is good for me right?”.
70
Mining coal has a direct and measurable effect in improving society as a whole, allbeit with some unfortunate costs. But as mining techniques improve these will become less.
Wind farms on the other hand provide NO benefit to society – in fact they directly increase the cost of electrical power because they demand subsidy. This extra cost is carried by society as a whole, and affects the poorest the greatest. What benefits do wind-farm give society? I defy anyone to suggest any.
Installing windfarms are a net loss as the cost of their installation can NEVER be recovered without taxpayer subsidy. Without secure and reliable fossil-fueled or nuclear power the windfarm could not exist (if continuous power is demanded.)
Overall windfarms are a wasteful distraction for the weakminded.
181
Yes, your comments are utter laughable.
There you sit in front of a computer on the internet, non-cognitive dissonance spewing forth.
The whole of modern society is built from and around a solid regular electricity supply.
I bet if you look around you, you would be hard pressed to find one item that has not been touched by electricity.
Assuming you are living in a house an not a cave, then that whole structure is built using electricity.
The cement, the aluminium, the glass, the copper, the plaster on the walls, the synthetic carpets.
Even the timber frame (or is it a steel frame) would have been cut using electricity.
Your clothes, your fridge, your TV, your lighting, your car or transport, …
….your decaf soy latte, etc etc etc etc.. all require electricity.
….. and the large proportion of that electricity comes from COAL FIRED POWER STATIONS.
EVERY FACET of your feeble little weasel-like existence is steeped in a foundation of coal fired electricity.
Did you know that you cannot build a wind turbine or make solar panels without using coal and coal fired electricity.
So I dare you to turn off that computer, head off into the wilderness, and build your little bark hut by hand, using tools untouched by coal fired electricity and live a life untouched by the evils of coal and coal fired electricity.
But you won’t will you.. because all you are is a pathetic, ranting hypocrite. !
241
“cannot build a wind turbine or make solar panels without using coal and coal fired electricity”
correction.. you could use hydro or nuclear powered electricity, but anything with steel in it requires coal.
131
If the person with the ultra well developed sense of humour who finds scientific discussion laughable had a good look around, it would be obvious that a large part of their existence depends on products that are not only derived from mining, but woe betide, from coal mining.
Should said person want to return to prehistoric times, when mankind apparently lived a pure existence, the stone axe that said person would like to use to cut down trees would use materials from a flint mine. Hopefully one not subsidized by the government of the day.
100
Solar panel mineral Link for you http://www.mineralseducationcoalition.org/pdfs/Solar-Panel.pdf
Umm, made of really nice stuff – Arsenic, Cadmium, Tellurium, etc. Just like TVs and mobile phones – only worse!
I wonder who recycles them when they stop working?
90
“I wonder who recycles them when they stop working?”
Recycled Solar cells.
Same entity as recycles old wind turbines of course.
The people who put them there have taken their subsidies and scarpered.
The “green” entrepreneur. !!
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I should know you well enough by now Griss. But must admit, I was expecting something different at the links. 🙂 You got me…
50
Would be interesting to know what you expected. 🙂
The big point is that nobody recycles these follies when they stop working.
Certainly not the people who made the money out of them !
They are just left to rot and pollute the surrounding environment.
Like those wave-gen things, eventually to be removed with tax-payer money !!
90
Coal, on the other hand, has to clean up its mess when its finished.
They have to re-vegetate the mining land. Proper environmental de-commissioning.
I remember reading somewhere about the green blob complaining about a beautiful ‘natural’ lake that could be damaged by a new local mine.
Was quite funny when it was pointed out that the lake was actually on the site of an old surface mine. 🙂
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Chester,
“How many fires and, as a result deaths, have been started by electricity wiring. ”
Probably less than if we relied on wind turbines. It still has the same poles and lines to get were it’s going and the propensity for the turbines to catch fire and topple is well documented in France, Germany and Brittain.
But a recent study has found by far the greatest cause of bush fires in Australia is arsonists, you know, people that feel marginalised and disenfranchised because their belief system is falling in tatters around them so they decide to make a statement.
Another study has found that the greates cause of lost revenue is grants and subsidies to renewable energy schemes because there is no return, unllike mining where the mining companies pay wages, subsidise governemnt infrastructure and produce a tangeble and profitable product.
There is also a small matter of the essential requirements of efficienct, reliable and economical which renewables can’t meet.
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THIS is where the expensive rare-earth magnetic materials for wind-turbines come from.
The massive uncontrolled expansion of the Chinese neodymium industry driven almost exclusively by the idiocy of wind turbines.
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Griss, I can think of any number of suppliers of oxy-acetylne gear who would be happy to demo what happens when these bird shredders are past their use-by dates….
*pop*…….yellow flame…..bit of soot, hit the oxygen and …play time!!
Timberrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!!!!!!!!!!!!!
51
Wind power is a massive, growing industry employing hundreds of thousands of people that provides electricity generation more cheaply than you could get from making any other sort of investment today.
And you want to smash it all down.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luddite
Nobody could do a better job of satirizing your hilarious beliefs than you do all by yourself.
26
roflmao! Craig quoting Wiki again.. very funny ! 🙂
NON-SCIENCE propaganda courtesy of the Con man !!
50
Craig says this:
A method of electrical power generation that still cannot be made to work. A method of electrical power generation that patently CANNOT replace coal fired power, wind power’s main claim.
Currently in the U.S. there is around 62,000MW of Nameplate for wind, the equivalent of 31 large scale (2000MW+) coal fired power plants.
Not one large scale coal fired power plant has closed in the last seven years, and in fact no plant larger than 800MW has closed. The only plants closed are the tiny (mostly less than 100MW, and in fact most averaging only 10MW) and mostly ancient (40 to 50 years old +) plants, replaced in their totality, in fact with more than their totality, not by wind plants, but by Natural Gas fired power plants.
These power plants like coal fired power plants supply electrical power ON DEMAND, something Wind will never be able to do.
62,000MW Craig, and NOT ONE plant closed because of that.
Now surely that wouldn’t be an indicator, or would it?
Craig says here they are cheap.
Hey cheap is fine I guess, if you think it is is, which it isn’t, but hey, it seems to me that the people who supply electricity actually wants something which works.
Don’t come here and spread your subliminal “I’m better than you” crap, Craig. Get out there and get your people to close down those coal fired power plants if you’re so certain.
Don’t talk.
Do something.
Say, perhaps you could make a submission to parliament or something. That would at least be a start eh!
Tony.
40
“And you want to smash it all down.”
Level the playing field, wind and solar would die a natural death in a short couple of years.
Its only the massive subsidies, and mandates and ludicrous feed-in rules etc, that even allowed any of it to set up in the first place.
NO-ONE would bother with any of it were it not for the BRIBES !!
40
In 2012, I was lucky enough to have a 2 week holiday driving around the SW of the USA.
Apart from the spectacular scenery, I observed the following:
1. 2 Power Stations in California that appeared to be closed
2. Large windfarms in California, of which less that 20% of the turbines we turning
3. A very new power station in Paige, Arizona, that produces electricity for California
Apart from the hypocrisy of California using ‘dirty’ electricity from across the border rather than ‘hurt the planet by burning their own coal’, every appearance was that wind was not much of a contributor to the daily comforts of California’s citizens.
Further, the German government recently let a contract for additional windfarms, but as the new arrangement was for no subsidies, there were no takers? Why could this be, if the generation of wind power was so cheap?
I think that the ‘science is settled’ with respect to wind power (and a lot of the other ‘renewables’.
60
Grumpy is yet another one with his head in the sand:
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2015-01-22/u-s-wind-power-installations-rose-sixfold-in-2014-bnef.html
“The U.S. added 4.7 gigawatts of new onshore wind capacity in 2014”
“China remains the biggest market for wind with installations rising a record 38 percent, or 20.7 gigawatts”
“Germany installed 3.2 gigawatts in 2014, Brazil 2.7 gigawatts and India 2.3 gigawatts, according to BNEF. Both German and Brazil totals are records for their countries. ”
Wind power is now a cheaper investment than any other, according to the IEA.
27
Oh, Craig, you Pinnacle of Ignorance!
If you had any appreciation of what happens in the real world, rather than relying on what others tell you, you would know that the process of tendering though to construction and commissioning of wind farms, power stations and such, is a protracted process.
Bloomburg may well be right in the NAMEPLATE capacity installation they have quoted, but this would only be the capacity in the pipeline.
Also, please do not confuse nameplate capacity with what these monuments to climate dogma actually produce.
80
Lucky I checked some of the above assertions.
The coal-fired power station in Page, Arizona was built in the 1970s to fulfill local demand as well as demand from Southern California. Nothing to do with wind power.
Arizona has 7 coal-fired power stations (they had 8, but the Abitbi plant was closed 2 years ago – never mind Tony’s twaddle above about “no plants closed in the last 7 years”, just more clueless fairies-at-the-bottom-of-the-garden Tony nonsense).
They were mostly built in the 1960s and 1970s.
Some stations had their last units completed in 1980-1982.
The Springerville plant was the newest, commenced production in 1985, with the final unit completed in 2010.
The following article
36
http://archive.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/business/articles/2010/03/18/20100318arizona-coal-plant.html
Arizona’s last power plant.
21
Doh Craig.. did you look at the capacity of that plant ? and it purpose ?
Tony said “Not one large scale coal fired power plant has closed in the last seven years”
Craig scrapes his bum in the sand as he tries to keep both feet in his mouth !!
62
Craig says here:
Note what it says at the link he provided: (my bolds)
Thank heavens for that subsidy eh!
Nice one Craig.
Say that’s a pretty big addition of power.
4.7GW of Nameplate. Man, that’s huge.
The amount of actual delivered power came in at an extra 15,000GWH.
Natural Gas (NG) Fired power added an extra 7GW Nameplate of added new power. Now, as you well know, these NG plants are primarily for Peaking Power operation, so they might run from 2 to 4 hours a day, most of them.
Natural Gas Power delivered an extra 16,000GWH of power to U.S. grids.
Nuclear Power had no new additions whatsoever and yet they delivered an extra 16,000GWH of power to U.S. grids.
Coal fired power had nothing but closures, and as I have mentioned before, they were all low Nameplate and old plants.
But Craig, here’s the kicker here.
While coal fired power had nothing but closures, coal fired power
So, here we have less plants delivering more power.
So, Craig, it looks like wind power is, umm, not really replacing coal fired power, and hey, if wind was so damned cheap, why are the grids crying out for more coal fired power.
Craig, you’re a little like that FIN guy.
Open mouth change feet.
Thanks for opening yourself up to be shot down so mercilessly.
Tony.
70
Here is Craig !
42
It must be sad being in Tony’s position of desperately clinging to yesterday…
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/business/breaking-news/us-wind-rebounds-up-sixfold-in-year/story-fnn9c0gv-1227194374037?nk=007561aa52d2403ece46cc24af533021
“In 2014, China installed 20.7GW”
“Germany (3.2GW), Brazil (2.9GW) and India (2.3GW) round out the top five markets along with the US; both German and Brazil totals are records for their countries.”
http://spectrum.ieee.org/energywise/energy/renewables/china-dominates-but-us-wind-energy-market-rebounds
“The strong figures for wind reflect a solid year for clean energy investment worldwide. Global clean technology investment was $310 billion in 2014, according to BNEF—up 16 percent from the previous year, but still a little lower than its peak of $317.5 billion in 2011.”
http://www.evwind.es/2015/01/24/the-average-price-of-u-s-wind-power-declined-by-58-percent/50126
“The average price of U.S. wind power declined by 58 percent from 2009 to 2013.”
Tony will eventually get it: wind is cheaper, wind is a massive industry employing millions, wind is replacing outdated methods of generating electricity and most of all: wind is here to stay.
Despite being a mature industry, coal-fired power still relies on massive subsidies to stay viable, not the least of which is the massive benefit of externalized costs in the form of pollution emission.
21
Global CO2 emissions v global extreme poverty.
100
Most of the warming is supposed to take place in the winter and at night. And if Oslo gets the same climate as Amsterdam I think we will have no problems to adapt? About the thread, maybe the noisy windmills are Agenda 21 motivated and the aim is to kill and scare people away from rural areas?
130
You can’t say that!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TQlHaGhYoF0
30
Same as it ever was; the climate constantly changes.
Next question?
40
We will never find out….damn shame….
10
What about the diseases spread by shredding birds and bats?
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Good point RoHa, not to mention all that road kill by cars trucks etc.
236
“cars trucks etc”
Which of course you have no contact with at all.
At least cars, trucks have a use..
Wind turbines are basically useless, except for reducing bird populations, making people sick, and feeding taxpayer funds in the form of subsidies into the pockets of rich wind turbine entrepreneurs.
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FIN,
Not too many protected raptors decimated by cars and trucks, but plenty shredded by wind turbines.
In fact the death rate on protected bird species is disgusting and you truly should be ashamed to be promoting it.
481
Road kill tends to stay mostly on the road. Wind turbines turn the birds into an aerosol, so there is much great spread of the bits.
131
Maybe some here don’t know that the pressure pulses from turbine blades collapses bat’s lungs which then obviously kills them
Bats DON’T need to have any impact with the turbine blades to be killed.
They just need to be within a few metres of a passing blade to be killed by the pressure pulses
It even has a name “Barotrauma”
.
The wind industry had done it’s damnedest to try and bury this wholesale slaughter of flying wild life aided and abetted by the grossly hypocritical Greens turning a complete blind eye to the wind industry’s continuing slaughter of birds and bats.
Anecdotal from a friend of mine. He knows a worker on a new wind turbine farm here in SE Australia quite well which is where this information comes from.
The first year the new wind turbines ran the workers collected around 40,000 bats of the local species, all killed by the pressure pulses and the impact of the turbine blades.
The next year they only collected a couple of hundred bat carcases from the turbine farm’
The conclusion was that in that first year of operation that turbine farm had destroyed almost the entire bat population of that area.
Now envisage a farmer or a wood cutter cutting down a tree in which bats were known to harbour and the hypocritical greens happening on that piece of information
That farmer or wood cutter or householder just looking for firewood would be heavily fined even if he had not killed any bats.
_______________
From “Current Biology”
Barotrauma is a significant cause of bat fatalities at wind turbines
Summary
Bird fatalities at some wind energy facilities around the world have been documented for decades, but the issue of bat fatalities at such facilities — primarily involving migratory species during autumn migration — has been raised relatively recently [1,2] . Given that echolocating bats detect moving objects better than stationary ones [3] , their relatively high fatality rate is perplexing, and numerous explanations have been proposed [1] . The decompression hypothesis proposes that bats are killed by barotrauma caused by rapid air-pressure reduction near moving turbine blades [1,4,5] . Barotrauma involves tissue damage to air-containing structures caused by rapid or excessive pressure change; pulmonary barotrauma is lung damage due to expansion of air in the lungs that is not accommodated by exhalation. We report here the first evidence that barotrauma is the cause of death in a high proportion of bats found at wind energy facilities. We found that 90% of bat fatalities involved internal haemorrhaging consistent with barotrauma, and that direct contact with turbine blades only accounted for about half of the fatalities. Air pressure change at turbine blades is an undetectable hazard and helps explain high bat fatality rates.
We suggest that one reason why there are fewer bird than bat fatalities is that the unique respiratory anatomy of birds is less susceptible to barotrauma than that of mammals.
_________________
That last comment is very interesting;
.
Humans are mammals;
Draw your own conclusions about the honesty, integrity and the well known and well documented, deliberate willful lying of the wind turbine industry about nearly every phase of it’s operations.
241
“The first year the new wind turbines ran the workers collected around 40,000 bats …
The next year they only collected a couple of hundred bat carcases ”
You see? It isn’t such s problem . The bits quickly adapt. They might do it by learning to avoid the turbines, or perhaps by being dead, but the figures show that the problem goes away by itself.
160
bAts, not bits, dammit.
80
bits of bats… or
bats in bits ?
100
What happened to the precautionary principle?
151
You mean not playing fast and loose with the planetary systems AC?
349
We aren’t playing fast and loose with anything.
We are returning CO2 levels, very gradually, to a sustainable level.
You are the one playing fast and loose.. with reality and the truth. !!
442
ps.. Did you read how they have removed that useless hunk of junk on Kooragang Island in Newcastle.. to make way for the next coal loader. 🙂
And wasn’t it great to see NSW increasing its coal exports by 8% last year.
More lovely CO2 for the Earth’s biosphere 🙂
341
FIN,
The planetary system is working just fine it’s the truth that the alarmists are playing fast and loose with that is causing the harm.
Why are you so afraid of change – the stone age didn’t end because we ran out of stones.
331
Nice 🙂
160
Change? I thought it was you guys who don’t want to change.
228
Its not a matter of if we want change or not..
Its just that it isn’t changing at the moment..
Over the last couple of hundred years we have been fortunate enough to warm from the LIA, but we are still at a point which is somewhere only just above the very low temperature point in the whole of the Holocene…
..below the MWP and RWP and way most of the early parts of the Holocene, periods where life on Earth flourished.
I little warming would not go astray, and extra atmospheric CO2 as well.. major bonus. !!
A bit of cooling, on the other hand, could cause a lot of problems.
Its the utter stupidity of the CO2 demonisation that annoys me.
CO2 is the building block of all life on Earth, and is PURELY BENEFICIAL at any level we could ever raise it to in the atmosphere.
321
FIN,
“Change? I thought it was you guys who don’t want to change.”
That’s the argument you try to promote through misdirection, the same as the Galileo anaolgy where you portray the flat earthers as sceptics.
Got news for you buddy, Galileo was the sceptic who disagreed with the instrumentality that the earth was flat.
Sceptics accept that the climate changes and sceptics promote adaption = evolution.
Alarmists try to stop the climate changing because they fear adaption = extinction.
Sceptics don’t troll alarmist sites because sceptics don’t care what you believe hwere as alarmists troll sceptic sites because alarmists fear what they don’t understand.
Alarmists tend to fear an awful lot, that why they throw vast resources at shutting down debate.
Climate alarmists are just another bunch of Luddites really.
311
Natural change that improves the whole situation as experienced over the last few millenia is not a problem. Changes to life style and society imposed on the majority of the population by people with an over-inflated idea of where they fit in the scheme of things and a distorted sense of guilt is not acceptable. When those egotists distort the application of basic science, generate spurious reports and propaganda, to the detriment of true scientists and their credibility, it is not just unacceptable, but downright criminal.
170
We are the guys who know that it doesn’t matter a [moderated] what we want. The climate will change or not change regardless of anything we do.
80
You do mean the solar system, FINN? It is the big ball in the sky [that you watch on TV] that causes variable climate conditions on planet earth. This planet we live on just happens to be in the Goldilocks position, not too hot and not too cold, so that H2O can exist in three forms, gas, liquid and solid. Add to that , the fact that that huge gravity wells of the sun and Jupiter are acting like a giant vacuum cleaners, hoovering up random bits of rock which could otherwise REALLY affect our climate. Did you ever happen to see the footage of Shoemaker-Levi impacting Jupiter? Splashdown wider than earth diameter. And the near miss of 1989FC, that spawned all those Bruce Willis disaster movies! This planet has never existed in a steady state, and never will, except if you view it from the blink that is a human lifetime.
401
Very well said, 10 thumbs-up!
181
Exactly, if only we could turn down the planetary system’s A[ir] C[onditioning]!!!
Just twist that co2 dial two degrees to the left!!
And then all our problems will be over!!!
[/sarc]
120
Fin, once a mathematician removes the “adjustments” out of the hockey schtick and the gorebull warming disappears, will you be a happy nappy, or are you to entrenched in your belief?
160
Gosh, if only people took the trouble of actually checking their facts before spewing uninformed nonsense on the internet…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Mann_(climatologist)#Hockey_stick_controversy
The 2006 North Report published by the United States National Academy of Sciences endorsed the MBH studies with a few reservations. The principal component analysis methodology had a small tendency to bias results so was not recommended, but it had little influence on the final reconstructions, and other methods produced similar results.[30][31]
More than two dozen reconstructions, using various statistical methods and combinations of proxy records, support the broad consensus shown in the original hockey stick graph, with variations in how flat the pre-20th century “shaft” appears.[33][34]
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/22/science/22cnd-climate.html
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v441/n7097/full/4411032a.html
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/wcc.53/abstract;jsessionid=5EB0A4E509B78160C8D27C7418B20607.f03t03
So there you go – armed with the actual facts, you need never embarrass yourself again.
36
Facts, Wikipedia, NYtime.. do NOT belong in the same sentence, dopey drawers !
ROFLAMO..
Believe the Mann farce if you want..
You have already proven you have zero grip on reality, so please keep going. 🙂
62
We used to live by a passing loop on a coal line. The trains were about a kilometre and a half long, some just making the mile.
The trains were remarkably quiet, the bigger the more so, because later model locomotives had later model sound deadening technology. Continuous welded rails made very little noise.
Our driveway crossed the track 90 metres from the house. Road traffic used to kick up stones onto the track, trains then crushed those stones, pitting the rails as they did. The pits in the rails then caused the wheels rolling over them to make a little rumble.
The noise was not very great, but at night by the time the 190th bogie had rolled over the crossing you would be thoroughly awake.
Very unlike when stopping in a highway motel where a truck at 3am lifts you off the bed then lets you go back to sleep.
120
I’m so pleased to see FIN posting here – whoever he/she is – as it gives us yet another look at the hypocrisy and silliness of the green/left anti-development activists that pervade the Internet to push their emotive and unscientific opinions.
The study cited by Jo is a (preliminary) scientific analysis that has provided all its data and its methodology for all to see. Replication will be possible – and will be needed because of the small sample size. How refreshing is that? Well, very. Especially when we see the deceit and obfuscation associated with so much of the so-called CAGW “science.
And thanks PacificHydro for behaving as a good corporate citizen.
331
Well its what happens when you let the “Save the Planet” work experience kid loose on the office computer, huh?
40
Yep OS, spot on.
Hopefully those “work experience” kids will stick around Jo’s site and learn a hell of a lot more about science and the scientific method than they ever learnt in their dumbed-down university courses.
Already I can hear FIN saying: “scientific method? What’s that?”
30
” “scientific method? What’s that?” “
Oh, are you saying that Fin could be a “climate scientist™” ??????
20
Isnt “Climate ascientist” a contradiction in terms?
Like military intelligence?
Science requires observation, measurement and application of logic.
10
Apologies for the repeat link to the ABC article, but here goes:
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-01-21/jericho-global-temperatures-are-batting-above-their-average/6029926
Greg Jericho, the OP, says:
Also things such as:
He is either very ignorant or deliberately flame-baiting – I imagine the latter more likely, though he has not shown evidence of being all that knowlledgeable about climate science, so who knows?
I have added a comment (assuming it passes moderation):
I say the last line mostly to play with the mods – when I say such things I almost always get posted. Otherwise my hit rate is much worse. But that is my personal empirical observations… not the ABC’s strong suit.
281
Hotting up in there … here is a taste of the commentary:
Yeah, I now… such a brave anonymous ad hom. Must be hitting the mark with my references to satellite data.
Oh, my comment above made it in – I imagine the blog will be closed before sceptics can add to much more common sense to it.
221
“deliberate manipulation of RSS data by denial scientists like Christy and Spencer”
roflmao..
Except RSS has nothing to do with Christy or Spencer 🙂
The warmista ignorance abounds. !
191
Thanks for the reminder – might have to point that out LOL
131
@the Griss
My comment that follows is not directed at you – this just seems like a good spot to stick it -thanks.
Carl Mears is VP and Senior Research Scientist for Remote Sensing Systems (RSS). While many thought RSS would be a counterweight to University of Alabama at Huntsville (UAH), the RSS temperature is running lower than UAH. Roy Spencer has written that an about to be released series will more closely align the two sets. John Christy is the Director of the program there and Roy Spencer is a principle research scientist.
They do not actually measure temperature in the same sense as walking out on to your back porch and reading a thermometer. The whole issue is quite complex.
Anyone interested in temperature series should go to their web pages and associated statements and read what they have to say. I urge you, also, to read how CO2 is measured at Mauna Loa.
Don’t be lazy.
100
The big bonus with RSS and UAH is that they are consistently measuring the same thing,..
…whereas the land temps are constantly being affected by local changes, often unknown and unaccounted for.
Also the number of stations is constantly changing, there is missed and manufactured data in abundance.
We know that “adjustments”, warranted and unwarranted, are constantly being made at the whim of “the keeper”.
The land surface record has become totally untrustworthy because of the extreme warmista activists that have somehow got into the position of “the keeper”
171
Very important point there Griss.
Worth repeating again and again
130
Yes but its worse – Christy just used straight baloon & satellite surface temperature observations.
Observations by definitions is raw data. Surely even the warmists have to accept that a basic thermomenter doesnt have apolitical bias.
See this is the problem of letting lefties anywhere near science – they mess it up as only they can, and turn the basic act of being curious about the physical world into something political.
Science has been hijacked by these bozos.
40
Yep Bulldust, I read it. Jericho’s been caught out sledging again. But that’s what they do best. Why doesn’t he speak English?
And the ABC’s “The Drum” is the green Marxists’ home ground. That’s where they have a home ground advantage. The ABC is staffed predominately by green left sympathizers. That’s why the joint is so biased against those who would give the alternative view.
The really interesting thing is that the data-sets don’t agree. We know BoM fiddles with its, just like ball tamperers. We know GISS fiddles with its as well. Data fiddlers generally find what they’re looking for. But it amounts to nothing, even with their data fiddling the data-sets contradict each other. They’re not even good cheats.
Even then, the problem they have is that they can’t find the scientific link to CO2 as the predominant driver of global warming. That’s where the attack on their failed hypothesis should be focused, not on global average temperature.
221
It’s getting weirder:
I have posted (not up yet) to the effect that I shall have to email Prof Carter about his untimely demise. I went further to suggest he will probably strongly deny this 🙂
The Drum is turning into bizarro-world…
Oh correction … did I imply past tense?
141
Bulldust,
The mere fact that Bob Carter is very much alive would not dissuade the denizens of The Drum one iota. They haven’t let any contradictory evidence in anything else penetrate the ivory tower up till now, so the presence of a pulse certainly shouldn’t deter them.
121
“so the presence of a pulse “
You are not talking about the zombies on The Drum, I hope.
Blood stopped flowing to those empty brains ages ago !!!
111
And their synapses are driven by wind energy ..
.. so the only time they have a thought is when they fart !
81
you just to look at Fin’s posts..
….a series of random brain-farts. !
101
Oh God, reading through some of that thread. Reinhard represents the very embodiment of a convicted self-projectionist. Horrific stuff in there.
How could anyone have a sensible talk with these people? Quoting Michael Mann denigrating Christy, while not noticing the pure hatred emanating from Mann himself, as though his statement was an objective one.
I surely would not wallow in a sess pool like that at all. A quick read is enough to convince me it isn’t worth more than 30 seconds of my time.
50
Guys like Reinhart seem to be the stuff that sinks to the very bottom of that cesspit. Seriously putrid !!
41
I should have added “I bet my comment gets moderated” so that it didn’t.
Not quite politely (“that’s idiotic”) I pointed out that if you take into account the 0.09 degree uncertainty, only three years are cooler than 2014 since 1998, and one was in 2008. The cricket averages are correct to the last decimal place pops up on your calculator.
I should have added that you wouldn’t judge one batsman to be better than another on the basis of 0.1 difference in averages. An incorrect decision when on 0 in good batting conditions could have affected their career average by 1.
50
And of course the scorer just happens to be the “best” batsman’s employee. !!
50
RB,
How do you know what the uncertainty is?
It is not likely to be 0.09C, likely a lot more.
Estimating uncertainties in systems is a lot more complex that I thought. Especially if the experiment cannot be repeated precisely over again.
40
GISS reported it as 0.09°C
I would go with about a third of the whole increase over the 20th century.
I noticed this a little while ago. The data for NH and SH SST compressed over 3 months (to compare seasons). Because its the anomaly from the monthly average, there shouldn’t be a seasonal signal unless the temperatures deviate differently ie, summers get hotter but not winters. This appears to have been happening for the NH since 2000.
It doesn’t appear natural so I would say that there is a bigger systematic error (fudge?) to deal with. http://s5.postimg.org/rjv1jifaf/SST_difference.jpg
10
I’m reading your interventions Bulldust on Jericho’s Drum article, and enjoying your demolition of the very silly nonsense that’s being posted by the brain dead, green, zombies.
You seem to be getting a bit of a run. Now that’s a change.
As usual I can’t seem to get my input past the Drum’s censor. Par for the course. Four submitted so far. None published.
80
as a “wind turbine” joke is mentioned in the Guardian piece below, i hope this will not be considered totally O/T!
on jo’s “Solar cycle affects human fertility and lifespan” thread of 12 Jan, i posted the following:
19 Sept 2014: HollywoodHealth&Society: What’s So Funny About Climate Change?
What do you get when you mix TV legend Norman Lear with climate change experts (should be expert singular Anthony Leiserowitz, Ph.D., of the Yale Project on Climate Change Communication) and some of the funniest comedy writers around, and put them all in front of a packed house?…
In addition to Norman Lear, the Sept. 19 panel—presented by Hollywood, Health & Society (HH&S) and co-sponsored by the Writers Guild of America, East (WGAE)—featured blah blah…
Calling it a “gateway drug,” Leiserowitz said that comedy is uniquely suited to conveying the message about global warming…
Comedians have become trusted,” Winstead (co-creator and former head writer of The Daily Show) said. “People believe they’re truthful and don’t have an agenda—other than finding a common enemy and then pointing up the hypocrisy.”
“It can’t just be the comedy shows and a couple hosts on MSNBC who are carrying the water,” she added. “We need better messaging.”
https://hollywoodhealthandsociety.org/events/whats-so-funny-about-climate-change
well, wouldn’t you know it, from across the Atlantic:
20 Jan: Guardian: Adam Corner: Why it’s good to laugh at climate change
Climate gags are notable by their absence, but an RSA event on Tuesday night hopes to show that climate change comedy can raise laughs and awareness
Climate change is not generally considered a source of amusement: in terms of comedic material, the forecast is an ongoing cultural drought…
This is the challenge that a panel of British comedians, including Marcus Brigstocke – a seasoned climate humourist, will take up at an event on Tuesday evening hosted by the RSA and the Climate Outreach and Information Network in London (the event is fully booked but it will be streamed live online). Maybe laughing about something as serious as climate change is just another form of denial. But perhaps its relative absence from the comedy realm is another warning sign: despite decades of awareness raising, the cultural footprint of climate change is faint, fragile and all-too-easily ignored.
The first example of a climate-policy parody was probably the ‘Cheat Neutral’ project: a slick spoof of the logic of carbon offsetting whereby people could pay someone else to be faithful, giving them the opportunity to cheat on their husband or wife. And there have other good video mockeries – including one warning that wind farms will blow the Earth off-orbit – which have captured the comedy potential of bizarre debates about energy policy.
This year, Greenpeace teamed up with the surreal comedian Reggie Watts to promote the idea of a 100% renewably powered internet. There have been sporadic examples of climate change ‘stand-up’. And the ever-reliable Simpsons has been occasionally willing to engage…
According to Nick Comer-Calder, of the Climate Media Net, getting people laughing is a good first step to getting them talking – even across political divides. One analysis found that major US satirists, such as Jon Stewart and Steven Colbert, have given more coverage to climate change than many of the news channels – although admittedly, this is a pretty low bar to clear.
But while online ridicule directed towards climate ‘deniers’ (generally portrayed as either too stupid to understand the science, or as conspiracy theorists) may appeal to the usual crowd, its hard to see how this kind of approach will breach the political divide. After all, the feeling of being laughed at by a sneering, left-leaning elite is not appealing. One notorious attempt by the 10:10 campaign and director Richard Curtis at ‘humorously’ marginalising opposition towards environmentalism backfired completely. It turns out that most people don’t find graphic depictions of children’s heads exploding all that hilarious after all…
Its an interesting irony that while the ‘pro-climate’ discourse can often feel po-faced and pious, climate sceptics have wasted no time in parodying the climate community. The Heretic, a play by Richard Bean, built its dramatic tension around the conflict between a sceptical climate scientist and her cynical departmental head who is suppressing her data in order to keep his grants flowing. The characters are overdrawn and instantly recognisable. And, as a result, it works: it is good drama, entertaining, and laugh-out-loud funny…
The science-communicators don’t seem to be making much progress with the public: maybe its time to let the comedians have their turn.
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/jan/20/why-its-good-to-laugh-at-climate-change
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The Greens have long excused or turned a blind eye to the adverse effects of any of their policies. What matters most to them is the ‘seeming’, not the reality. That’s why they like to see third world countries kept in their hand-powered water pumps and the like, as modern, engine driven, pumps etc would go against the seeming.
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the event is over, but the video is up. haven’t watched it, but cannot imagine it is funny in the manner they intended. forced comedy! whatever next?
RSA Events: VIDEO: 1HR 14 MINS: Seven Serious Jokes About Climate Change
A Comedy Night, Tuesday 20 Jan, 6.30pm GMT
Climate change is no laughing matter, but when all else fails, perhaps it’s time to take humour a bit more seriously?…
http://www.thersa.org/events/audio-and-past-events/2014/seven-serious-jokes-about-climate-change
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As far as health issues from wind power are concerned I believe that they could be very real.
It is well know in some circles that NASA has had to consider the effects of very low frequency vibration in space vehicles on long trips, say to Mars, and road haulage and train drivers are at risk from the same problem.
It is not so much acoustic as a constant pulsing which compresses and decompresses the heart lung system.
To put it mildly “you are better off without it” and if you don’t go mad from the pulsing you will still have heart trouble.
You will find the usual “Experts” saying that low frequency pulsing is not in any way bad for you.
Well, you might like to check that out. It is contrary to the facts.
LFV is dangerous and shortens lifespan
It is one of NASA’s biggest worries about long distance space flight but at a more mundane level it concerns truck and train drivers and not surprisingly residents who live near Giant Wind Powered Turbines.
They wont kill you straight out but your life will be hell and you will die ten years before your time.
I completed a degree back in 2003 which had majors in Psychobiology, Abnormal Psychology and various topics in Neuroscience.
One of the main assignments involved assessment of mechanisms that allow us to sense speech through moving sound impulses to the brain via
the ear. That’s the obvious focus but damage from abnormal sound stimulus was also examined eg Tinnitus.
We studied damage from high volume noise and high and low frequency inputs.
Loss of hearing from excess stimulation of the hearing apparatus is also one of the better known problems but not one that attracts a lot of research money.
Maybe you can figure that out for yourself. Could have something to do with the fact that factories and mining companies would be overwhelmed with compensation cases if the details ever became to familiar to the public and lawyers.
As I researched the issue of noise damage and VLF pulsing it became very obvious that most of the research was coming from 3rd world and iron curtain countries and again you can draw some obvious conclusions; No employer is going to sponsor research that will see his factory closed down.
No employee in a 3rd world company can sue his boss.
NASA was the only place I could find in the west which acknowledged the problem of VLF damage from situations such as Wind Turbine Blade Pulsing.
The pulsing moves air into the body via the lungs where it has very close proximity to the heart and the heart suffers.
It is not a joke and is quite serious but as I said earlier it is not something that transport companies or railroad companies want trumpeted from the roof tops.
In the current idiom we have the Green Monsters denying a very real medical issue that is being hidden. Perhaps it’s the way of the world that the few people caught near someone elses wind farm, or even their own, are seen as expendable or acceptable collateral damage.
If you really want to follow it up on LF sound damage then a psychiatrist or psychologist may be able to help but it must be someone who is involved in that field otherwise you might as well ask Obama.
Forgot this but it is probably so obvious; the skin is a major receptor for VLF pulsing and it transmits to the brain stem.
Nothing of finite daily capacity works well when overstimulated by degree or by extent.
KK
171
Very interesting KK. I’d like to find out more.
What about hours of engine droning on long haul flights? I’ve flown a lot in recent years and I gather that pilots are apt to suffer from coronary artery problems (they have shifts/stress/jetlag too of course).
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Annie
When I was researching this 15 years ago I had access to all the work done on VLF problems.
As I’ve mentioned it was mostly done on groups in non western countries which tends to suggest a coverup.
Proper research is needed to assess this issue of airline pilots and VLF exposure.
KK
50
@KK
I have a car that will pulse if the back seat window is part way down. At normal driving speed it is disconcerting.
70
John
That pressure pulse is going in your mouth and nostrils and sending a signal back to the area of the brain affecting the control of heart and lungs.
Confusion occurs because of this feed-back and it wont do you any good.
KK
50
Thank you Jo, for some more sanity.
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These points have been raised before. I am glad to see that so scientific research is being started on the health effects of infra-sound on the human body.
I am reminded that back in July 25, 2013, James Delingpole writing in the Telegraph made some similar points, but sadly nobody in the British Medical fraternaty felt the need for any research into this matter.
One quote from this old arcticle which may be relavent here is –
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Oops, I made a complete gborlicks of formating that –
The second paragraph should be –
I have also found this unpublished work on the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe site —
http://www.unece.org/trans/doc/2004/wp29grb/TRANS-WP29-GRB-40-03e.doc . Dating from 2004 it may or may not be relavent. It seem it indicate that internal bodily parts rattle and resonate at infra-sound frequencies…
ummmm…
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Horlicks or Algorelicks?
70
They both make you sleepy Annie 🙂
50
🙂
40
Very interesting and relevant article.
20
Sadly, studies such as this will only create a new class of victims that will need to be compensated, at the consumers’ expense.
The windpower industry is now so firmly entrenched in our politics that back-pedaling from wind turbines is no longer an option.
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ABC Spin Headlines on its website:
Wind turbine study finds noise ‘signature’ to help future research, study author says
bob
50
From – http://scitation.aip.org/content/asa/journal/jasa/99/5/10.1121/1.414863
Full report at http://doc.wind-watch.org/sources-effects-lfn-1996.pdf
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
From http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a081792.pdf
a document from 1980!
Titled ‘The Effects of High Levels of Infrasound’
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
From http://multi-science.metapress.com/content/8102h64h887w4r67/
Dated Sept 2004.
Titled ‘
Effects of Infrasound on Changes of Intracellular Calcium Ion Concentration and on Expression of RyRs in Hippocampus of Rat Brain’
So infrasound can affect the brain, what about the brains of children?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The Chinese appear to have done some recent research but gaining access to them have proved probamatic. E.g – http://en.cnki.com.cn/Article_en/CJFDTOTAL-JLGY200004023.htm and the links therein.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
And finally there from the UK there is –
Review Articles
‘Wind turbine syndrome’: fact or fiction?
A Farbouda1 c1, R Crunkhorna2 and A Trinidadea3
at http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract?fromPage=online&aid=8853239&fileId=S0022215112002964
Obviously much more research is required, but who would ever fund such an idea…
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With a background of some 50 plus years of flying gliders. tow planes and light aircraft and my consequent acquired knowledge of aerodynamics I have never doubted that there are potentially serious health problems arising from the fast moving turbine blade generated pressure pulses for anybody forced to live in the vicinity of a wind turbine let alone a whole nest of them.
Frankly, what we are seeing right across the board in all scientific research is the appearance of gross corruption of any science that is related to any way to any subject or project that is supported and boosted by the Green scum,
In short to borrow a long standing accusation of the Greens whenever somebody or something challenges their vicious ideology of a catastrophic global warming they are in the pay of Big Coal or Big Oil then we can only assume that the scientists involved in past turbine health effects research who found no health affecting problems from close by wind turbines have been in the pay of Big Wind.
And THAT considering the lies and deceit and corruption of politicians and bureaucrats by the massively tax payer subsidised wind industry is something I can believe.
There have been far too many doctors in rural and small urban centres with local rural patients they have dealt with for years who have suddenly found some serious health issues with those same patients and clientele when they have suddenly find themselves in close vicinity to newly erected wind turbines.
The technical reasons why the infrasound is generated by turbine blades will have to wait a bit as I have been informed that urgent domestic matters take precedence over my ramblings on the internet.
But think of standing near a helicopter running at a high rotor speed and the consequent hearing damaging whup, whup, whup as the blades move rapidly past and there you have the exact same aerodynamic pulses as wind turbine blades generate but do so at much lower frequencies and slower pressure rises and falls.
More later unless somebody with a good aerodynamic knowledge, better than mine, can expand on the subject.
171
Should actually be infrasound, not ultrasound….
30
Yes. Jo, you should replace “ultrasound” with “infrasound” in the first paragraph.
10
Another look at the UTTER and COMPLETE HYPOCRISY of the warmista agenda.
1700 private jets expected to Davos in Switzerland to discuss climate change at World Economic Forum.
Almost as hypocritical as the slimy green blob worshiping bird-munching wind turbines and scamming subsidies from the tax-payer.
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When the movie Earthquake was released way back when, the advertising was all about the subsonic sound and that you could feel the movie. After a couple of these it was discovered that people sometimes reacted quite badly to the low frequencies and that kind of intense subsonic audio was removed from future movies.
While this example is anecdotal rather than medical it does highlight that the negative affects of sound on people has been known for quite some time (and I suspect well before the example above). To pretend that somehow because it is ‘green’ wind energy and so cannot cause harm is at best naive.
80
You might be thinking of the Infrasound effects on people regarding paranormal experiences, many scientifically conducted tests have found ~ 19Hz to have an adverse depressive effect on people in the right conditions with ghost sightings explained by the eyeballs resonating enough to duplicate images, combined with a heightened state of imagination this becomes plausible.
60
The Deafened Strawman
The G-weighting is a nice way to diminish the signal from wind turbines. It rolls off at 24dB/octave below 1 Hz from an already low level of -43dB at 1Hz.
While this may be relevant to (conscious) audibility, it’s a mistake to apply it when trying to determine if there is any sensitivity to the vibrations produced by the wind turbine. i.e. using G-weighting pre-supposes that the nature of the sensitivity. It’s the CO2-equivalent in that field of studies which are purposed to find no ill effect.
More Annoying than Alarmists
The primary annoyance felt may be due to the blade passing the tower which imposes a pressure pulse approximately every 3 to 6 seconds in the larger turbines, depending on the size of the wind turbine and the operating speed.
The audible spectrum content of the blade passing is a thump along with a “whoosh”. The depth of the pulse depends on wind speed and the aerodynamics of the blade; the wind speed determining the magnitude of the “incoming” pressure and the blade determinining the depth of pulse, along with the supporting tower. Typically, the downstream wind speed is as low as one third of the incoming, so the dynamic pressure is one ninth. The total aerodynamic energy of the blade passing has to be carried by changes in air pressure elsewhere; audible and otherwise.
Imagine/remember being in a small, closed room when somebody opens and closes a door rapidly. If the door doesn’t slam, you still notice because the whole body responds to the pressure change. To get a measure of the annoyance; what if that happens every 3 seconds, all day long.
In a wind farm with more than one turbine, the pressure pulses tend to be syncronised. That leads to places around teh turbines where pressures cancel each other out and others where they add “perfectly”.
Complicating matters somewhat; the greater the wind speed, the deeper the stagnation zone in front of the tower; which is where the air comes to a halt before turning to go around (mostly) the sides of the tower. The stagnation pressure (and temperature) at the face of the tower is the total wind energy on the tower itself. If the blade passes through the stagnation zone, then that upsets the pressure on the tower, it’ll try to quickly return to “its undeflected” position, but is prevented from doing so by the wind already pushing on the blade which transfers the wind load via the hub and nacelle back into the tower. But the tower is, for a short time, “shielded” by the blade. When blade has passed, the stagnant zone must re-establish, pushing teh tower back again.
If you think that one can predict exactly what happens by calculation, then have I got a climate model for you! 🙂 Attempts at using CFP (computational fluid dynamics) fail to predict even what is observed in models in wind tunnels. In part that’s because the problem doesn’t scale as nicely as some would wish. The natural wind velovity profile with height varies with terrain and the effects of surrounding structures; notable other wind turbines. The other scale problem is that most aerodynamics don’t take the effects of gravity into account. When the diameter of the “disc” is over 140 metres, one should at least consider that possibility.
Structure-borne Vibrations
Structurally, the change in load has ultimately to be supported by the foundations/footings upon which the tower is mounted. The low-frequency components of the vibration are best carried through the solids of structures. It can carry through bed-rock for long distances with far less attenuation (reduction by energy being absorbed) than what one would expect from a simple radial model.
When you lay your head down to sleep, the surface over which structure-borne vibrations can travel is increased dramatically. When standing, most of your organs are “isolated” via muscles, tendons, etc. absorbing much of the vibration. Hopefully, your bed will dampen some vibrations but the very low frequencies take a lot more effort than what an ordinary inner spring matress provides. Maybe a water-bed will do.
Structure-borne vibrations are also important for the infrasound emitted from wind turbines if that pressure acts on the surfaces of an inhabited building. Many things in a typical home will vibrate in sympathy. Elements such as (single-glazed) windows exposed directly to the outside and the interior will “repeat” the signal to the inside with (reduced magnitude). Again, there are likely to be locations in the house where the vibrations cancel and in others, where they will “add” from e.g. windows and vents.
Most insidious is when such vibrations aren’t consciously perceived. Without apparent sources of exposure, epidemiologly is actually frustrated.
Instruments are needed, monitoring the vibration spectrum to well below 1Hz; both air- and structure-borne. Then physiological studies exposing subjects to components of that spectrum under controlled conditions.
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Is this the same as the thump thump thump of the Bass from the flats across the road, when they have a party?
I can’t hear the music,such as it purports to be, but am aware (and kept awake) by the thumps.
70
Those ‘thumps’ are more likely in the 40-60Hz range.
Infrasound is more insidious.
80
Ultrasound is annoying but bass from neighbours’ muzak is totally infuriating and a health hazard from the stress it causes.
60
Actually…insidious damage from ultrasound is a huge worry. I expect that’s why there’s not been much research; they don’t want to know.
50
Actually Annie,
I believe that there have been as lot of studies into Ultrasound. because of the potential damage to unborn babies.
Infrasound, not so much.
50
I meant infrasound …I’ve just discovered that my predictive text did a naughty again. 🙁
30
Annie
You may be interested in a little book called The Hidden Power of Vibrations by Harvey Day, published 1979 if you can get hold of a copy.
It’s a little way out, but among other things, it details an infrasound experiment where the testing technicians were killed by their experimental infrasound “whistle”. When autopsied, their internal organs were found to have turned to mush.
Other effects reported were nausea, fright, panic, blurred vision, lassitude etc.
The military was keen on infrasound weapons for a time until it was seen that they were as dangerous to the users as to the enemy.
50
That sounds really interesting Beowolf. Thank you for the info.
00
Sorry, Beowulf .
00
I’m glad someone pointed out that infrasound energy can be propagated through the ground, and not just through the air
This might explain why the effects vary from one geographic area to the other (i.e. differences in underlying rock and soil structure).
40
An excellent analysis Bernd.
One of the most important points, which I think you bring out, is that there is no value in doing an assessment of damage from wind turbines in the normally well documented “audible” range.
The damage is being done in the Very Low Frequency spectrum which I believe has been deliberately ignored because of OH&S and insurance implications in the transport and mining industries.
KK
110
Spot on KK.
50
Thanks Annie
Just imagine sitting in a huge diesel powered locomotive pulling 100 wagons of coal.
Power plus resonating through your respiratory system and causing confusion in your neural networks that control heart lung interaction.
KK
60
Some studies exist into occupant comfort in motor vehicles and presumably airliners. (e.g. 1, 2, 3) Few however deal with frequencies below 1 Hz nor with the effects of continuous “pressure-cycling” of the body. The vibration studies typically involve large displacements; i.e. the subject’s body is physically moved a significant differnce, which is probably quite different to the sub-millimetre movements imposed by structure borne vibrations.
There are some empirical ‘standards” for classifying the (dis)comfort. It would be brave to extrapolate those to the frequencies of interest.
One must also take care in interpreting the results of studies where sinusoidal excitation at low frequencies was used. e.g. Matra Airbus; a study that describes motion sickness sensitivity vs frequency dipping well below 1Hz.
Buildings for multiple-occupancy apparently have to comply with standards to limit structure- and air-borne virbrations between occupancy units. That includes things like suppressing the thud of the hob-nails on the wooden floors. I can’t justify the purchase of AS ISO 2631.2:2014 — Mechanical vibration and shock – Evaluation of human exposure to whole-body vibration – Vibration in buildings (1 Hz to 80 Hz) for the purpose of drafting this comment, but I suspect that it may be “slightly relevant”.
70
“there is no value in doing an assessment of damage from wind turbines in the normally well documented “audible” range”
Exactly.
Slightly off-topic – there is a similar problem with regulated thresholds of RF emissions from mobile phones.
The RF power limits are formulated in terms of their heating capacity, when what should be studied is their effect on the delicate electrical activity in the brain.
And before anyone says that low power RF can’t go through the skull bones, how is it that external EEG pickups can detect brainwaves ?
20
Interesting.
Just shows the interaction between business interests and politics.
The consumer and society are not always well looked after.
KK
20
Windmills had their day, nice for pumping a bit of sea-water over the dykes. Nice for getting some bore water for the sheep.
And now the modern wind turbines have the shadow of doom over them.
What’s the buzz on Thorium reactors?
http://www.pocket-lint.com/news/129913-world-s-first-thorium-reactor-ready-to-be-built-for-cheaper-safer-nuclear-energy
60
In the UK, vested interests in the wind industry control the issue of noise from wind turbines/farms. Government civil servants (no doubt fully paid up members of the green blob) prevent the issue from being addressed. Government policy denies that there is a health issue and strictly forbids the health effects of wind turbines (due to infrasound or Excess Amplitude Modulation) from being a consideration when planning permission for wind turbines/farms is being sought by developers.
60
It’s Time.
Again.
http://joannenova.com.au/about/donations/prefer-a-different-option/
20
Didn’t Brian Valentine post a link here some time ago related to VLF from wind turbines? IIRC it was a study done by US DoE in around 1983 or 1985. I can’t find it on my PC.
30
Further to the above IIRC it said that you needed to measure the pressure pulses INSIDE houses. Outdoor measurements were no good as there is interaction between the pulses and the structures which is the problem.
50
And of course every structure will respond differently.
I suspect a brick structure would allow minimal infrasound through,
…but it is quite possible that a timber structure could actually amplify or modify the infrasound and make things quite nasty.
To the best of my knowledge, very little study has been done on the effect of these sorts of frequencies on structures, except in the case of sway of tall building and the effect of earthquakes etc.. ..
… but this is motion, not pressure fluctuation.
Certainly it is good to see someone starting to take a solid scientific approach to these issues as they really do need to be properly resolved.
I would also like to see much more study done on the effect of these infrasound and the huge magnetic filed introduce to the marine environment in offshore wind farms. We know little enough about marine life as it is, but we do know that some creatures communicate in these frequencies and use magnetic variations for guidance.
Seems we should be taking much more precaution…
…. not that the greenies and far-left socialists give a damn, so long as they can push there anti-plantfood control agenda.
61
typo .. huge magnetic fields introduce ……
41
There are some interesting bits in the research into vibration from wind turbines by Keele University in the UK.
This was carried out because of feared interference in seismic monitoring posts operated by the Government (Ministry of Defence). The results showed that a surprising amount of vibration and ‘noise’ is carried through the ground and is why the MoD still maintains a 50km exclusion zone around seismic monitoring stations.
http://www.keele.ac.uk/geophysics/appliedseismology/wind/
The detail of the report the article refers to makes interesting reading.
I am not sure that any studies have been carried out in relation to the effects on domestic properties close to turbines, but there will clearly be some.
100
Already disrupting weather and air traffic control radars, they interfere with the equipment used to monitor nuclear test ban treaties. Are any near seismic sensors used to monitor natural seismic activity to warn of eathquakes and tsunami?
The accelerometer spectra (Figure 12) in the PDF are interesting, with high velocities (and therefore power) below 1Hz.
50
From what I understand bowel motions are in the 1Hz and below region.
Ugh!
50
O/T
Seen on the Weatherzone site but maybe reported elsewhere as well
BoM withdraws advice Alice Springs recorded its hottest day ever, blames faulty thermometer
[quoted from WZ ]
The Bureau of Meteorology (BoM) has withdrawn its advice Alice Springs recorded its hottest day on Tuesday, blaming a faulty thermometer for an incorrect temperature reading.
The ABC was told on Tuesday night the temperature at Alice Springs airport reached 46 degrees Celsius at 3:21pm (ACST).
The standing record of 45.2C had been set on January 3 in 1960.
But about midday today, the BoM said an instrument error was to blame for the record high reading.
“The details are still under investigation,” climatologist Joel Lisonbee told the ABC.
“It looks like we had an instrument fault with with our automatic weather station at the Alice Springs Airport.
“We do have other thermometers on site.
“We have some mercury and glass thermometers that did not show that spike to 46C.
“They showed the maximum temperature yesterday to be only 41.5C.”
___________________
Probably nobody believed them so they decided they had to check against the stone age LIG’s
Hmmm!
So one, just one [ Ha Ha! ] of the BOM’s highly sophisticated Electronic temperature measuring devices goes tits up.
Nothing unusual about electronic gizmo’s doing that.
Meanwhile ancient 200 year old technology Liquid In Glass [ LIG’s ] thermometers just keep right on keeping on and churning out those correct temperatures regardless.
I just wonder how many other of the BOM’s electronic temperature measuring gizmos are also just down right wrong as in electronically slightly or significantly stuffed but still seem to be working while churning out significantly incorrect temperatures for which NO method exists in the BOM to back check their electronic gizmo’s claims.?
Ah well they can always homogensize or infill with data from a couple of stations a few hundreds of kilometres away or create a zombie station and just create a bit of data to cover the last century of data from the zombie station .
No problems there and it is the hottest year you know. Thats what all those electronic station thermometers after ALL the relevant adjustments have been applied, are telling us.
[ /sarc x 2 ]
110
Had a good think about this wind turbine stuff and it’s effect on living creatures.
I saw their theories but think it maybe something to do with the water in our bodies, water is strangely anomalous between 30 and 35C effected greatly by long waves. Water is still barely understood in it’s weird behaviour.
Do not know how to put up a link but Googling Prof Giorgio Piccardi . The Chemical Basis Of medical Climatology. Is well worth reading.
40
Over in Britain and USA, there is a double-standard from environmentalists and academics. There have been no properly funded studies looking into the potential side effects of wind turbines, but there is a huge effort to try to identify the health effects of fracking for gas. One fracking study I looked at last year was based on a survey in Pennsylvania. Despite known flaws in the survey procedures and, not properly accounting for other explanations, the authors published the results, saying they were “hypothesis generating“.
70
I teach a course to pilots approved by EASA, the European equivalent of Australia’s CASA and a constituted part of the EU. Part of the Human Performance syllabus states specifically that low-frequency vibrations have a variety of unpleasant effects on the human body. Note again that this is information that all pilots within the EU must be taught in order to hold a commercial or airline transport pilot’s licence or an instrument rating.
I have an email from the British government stating directly that frequencies below those audible to humans were not considered in choosing sites for wind farms (the above is why I asked).
Anyone else see a discrepancy her?
80
The very low frequency vibrations problem seems to be have been well known in certain circles (as evident n the Airbus reference in my earlier comment), but selectively ignored by those with priorities “higher” and human health.
Certainly any Engineering student of noise and vibration from the 1970’s onward would be quite familiar with not just the structural consequences, but also the ability of people to function safely while working inside the machine’s sphere of influence. My 1980 edition of B&K’s Mechanical Vibration and Shock Measurements has a chapter on the Effects of Vibration and Shock on Man, detailing the need to consider the vibration spectrum down to 0.1Hz. Continuous exposure for different periods and magnitudes of vibration at certain, centre frequencies was recognized as leading to fatigue-decreased proficiency.
The problems with low-frequency vibration were recognized by “experts” before 1980.
The may well be NACA/NASA studies buried somewhere in the endurance of flight crews subjected to constant vibration for many hours.
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How does real science and engineering deal with public mischief reporting like this.
http://www.businessspectator.com.au/article/2015/1/22/wind-power/did-pachydro-give-free-kick-anti-wind-lobby
Very obviously skewed to dismiss infra-sound issues as if they were witchcraft.
KK
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“why wasn’t this done before?”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lm0Oe8J6qT8
Hardly unknown.
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Ground Breaking Study Eh? I wonder if Low frequency techniques will replace bulldozers? ( humour alert)
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Dynamite/TNT/C4… One single expansion pulse. ! 🙂
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I hope the people manning the ASIO hotline have a sense of humour…
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You really do post the most childish comment, don’t you.
Its all you… Its all you are.
I’m sure they have way more understanding of comments than you have ever displayed.
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Recently, in a lawsuit in Ontario Canada (directed at the provincial government forcing wind farms on a community without meeting the legal requirements for safety and environmental assessment); the judge tossed out the lawsuit by people stating they were experiencing adverse health effects (without hearing any evidence) based on an arguement of the Provincial Government being above its own laws. Score a “win” for the green nazi’s over law, decency and common sense.
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Oh, what nonsense “Craig”. Every one of your “references” has been thoroughly debunked years ago. BTW, Nature is no more a reputable source than wiki.
Regards,
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On another note, one relevant to animal conservation issues:
The bird and bat kill ratios in the area of these mega turbines is much higher than anywhere else. Conservation/wildlife laws are not adhered to in this regard, whereas in many juristictions a homeowner would be prosecuted for such conduct.
(cue the fruitbats defending silly uneconimical, engineering failure projects. Pun intended)
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Please excuse me if this has already been posted but congratulations to Pacific Hydro for cooperating. On the other hand remember James Hardy and compensation claim awards because of asbestos based products they produced and sold for profit before the health problems were discovered. Could wind turbines be another class action target.
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