02/01/13 Letter sent to the Carmarthen Journal

Dear Editor,

Mr. Clubb has sought to dismiss the idea that low frequency wind turbine noise can cause any health problems to human beings. In fact opinions on this subject among acoustic experts are very divided, in the same way that opinions about global warming are also divided among environmental scientists. Is Mr. Chubb, whose employers RWE have a vested commercial interest in promoting more wind farms, suggesting that a considerable number of research projects from all over the world which demonstrate that low frequency noise and infrasound can cause neurological problems, have all got it wrong? Perhaps he would like to put his views to residents of Gwddgrug, who convinced a petitions committee from the Welsh Government last February that their suffering from the Altwallis wind farm was all too real. owded island of ours!The truth of the matter is that the ETSU committee, when setting up the guidelines for determining acceptable noise limitations in the placement of turbines, found a way of removing low frequency noise from the equation because they realised that, if it was left in, it would not be possible to have any onshore wind farms in this crowded island of ours.

Does Mr. Clubb want to ignore the opinions of organisations such as the British Medical Journal and the World Health Organisation, which expressed concerns on this health issue? I could list at least 10 research papers from either the USA or Britain which refer to empirical research on the effects of this type of sound. I suggest that as a minimum he looks at the work of neurological expert  Dr. Amanda Harry. We should not allow ourselves to be panicked into accepting this flawed wind farm technology to meet the green lobby allegations that the lights will all go out by 2015 unless we go all out with wind power. Recent evidence from the Met. Office shows that the rate of global warming is not ensuring an immediate crisis and that we have plenty of time to transfer the subsidies presently enjoyed by the wind industry over to more potentially reliable sources of energy such as tidal and wave power.  

Yours truly,

Ted Razzell    

Words in italics were left out of the actual publication!