The board amended the Mason County Zoning Ordinance at its monthly meeting and eased the regulation on the amount of noise large or industrial wind turbines can produce. The amendment allowed an increase in noise from 45 to 55 decibels - a level still lower than normal conversation, which the county says and several Web sites concur, falls at about 60 to 70 decibels. Although there are currently no large industrial wind turbines in Mason County, the county's Zoning and Building Director Mary Reilly said several companies are looking ...

The region of Otago is in a state of significant upheaval over the giant turbines of Meridian's Project Hayes and TrustPower's Mahinerangi Wind Farm. Both wind farms have been given interim consent. Both decisions are being appealed in court by a variety of NGO groups ... a combined 276 turbines and 190 kilometres of twelve-metre-wide roading, Project Hayes and Mahinerangi Wind Farm stand to be the most visible industrial sites in New Zealand. Both wind farms will intrude on cherished, officially designated ‘outstanding landscapes', and annihilate nationally significant historic features such as the Old Dunstan Road.

The route for Maritime Electric's high-voltage transmission line through West Prince is not a done deal, says Energy Minister George Webster. The utility has applied to the province to build a 138,000-volt transmission line to carry wind power generated at the West Cape wind farm. A group has formed to oppose the route for the line, which would connect the O'Leary substation to the Sherbrooke station outside of Summerside. In addition, voltage on a new line from the wind farm to O'Leary is due to be increased from 69,000 to 138,000 volts. Islanders for the Safe Transmission of Power says the line poses a health risk by passing too closely to homes.

An Amherst area resident is continuing his fight to stop a proposed wind farm on the marsh near the town. Jim Milner, who lives on the John Black Road, is preparing a submission to the project environmental assessment claiming that its existence threatens the future of the John Lusby Marsh as a wildlife habitat. "Wildlife is the property of the Crown so it is the duty of the province to protect wildlife, not sell to the lowest proponent bidder," Milner said in his submission.

Elkins City Council chambers was packed Wednesday afternoon for a West Virginia Public Service Commission public hearing as people spoke for and against the AES proposed windfarm project on Laurel Mountain. The meeting started with Chris Callas, the attorney representing AES, and WVPSC Staff Lawyer Carrie DeHaven presenting opening statements. ...WVPSC Chairman Michael Albert then opened the public hearing portion of the meeting. Those for the project were matched about evenly against those against the project. Twenty-two people took the time to speak to the WVPSC - 10 spoke in favor of the project, 11 against the project and a representative from the Randolph County Airport Authority stated the authority was not for or against the project but wanted further investigation conducted to see how the project could affect the airport.

Logan County regional planner Phil Mahler said he expects to hear a lot of opposition to a proposed wind farm at today's Regional Planning Commission meeting, set for 7:30 p.m. in the Logan County Courthouse. Barb Aper of Union Ridge Wind hopes to exceed Mahler's expectations. ... One of Aper's main concerns is that no one has addressed how she is supposed to navigate outside of her residence with the main roads to the east and west set to be blocked by construction. "A county board member told me that I should stay at my mother's house while they were doing construction," Aper said. "I have a heart condition and am worried about having access to those roads." This is only one of the concerns dismissed by county board members, according to Aper.

Blades have begun to turn on 121 wind turbines here and in neighboring Ellenburg, a 35-minute drive northwest of Plattsburgh. Saturday, they turned with a soft whush, whush, whush. "Whush, whush, whush, all day long, all night long - I moved here because it was so peaceful and quiet," groused Allen Barcombe as he pointed to the nearest tower, jutting up 400 feet into the sky behind his house. ...The New York turbines, in two projects developed by Noble Environmental Power, are the first of nearly 400 expected to go up in five towns on a windy plateau just south of the Canadian border. When completed, the development about 90 minutes from Burlington will represent the largest concentration of wind turbines in the eastern United States.

A Blue Knob couple is seeking unspecified monetary compensation and is asking a court to intervene to reduce noise and vibration from energy generating turbines in the Allegheny Ridge Wind Farm. A Pittsburgh attorney representing Todd and Jill Stull of Pine Springs Lane, Portage, filed a 14-page civil lawsuit in Blair County court naming Gamesa Energy USA, developers of the wind farm in Portage Township, Cambria County, and Juniata and Greenfield townships, Blair County. ...At the urging of residents, the Portage Township supervisors say they will hire a sound expert to determine whether the turbines are being operated in violation of the ordinance. Similar action already has been taken by Juniata Township officials.

[A]fter they had brought a house in Depauville, they found out about the proposed Horse Creek Wind Project. They and their doctor believe that the turbines will produce similar low-frequency noises and those noises will interfere with his defibrillator. ...The low frequency noise range of these wind turbines could interfere with the proper functioning of Mr. Wilkie’s AIC defibrillator leading to shutting down of the device,” Carroll L. Moody, Mr. Wilkie’s cardiologist, wrote in a visit report. The plans for the development show one turbine within a half mile and nine within 1 ½ miles. In six months Mr. Wilkie had lived up here, he had not had an incident, his wife said. But 12 hours after he returned to Florida in March to finish moving and visit his doctor he collapsed. A second collapse led to a five-day hospital stay.

A community completely and bitterly divided over proposals for wind turbines is how Marshland St James was described in Parliament. MP for North West Norfolk Henry Bellingham called into question the efficiency of small clusters of onshore turbines. He said: "Putting small clusters of eight, nine or 10 turbines onshore does untold environmental damage, for very little gain ...Government subsidies are effectively being used by developers to achieve what is known locally as the Tesco factor: if one has enough money and one keeps coming back, one will eventually overwhelm the planning inspectorate - and even persuade local people, who have to use their own money to appeal, that it is not worth the fight."

Supervisor Frank Duserick said the town of Naples is investigating what legal standing it may have to protest the placement of wind turbines planned for neighboring Prattsburgh. "We're not against wind towers," Duserick said. "But we are for appropriate placement of towers. Our concern is they should have put them a minimum of 1,500 feet from the town line." Ecogen of West Seneca, near Buffalo, has proposed building up to 53 turbines - though the number could fall to 31 if it switches from a 1.5 to 2.5-megawatt model - in Prattsburgh in 2009.

The Juniata Township couple seeking relief from noisy wind turbines has taken their complaint to Blair County Court. Todd and Jill Stull, in a lawsuit filed at the courthouse, accuse Gamesa Energy USA LLC and the Allegheny Ridge Wind Farm LLC of destroying their quality of life and damaging their health. They're seeking an injunction ordering the noise to be reduced. ...The lawsuit also accuses Gamesa and the wind farm of securing permits and approvals to build on the basis that the turbines would cause no noise.

Fast-turning wind turbines could trigger seizures, a University of Essex professor has discovered. Arnold Wilkins, a neuropsychology lecturer at the university, found turbines rotating more than sixty times a minute could provoke epileptic seizures. Prof Wilkins, who heads up the university's Visual Perception Unit, worked with researchers at Aston University, Birmingham, to assess whether the flickering of sunlight caused by the shadow of wind turbines could affect photosensitive people. ..."There are guidelines now to prevent flickering adverts on TV. There needs to be the same regulations with wind turbines."

From the early 1980s through the early ‘90s, California was the national leader in wind energy development and power produced by wind farms. ...Are the turbines benefiting one aspect of the environment at the expense of another? Longtime Snow Creek resident Les Starks calls the wind farms "industrial slums" - claiming the windmills have displaced wildlife and degraded the quality of life for nearby residents. "There was a canyon near Whitewater Canyon that used to have thousands of bats," says Starks, "and now you don't see any." He's also noticed a decline in turkey buzzards migrating through the pass. ...With wind energy having been harnessed in the Desert for nearly three decades, the next few years will determine its future here. Presently, it accounts for just two percent of California's portfolio. That number surely will rise along with new and bigger windmills - love them or hate them.

Jane and Julian Davis left their Deeping St Nicholas home at Christmas 2006 after months of sleepless nights due to noise and vibration from the turbines, which are less than 1km from their house. However, there is a way forward at last after complaints to the Local Government Ombudsman over the handling of their issue by South Holland District Council, and monitoring of noise levels will now take place once more to establish the extent of the issue. Mrs Davis said: "Now we start all over again - but at last it is being accepted there are issues.

There's no scientific proof wind turbines make disturbing levels of noise and, although more study is needed, Ontario's guidelines are sound, a long-awaited consultant's report for the ministry of the environment says. The report by Ryerson prof Dr. Ramani Ramakrishnan was finished in December 2007 but was only posted on the government's Environmental Registry website on Monday.

Wind turbines could trigger dangerous epileptic fits and seizures according to two leading university professors today. Already criticised as a blot on the landscape and a threat to wildlife, giant commercial windmills could pose a serious risk to health, say experts who have been studying turbines and their effects. They claim that the more blades a turbine has and the faster it turns, the more likely it is to trigger a seizure for people who suffer from photosensitivity.

Unable to agree on an expert to gauge noise from Allegheny Ridge Wind Farm turbines, Portage Township and Juniata Township in Blair County will conduct separate studies. Portage officials said they likely will hire a company next week to conduct the sound study from their side of Blue Knob Mountain. "At this next meeting, we should have all of the information and I would hope we can come to some resolution," Supervisor Ken Trimbath said. ...Trimbath said the company doing the study must be acceptable to Babcock & Brown, owners of Allegheny Ridge. "My concern is the other way also: The results must be accepted if there is not a noise problem," Trimbath said.

A noise control consultant and acoustics expert urged planning commissioners here to create their own wind turbine ordinance that's tailored to the local community and more restrictive than the state's guidelines. Roughly 40 area residents, as well as some DTE Energy representatives, turned out for Wednesday's Lake Township Planning Commission meeting featuring a presentation by Richard R. James, owner of the Okemos-based E-Coustic Solutions. ...Township officials asked James to come to a meeting and share some of his expertise because they currently are conducting research for a wind overlay ordinance. Lake Township instituted a one-year moratorium on any wind farm developments during the township board's March meeting, said Lake Township Cleric and Planning Commissioner Valerie McCallum.

By the time federal regulators stopped accepting public comments about the proposed Nantucket Sound wind farm on Monday, two of the letters had already raised some eyebrows among the project's critics. That's because the two letters were signed by the same person, state Division of Marine Fisheries director Paul Diodati, but they struck noticeably different tones. ...Diodati's first letter [dated Feb. 20] spells out the loss of access that fishermen could face as well as concerns about rescue crews reaching a troubled boat in the area. But the second letter, dated March 7, tones down the rhetoric considerably, reducing the section that lists the potential impacts to fisheries to just a few sentences. The section also mentions a couple of possible benefits, such as certain species becoming attracted to the newly built tower foundations.