Professor John Ffowcs Williams, a world acoustic expert at Cambridge University says modern very tall turbines do cause problems and guidelines fail adequately to protect the public. Nicol Stephen the Deputy First Minister for Scotland, when standing beneath a newly commissioned turbine recently, said: "It was as noisy as being below the path of a very low flying aircraft." Such a statement is highly significant when made by the Deputy First Minister who is a vigorous supporter of wind turbine energy. Of course low flying aircraft move on, unfortunately wind turbines do not.

Many people seem to be referring to the efficiency of wind turbines. From my point of view what's important is the fact that their maximum output is always referred to, rather than their actual average output. Their actual average output is only about 25% of their maximum output; so quoting their maximum output makes them appear four times more useful than they really are. If one really wants to refer to their efficiency, one would have to compare their output with all the wind energy passing through the envelope of their blade rotation, and the figure would undoubtedly be minuscule.The... [continue via Web link]

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