A small group of people have complained and argued that wind turbines can cause health problems. A new study confirms that those people are wrong and in fact wind turbines are not a health risk at all.
The study acknowledges that a minority of people find the intermittent swooshing noise emitted by the turbines’ giant blades to be annoying, but it also concluded: “Annoyance is not a pathological entity.”
The study says there’s “nothing unique” about the noise or vibrations emitted by wind turbines and no evidence that the audible or sub-audible sounds have any direct adverse effect on health.
It suggests that those who are bothered by turbines simply have a lower tolerance for annoying sounds of all sorts.
“A major cause of concern about wind turbine sound is its fluctuating nature. Some may find this sound annoying, a reaction that depends primarily on personal characteristics as opposed to the intensity of the sound level.”