Strategies to Reduce Effects of Noise Emission Due to Wind Turbines Close to Urban Areas
for Public Policy Makers:
A Review of the Literature
- Introduction
The world has been becoming more polluted day-by-day since the Industrial Revolution in 1760. The mechanization requires more energy to sustain its progress. Therefore, energy needing has also increased with industrial developments. Over the last quarter of 20th century, society has begun to realize changings of ecological balance, and negative effects on public health. Due to the world has limited sources, and consumption of fossil energy sources, such as petroleum, natural gas, coal, etc., causes greenhouse gas emissions, community has concerned about future of the planet. Nowadays, a trend is raised toward cleaner energy sources to reduce such emissions (Jianu, Rosen, & Naterer, 2011, p.1). In this context, nuclear energy and renewable energy sources come up as alternatives to fossil fuels. Beside nuclear energy, renewable sources compose of solar energy, wind power, hydropower, etc. Among these components, wind energy is the most promising one due to highly efficient performance and lower maintenance cost of it comparing to others.
Wind energy is converted by using wind turbines, which are specially designed to convert kinetic energy from wind to electrical power by movements of propellers. Romero-Sanz and Matesanz (2008) have pointed out that, “the use of wind turbines produces much lower impact than traditional energy sources, but there are still some important topics that should be considered and minimized, such as acoustic and the visual contamination, the deforestation of regions of natural interest and the use of energy to build wind turbine” (p.27). Although there are highly beneficial impacts of wind power on nature and the issues cause reductive results on public welfare, the side effects of wind energy should be focused to reduce.
In this context, this article investigates the literature concerning about noise emission of windmills, and effects of the noise pollution on urban life close to them. Ten different articles were examined to present what has been already told about the issue. Despite many research, the needing of strategy development to decrease effects of noise pollution is significant. Therefore, the purpose of this article is to review the literature related to strategies to reduce effects of low-frequency noise of wind turbines on urban areas. The driving question of leading the literature review was: What kind of strategies to reduce noise pollution effect of wind turbines on public welfare could be developed for public-policy makers to apply?
- The Literature Review
Citation percentages describe to researchers the importance and relativeness of an article on research field. Therefore, the research was conducted by using the most cited journal articles on the issue of renewable energy; such as Wind Energy, Wind Engineering, Noise Control Engineering, etc. To specify and easy reach to articles, some keywords were used; as wind power* plus noise emission* or pollution* plus public health* or welfare* plus strategy*. Limiters of the search were date range (1995-2015), full text documents only, and peer-reviewed journals. Although the side-effects of renewable energy sources is quite new study field, there are numerous articles written about identifying negative aspects of wind turbines. However, the examined literature was not offering strategies to reduce negative effects of the renewable that much. The current studies are mostly about technical reasons and results of them.
- Findings from the literature review
Wind turbines are basically made up of a rotor, and three propellers connected to it. Kinetic energy is existed by motion of this propeller system. Each movement results five outputs; energy, landscape pollution with inadequate locations, bird life threat, visual pollution, and noise emission (Gumula, Pytel & Silarska, 2014). Contrary to popular belief, wind turbines have noise pollution effect on public welfare beside its high-energy efficiency. Therefore, the results of noise emission caused by wind turbines and strategies to reduce the pollution will be presented in following sections.
- Negative Results of Noise Emission due to Wind Farms on Public Welfare
- Annoyance
Current studies have shown that one of the components of public peace is environmental noise pollution. Weinstein (1980) states “previous studies of community noise have found that people who tend to be consistently negative could be predicted to be more annoyed by a new source of noise” (as cited in Pederson and Waye, 2004). Moreover, individual sensitivity and attitude could have impact on the variation of noise annoyance due to wind turbine noise (Pederson & Waye, 2004). However, the consistency of disturbance is constant result of wind turbines close to living spaces. In this context, The World Health Organization (WHO) has published guidelines presenting noise edges of human anatomy for various result sections. The guideline points out the ideal sound level goal to prevent sleep disturbances, and nighttime noise level from wind turbines outside of residences as 40 dBA (Hassler & Hessler, 2010). The environmental negativity of wind energy is not a limitation to sustain developments. Each movement of propellers makes consistent sound with impact of wind. In addition, psychological effects naturally happen due to this noise from wind turbines. Therefore, WHO and many scholars take care of annoyance issue from wind energy in order to demonstrate the results on public life. Research have found that constant annoyance effect of noise emission from wind turbines reduces the level of public welfare and also property values due to social unrest.
- Downfall on Property Values Close to Wind Turbines
Environmental prosperity determines value of local properties. Nevertheless, annoyance causing from noise pollution reduces public welfare constantly. Therefore, there is a strong relationship between residential property prices and noise emission from wind turbines. Jensen, Panduro, and Lundhede’s (2014) found in their study that the values of neighboring residential estates are significantly impacted negative by wind turbines (p.89). The visual appearance and noise emission of wind farms have an important role on human subconscious. Even if the residents are not physiologically affected by visual appearance of wind turbines, noise pollution has critical impacts on public health. Therefore, residential properties lose their values due to public opinion effected by negativities of wind turbines. As cited in Jensen, Panduro, and Lundhede (2014), “nearby wind facilities significantly reduce property values. Results show that property prices reduced by between 8.8% and 14.87% at a distance of 0.5 miles to the nearest turbine (Heintzelman & Tuttle, 2012)” (p.90). The accurate results have shown that while rescuing future of the world, human beings decrease public welfare unconsciously. Therefore, the inventions should be made real with its negative effects preventing instructions and strategies.
- Strategies to Avoid Noise Effects of Wind Turbines
- Location Preference for Wind Turbines – On-land and Offshore –
Renewable source appliances are precisely built up to places where have the most efficient power capacity. Therefore, we always encounter with wind turbines in locations with high wind potential, even if these places are close to residential areas. The negativities have impact distance up to some levels. Kamperman and James (2009) reported that “the residents living as far as 2 miles from a wind farm complain of sleep disturbance from the noise. Many of residents living one-tenth this distance (1000 feet) from a wind farm are experiencing major sleep disruption and other serious medical problems from nighttime turbine noise” (p.8). So, placement selection of wind turbine sites should be according to the less effective distance-decibel proportion on human health. It is difficult to say that what is the best distance from wind generation fields for residential areas. Because, each location has different geographical structure, wind capacity, and habitat features. Therefore, location options differ according to local characteristics. On the other hand, current studies offer two appropriate options; on-land and offshore wind farms. On-land siting for wind energy operations has become more difficult to see in an increasing number of locations. Due to the external costs of wind turbines, on-land preference of wind farm locations is in the situation. However, offshore wind power era may be an answer for this issue (Ladenburg, 2009). According to Ladenburg, “the preferences for offshore locations strongly indicate that the environmental costs can be significantly reduced by the location of offshore wind farms at large distances from the coast” (p.171).
- Legislative Regulations for Wind Turbine Noise Level Designs
Although locating them into offshore sites could reduce environmental results of noise emission due to wind turbines, this option might not work for some countries that have not coastal areas. Hessler and Hessler (2010) suggested some “design goals and regulatory limits for new wind projects” (p.94). The design goals mainly consist of natural noise threshold of tolerance of a person and minimum distance limit of wind farms from the closest residential areas – 40 dBA and at least 2 miles – (Hessler & Hessler, 2010; Heintzelman & Tuttle, 2012; Schiff, Magari, Smith, & Rohr, 2013). Measuring potential noise emission due to industrial wind turbine operation is the first step of regulative movements (Schiff, Magari, Smith, & Rohr, 2013, p.509). The second step is conducting propeller modification methods to reduce noise without any power loss. Aerodynamic noise of wind turbines could be avoided by “adding serrations” to blades. The proven adaptive approach is another noise emission reductive regulation for wind turbine production (Jianu, Rosen, & Naterer, 2011; Laratro, Arjomandi, Kelso, & Cazzolato, 2014). If the limitations offered above would be legislated, future wind power investments will be adjusted in way that provides noise emission reduced wind energy generation fields.
- Synthesis of Literature Review
The literature review above has investigated ten studies related to noise issue due to wind turbines. This ten sources study has found out two main results of wind turbine noise emission on public welfare, and offered two strategies to avoid and reduce noise pollution due to wind power. Among the articles investigated, four articles (Gumula, Pytel, & Piaskowska-Silarska, 2014; Jensen, Panduro, & Lundhede, 2014; Ledenburg, 2009; Pedersen & Waye, 2004) provide information about existences due to noise emission from wind farms, and other six articles (Romero-Sanz & Matesanz, 2008; Kamperman & James, 2009; Hessler & Hessler, 2011; Jianu, Rosen, & Naterer, 2012; Schiff, Magari, Smith, & Rohr, 2013;; Laratro, Arjomandi, Kelso, & Cazzolato, 2014) offer solutions and develop strategies to current issues about noise pollution from wind turbines. Although, all of the studies mention results and noise pollution effects of wind turbines and solutions for them, any of sources do focus on administrative resolutions of the issue for public policy-makers. Future research on the issue of noise due to wind turbines might address legislative responsibilities of governments to avoid the case and reduce the effects.
- Conclusion
This article purposed to review the literature related to strategies to reduce effects of noise due to wind turbines on urban areas for public policy makers. As a result, two related problem were found out to develop strategic solutions to them. Moreover, two main solutions were offered to solve the problems and develop strategies. Findings would be helpful to generate new regulations for administrative institutions. On account of public policy makers need to be aware of the convergent problems of wind turbines with public welfare.
References
Gumuła, S., Pytel, K., & Piaskowska-Silarska, M. (2014). Environmental and Economic Benefits of Using Kinetic Wind Energy to Generate Electricity. Polish Journal of Environmental Studies , 23 (6), 2315-2320.
Hessler, D. M., & Hessler, G. F. (2011). Recommended noise level design goals and limits at residential receptors for wind turbine developments in the United States. Noise Control Engineering Journal, 59(1), 94-104
Jensen U., C., Panduro, T. E., & Lundhede, T. (2014). The Vindication of Don Quixote: The Impact of Noise and Visual Pollution from Wind Turbines. Land Economics, 90(4), 668-682
Jianu, O., Rosen, M.A., Naterer, G., 2012. Noise Pollution Prevention in Wind Turbines: Status and Recent Advances. Sustainability, 4, 1104-1117
Kamperman, G. W., & James, R. R. (2009). Guidelines for selecting wind turbine sites. Sound and vibration, 43(7), 8-12
Ladenburg, J. (2009), Stated public preferences for on-land and offshore wind power generation—a review. Wind Energy., 12: 171–181. doi: 10.1002/we.308
Laratro, A., Arjomandi, M., Kelso, R., & Cazzolato, B. (2014). A discussion of wind turbine interaction and stall contributions to wind farm noise. Journal of Wind Engineering and Industrial Aerodynamics, 127, 1-10
Pedersen, E., & Waye, K. P. (2004). Perception and annoyance due to wind turbine noise—a dose–response relationship. The Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 116(6), 3460-3470
Romero-Sanz, I., & Matesanz, Á. (2008). Noise Management on Modern Wind Turbines. Wind Engineering, 32(1), 27-44
Schiff, M. T., Magari, S. R., Smith, C. E., & Rohr, A. C. (2013). Field evaluation of wind turbine-related noise in western New York State. Noise Control Engineering Journal, 61(5), 509-519. doi:10.3397/1/3761045