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128 comments on DrumBeat: November 4, 2008
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128 comments on DrumBeat: November 4, 2008
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It seems to me that dismissing those who find turbines distressing in too cavalier a manner is unwise.
Some people are just a lot more sensitive to some stimuli than others, for instance in allergies, and it is perhaps possible that sensitivity to low frequency noise and perhaps changes in pressure may be much greater in some than in others.
Many who readily dismiss what they regard as nimbyism in this respect give credence to alleged leukemia clusters near nuclear power stations, but are reluctant to entertain any criticism of their pet projects.
I agree that we should not dismiss these complaints too quickly.
And with your point that some people are much more sensitive to certain stimuli is well taken. In my own experience, I've never had allergy problems, but I do get minor allergy symptoms from drinking even one can of beer - but only in the fall and spring. Maybe it's due to some combination of local pollens and something in the beer ???.
In any case, the phenomena should be investigated and if it is not psychosomatic we can hopefully find the cause and way to alleviate the problem.
Canada has been increasing its hydroelectric capacity. Alaska has great potential for hydroelectric dams. In Russia they had dams in the far north, had to make sure the intake for the water turbines was below the level for ice formation in the winter. The operating costs of hydro are very low, lower than for nuclear. Aluminum smelting required electricity to reduce the bauxite aluminum ore. Bauxite formed with the decomposition of clays at southern latitudes. Some of the first aluminum smelting was accomplished at Niagra due to the tremendous power potential there.
I used to be very skeptical of this kind of complaint until I married a prominent physician who treats many people with these issues. Many people become allergic to the yeast in beer and wine as they get older and their immune systems are less able to cope, myself included.
Not so fast. Just because someone who casually visits can not hear it, does not mean someone who lives there cannot. Many people are seriously affected by this kind of thing.
If wind power is going to be a major means of replacing fossil fuels we are going to need hundreds of thousands of square miles of wind farms. This is going to be a major issue in the American west and Europe where it is going to be difficult to locate them away from people far enough not to cause these effects. This is a much more serious issue than the fears some have of living near nuclear power plants since they take up so little land. Wind energy has significant visual and auditory pollution issues.
It's quite true. Most people cannot see a computer monitor flicker if the refresh rate is set to 60hz, but it gives me a headache within a matter of minutes. Whenever I did tech support, the first thing I would do if the monitor was set to 60hz is change it to 70hz or higher. I didn't have to check the settings, I could easily tell from everything just barely flickering for me. Fortunately new LCD monitors don't havve the same problem, even if their refresh rate is 60hz, as the brightness of the pixel doesn't fade away.
Similarly, with the new LED products that are coming out that run on A/C power, depending on how the power is rectified, I can see the 60hz "pulse" of the power in the LEDs. Incandescent, fluorescent, or DC powered LEDs do not cause this problem for me.
Other examples are CRT televisions that produce high-pitch whines cannot often be heard by others, but drive me absolutely batty, and when I was on vacation in Tokyo, Japan there would sometimes be ultrasonic bug repellers near entrances to businesses to prevent bugs from flying in the open doors which would also cause me pain.
In all of these instances, some other people experienced the same problems, while most people didn't. Some people just aren't sensitive to such things, or aren't as receptive. It's crazy how no matter how hard of a time I have deciphering what a person is saying when there is a lot of noise, there's no way anybody could sneak up behind me unless there was loud music via headphones or speakers going on..
60Hz flicker and the 60Hz "whine" of a TV set bothers me, too. Even car taillights flicker at 60Hz. If you look at one and quickly rotate your eye, it will make a trail like this:
_ _ _ _ _
Driving on the freeway is mildly unnerving because of this.
It's quite likely that in these cases, the car manufacturer is "overdriving" the LEDs to increase their brightness. An LED can be overdriven, increasing the light out put but decreasing its life if it is overdriven for a period of time. This is overcome by using PWM, or Pulse Width Modulation, to where the LED flashes on/off so fast that MOST humans cannot see it. If the PWM was set to a higher cycle rate, it wouldn't be seen, but they likely use the 60Hz as it is a standard with so many things. I suspect in time as documented cases increase, the auto manufacturers will hopefully increase the cycle rate to something higher, to at least 70Hz or 80Hz. Standard DC LED's that are not overdriven will not produce this effect.