26th May 2021
By Steven Cooper.
Wind Turbine Noise: Psychoacoustics to the Rescue. Forum Acusticum, Dec 2020, Lyon, France
Protecting the acoustic amenity of communities living near wind farms is at the forefront of Steven Coopers outstanding work.
Effective investigation of wind turbine noise requires working with residents, utilising residents diaries and observations, recognising the presence of unnatural and unique acoustic signatures and understanding that wind turbine noise and the impacts, differs to traffic noise, requiring different noise assessments.
Steven Cooper (and other acousticians) investigate the issues and why current limits on wind turbine noise may not meet the amenity needs of communities now suffering from wind turbine noise.
Residents do not have to see or hear wind turbines to be affected. The problem of disturbance to residents arises from ‘the pulsating nature of the acoustic signature of wind turbines with respect to fluctuation’. (based on work by Zwicker and Fastl)
Further investigations, including sleep monitoring support Mr Coopers original hypothesis as to disturbance in the ground-breaking Cape Bridgewater study report.
This paper suggests the answer to resolving the noise and pulsation issues causing annoyance, is found at the level of modulation at the third and fourth harmonics of the blade pass frequency.
Not through noise regulations using dBA measuring and averaging out noise data.
~ DeFrock ~
DeFrock 