{"id":43746,"date":"2021-11-15T14:58:49","date_gmt":"2021-11-15T19:58:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/?p=43746"},"modified":"2021-11-15T14:58:49","modified_gmt":"2021-11-15T19:58:49","slug":"something-that-needs-to-be-looked-into","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/?p=43746","title":{"rendered":"Something That Needs To Be Looked Into"},"content":{"rendered":"

I don’t usually use articles from The Guardian, but even a blind squirrel finds an acorn occasionally. On November 8th, The Guardian<\/a> posted an article about a French couple who won a lawsuit claiming health issues caused by a nearby wind farm. This is not the first time that wind farms have been cited for creating various health problems (article here<\/a>).<\/p>\n

The article at The Guardian reports:<\/p>\n

A French court has recognised \u201cturbine syndrome\u201d after a couple complained their health was damaged by living near a windfarm.<\/strong><\/p>\n

In what is believed to be the first judgment of its kind in France<\/a>, Belgians Christel and Luc Fockaert were awarded more than \u20ac100,000 in compensation by the judge in Toulouse.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The couple claimed they experienced a range of health problems<\/a> including headaches, insomnia, heart irregularities, depression, dizziness, tinnitus and nausea for more than two years, insisting these were caused by six wind turbines set up 700 metres from their home at Fontrieu in the Tarn, southern France.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The turbines had been installed in 2008. However, it was reported that the couple\u2019s health problems started five years later. The Fockaerts believed this was because woodland between their property and the nearest turbine was cut down.<\/strong><\/p>\n

They singled out the noise, which they said was \u201ccomparable to a washing machine continually turning\u201d, and the \u201cwhite flashing lights\u201d on the turbines, as particularly detrimental to their health.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cWe didn\u2019t understand straight away, but little by little we realised the problem came from the turbines,\u201d Christel Fockaert said. \u201cThe turbines flash every two seconds \u2026 we had to have outside lights to counter the effect of the flashes.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

The couple moved away from the area in 2015 and said their health problems disappeared shortly afterwards.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Doctors failed to find any health problem, but a court expert said turbine syndrome had been previously identified by scientific research.<\/strong><\/p>\n

There are also other problems with wind turbines. They don’t biodegrade and are so large that it only takes a few of them to fill up a landfill. There is also the matter of bird kills. In October 2020, a website called CFACT<\/a> posted the following:<\/p>\n

Wildlife conservationists hate Wind turbines for their infamous role as bird killer, a fact that is very rarely mentioned in the news media.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Pro-renewable lobbies argue that there are many causes for bird mortality and that the mortality contribution from Wind Turbines is quite insignificant. However, people who do actual ground work in protecting these birds\u2013biologists, bird conservationists, wildlife ecologists, and non-profit organizations\u2013disagree with this argument.<\/strong><\/p>\n

According to experts, Wind turbines pose a significant risk to birds, especially to large raptors, birds of prey, <\/u><\/a>and other migratory soaring birds. Even in a very high quality habitat, Wind turbines cause disproportionate increases in collision mortality<\/u><\/a>. Besides direct injury and deaths, Wind farm turbines also cause functional habitat loss for migratory soaring birds<\/u><\/a>, leading to significant damage to flocks.<\/strong><\/p>\n

In the U.S., the government is well aware of the Wind turbine potential to kill birds in large numbers. So much so that Wind operators have been allotted bird-kill quotas which indicate the number of birds that the wind operator is allowed to kill in a year.<\/strong><\/p>\n

It is a fact that is so well established, that researchers no longer ponder if Wind turbines kill or not. They have moved on to addressing how to minimize these deaths and finding solutions for more efficient ways<\/u><\/a> to calculate the collision mortality rates. Countries like India are even planning to introduce guidelines<\/a> to protect birds from wind mills.<\/strong><\/p>\n

A 2019 study estimated that wind turbines affect the life and habitat of around 150,000 birds<\/u><\/a> in the U.S. annually. But the numbers are only going to get higher, as more wind turbines will be installed in the U.S. (Installed wind energy capacity in the United States doubled from 2012 to 2020). The American Bird Conservancy predicts<\/u><\/a> that if 20 percent of the nation\u2019s electricity comes through wind power it will potentially kill at least one million birds per year by 2030.<\/strong><\/p>\n

I think we need to do more research before we decide that wind farms are the answer to our energy needs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I don’t usually use articles from The Guardian, but even a blind squirrel finds an acorn occasionally. On November 8th, The Guardian posted an article about a French couple who won a lawsuit claiming health issues caused by a nearby … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[14544,1474,726,14543,6399,14542,14541],"class_list":["post-43746","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-birds-of-prey","tag-cfact","tag-france","tag-large-raptors","tag-the-guardian","tag-turbine-syndrome","tag-wind-mills"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43746","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=43746"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43746\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":43748,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43746\/revisions\/43748"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=43746"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=43746"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=43746"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}