Posted By: djh

Posted By: tedAnyone like to hazard a guess as to the level of accuracy sound meters, approved to the highest international standard, are? Or the level of accuracy of the calibration devices that are used to set those meters and approved to the same international standard?

Don't google it first please - I'd really like to know what people's off-the-cuff assumptions might be.

Level of accuracy as described by plus or minus x.x dB.

Come on then, Ted! Let the cat out of the bag. Enquiring minds want to know. Or at least whisper the answer to those of us who have posted a guess.

IEC 61672 Class 1 sound meter

Accuracy
±1.9 dB at 1 kHz
±3.2 dB at 20 Hz
+4.0 dB at 16 kHz
-16.0 dB at 16 kHz

Standard calibration takes place at 94 dB at 1 kHz.

Where is that standard from Ted?

Hear no evil... ? B^>

Rgds

Damon

If you want an introduction to the far from straight-forward world of decibels then this is the best I have found:

http://www.animations.physics.unsw.edu.au/jw/dB.htm

'Fair share' is an interesting concept! Have the county's residents all done their 'fair share' of conservation, I wonder?

Rgds

Damon

Point taken!

Reducing energy use is as much a change in attitude as in U-values, and saves money too.

Can they afford not to, like education?

Rgds

Damon

Posted By: JoinerCan they afford their "fair share" though, as one of the poorest regions in the country?

"The infrastructure is poor and some communities do not have access to public transport. Lincolnshire remains one of the poorest areas in the country with one quarter of the population living in neighbourhoods that have been rated in the 20% most deprived areas in England."

From:http://www.lincolnshireprobationtrust.org.uk/AboutUs/Equality+and+Diversity" rel="nofollow" >http://www.lincolnshireprobationtrust.org.uk/AboutUs/Equality+and+Diversity

Back to convincing LAs of the wisdom of the AECB's thinking? Who's to fund it?http://1.2.3.9/bmi/www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/forum114/extensions/Vanillacons/smilies/standard/wink.gif" alt="" title="" >

Must be a different lincolnshire to the one I left as a youngster. As far as I was aware one of the highest energy use counties per population in the country. 2 major oil refineries one of europes largest steelworks and a large number of chemical works.

"Windy, the petitions committee are recommending a 1500m set-back, subject to conditions."

the problem with using distance as the determining factor is that low frequency sound reduces by 6db with every doubling of distance.

meaning that once you get up to a certain sound level, you really can't rely on increasing the distance from the sound source to reduce the noise to a reasonable level without having ridiculously big exclusion areas.

so roughly a house at 1500m will have a 6db reduction vs a house at 750m. If these reports are showing that 750m makes a house unihabitable, then a 6db reduction from that isn't going to make the noise level insignificant. I'd think you'd need at least a 12db reduction for that to be the case, which would mean a 3km exclusion zone if 750m isn't bearable, which is starting to get silly.

IMO the only sensible solution is to reduce the volume of the noise at source, which is likely to involve a limit on the size and number of turbines - or realisitcally a combination of that and distance.

Those doing the planning of these projects, and those assessing them urgently need to get a better grasp of the core fundamentals of this issue IMO.

Posted By: JoinerWe genuinely have reached a point where the contribution to energy supply has become secondary to ROI.

Probably true of the lay person, not so sure for the energy companies as they are directly or indirectly legislated to supply power, to minimum standards, day in day out. So they have other reasons to invest, why they liked the FITs, it was easy to pass the price on.

Still think they should put a high Carbon Tax on everything.

They are just developers though, they do not produce the power and distribute it. They do not get bonuses for producing low CO2 energy.
Must be about time I wound up Ian Mays again

The issue of community benefit funds was mentioned on this thread about a month ago.

Just found out that the fund associated with our local wind farm (£75,000 a year) has refused to cough up unless their 'preferred' companies are given the contract on a couple of local improvement projects.

In both cases the projects have said 'no thanks, we'll get the money from elsewhere'.

Someone (not me) will be looking in to it. Most of the people involved are my neighbours.

No surprise in Ed Davey's stand, Brian. It's stock LibDem stuff. But it just brings us back to the FACT that what's hitting the media nowadays are more reports of COMPLAINTS about wind farms from people who had originally supported the idea and shouted down the objectors.

Still very much a case of having to be careful about what you wish for because it might just happen and you might not like what you get.

A recent application for a small 20 kW CF20 turbine on a chicken farm contained this in the Planning Officer's report...

Planning Policy Statement (PPS) 22 ‘Renewable Energy’ has been recently
replaced by the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) published on 27th
March 2012, which sets out the Government’s planning policies for England.
However, the original companion guide to PPS22 is still current and now provides a
Companion Guide to the NPPF.

From what others have said, I was under the impression that the PPS22 Companion Guide had been made as redundant as PPS22 itself by the NPPF.

Who's right?

(Incidentally I have no problem with a turbine of this size - 20kW with to-tip height of 27m - just wish they weren't siting it 200 metres away from a residential home.)