PET(4)-12-12 : Tuesday 17 July 2012
P-04-329 : Control of Noise nuisance from Wind Turbines
Paper to Note
Note on the Petitions Committee Report
on the Control of Noise from wind turbines.
Grŵp Blaengwen thanks the Assembly Petitions Committee for their report, and for the attention they have given to this matter, which is so important in Gwyddgrug and beyond.
We hope the Committee’s report will be a turning point in giving the matter of intrusive wind turbine noise the attention it demands, and in making the required changes in regulation and planning guidance in Wales and in the UK.
We believe Welsh institutions could play an important role in research to help solve the problems of intrusive wind turbine noise.
The Report’s Recommendations 1 and 3 directly concern planning guidance in Wales. The E&S committee has just reported on Energy policy and appears to suggest further deferment of planning changes. With respect we ask the Assembly to order changes to be made as soon as practically possible.
Recommendation 2is a matter the Assembly, if they accept it, would take forward to the UK Parliament. We hope they will do this quickly, well in time for the next session of Parliament. It is for the Assembly to determine the most appropriate way of raising the matter in this UK context.
In the meantime the Assembly could suspend or moderate the role of ETSU-R-97 in TAN 8 and other wind turbine planning guidance, and we urge them to do so.
Recommendation 4is for the Institute of Acoustics Noise Working Group. It is scheduled to publish its report in September, so the group may be finishing consultations now. Grŵp Blaengwen asks the Petitions Committee to forward this report to the Noise Working Group, drawing their attention to all the recommendations and particularly no 4.
We would like to see the Petitions Committee report published as an Appendix to the Noise Working Group report, or for that Group to report separately after 'meaningful consultation with people living close to wind farms.’ The former is more likely in the short term and we ask the Committee to ask the Noise Working Group to do that.
Following the Committee’s recommendations, Grŵp Blaengwen will also write to the Institute of Acoustics. We are grateful to the Petitions Committee recommendations for this opportunity.
We regret that we won’t be able to attend the plenary session of the Assembly at which the report will be discussed: July 11 and 12 are important days in the planning hearings on RWE’s proposals for 28 wind turbines in Brechfa Forest West.
In the course of those hearings, it has emerged that RWE, the Applicant, argues that what it describes as the “urgent need” for alternative energy sources should over-ride sleep and health experts on the effects of intrusive turbine noise.
We ask Petitions Committee members and other interested AMs to refer this report on Noise from Wind Turbines to the Assembly Health Minister and senior Departmental officers, as deserving urgent attention, consultation and action.
Although we cannot be there, we will follow the reports of the Plenary Session. Once again we thank Mr Foster and the Petitions Committee for the valuable opportunity they created for this important matter to be raised in the Assembly and elsewhere.