Noise from wind turbines and health effects - Investigation of wind turbine noise spectra

摘要

The Danish Cancer Society is conducting an objective register based cohort study of whether noise from wind turbines can cause health problems. The study is investigating connections between noise levels from all land based Danish wind turbines with registered health problems for neighbours to wind turbines and are utilizing the unique combination of the Danish health register and a long history of wind turbines. The study includes occupants at all dwellings/houses which potentially can hear one or more wind turbines. The calculation of the noise levels are performed by DELTA based on weather statistics provided by the Technical University of Denmark. The noise calculation is executed each hour for all Danish land based wind turbines connected to grid in the years 1982-2013. The used calculation method is the Nord2000 method developed by DELTA and other Nordic institutes. Basis for the noise calculation is a study of results from wind turbine noise measurement reports during 1982 to 2013. The measurement methods have changed over the years, and the measurements are not necessarily performed for the frequency range, frequency resolution and wind speeds which are interesting for this study. This paper describes how data is collected to form the 100 classes of wind turbines, which forms the basis for calculations of the contribution of noise at the neighbours. Each class contains one third sound power spectra at wind speeds from 3 to 14 m/s and an assessment of the tonality and validity of the results in each of the classes.