Dwarfed by Turbines

Dwarfed by Turbines

Friday, May 14, 2010

May 14, 2010 - Quick Update

Sorry I haven't blogged, our internet went down in Friday's storm. Here is a quick update.
The weekend was actually pretty good, although windy, the rain seems to help with our symptoms, and the wind was so high that I think the turbines may not have been running for part of the weekend.

On Tuesday the 11th, I met with a gentlemen named Ron who was responding to my call to Kruger office from the previous Friday (april 30th) when it was so bad here. We had a good discussion. He was going to share some of my further concerns and questions with Kruger management and get back to me. ( I should mention that he is actually contracted with the company and not representing the company directly, but I had called his number last Friday and he was good enough to respond. I have met him in the past and I do appreciate his efforts in coming out to hear the updates).

So, we are currently waiting to hear back from Kruger and hopefully we will be able to find some type of middle ground. I did suggest that if they were unwilling to shut down the two turbines closest to us, perhaps we could try shutting them down when wind levels are in the direction and at the RPM's that seem to be affecting us the most. Perhaps we can find a level and direction where this would happen automatically and thus eliminate some of our concerns.

At this time, we are really dealing with only the symptoms and health concerns issues while inside our home. However, as summer comes we will be spending more time in our yard and on our property and we will likely need to deal with the issues of being outside, as well as the "annoyance" factor at a later date.

Through all of this, I remain optimistic that the completed renovation, together with cooperation from Kruger may assist us to relieve our symptoms. Having said that, I am still concerned about the unknown affects to our children and ourselves. There seem to be a lot of well-educated and informed "professionals" out there who believe that long term exposure to the turbines and the low frequency noise they emit can be harmful.

Further to that, I hope that others out there who are having extreme symptoms and are being forced to leave their homes are going to be heard and helped. Our government needs to take notice and do something NOW, not years from now when the suffering and illness has spread accross Ontario and Canada.

I heard our local Mayor, Randy Hope, on the radio the other day and I am very disappointed that he does not seem to have any concerns at all with the numbers of wind turbines being erected in ChathamKent and in fact, is focusing on only the dollars being brought into the municipality from them. He had stated that he wanted to see that money spent on certain things and not just put into the general funds.
I have to wonder if this is not an attempt to "buy" the general population of ChathamKent with the attitude of sacrifice the few for the good of many. I don't think my family is worthless and I certainly believe that if the general population new about the ongoing suffering of the few (which are slowly becoming the many) that the majority would agree that no life is worthless.

I still compare this issue to smoking. It took far too long for the government to admit that smoking is harmful and addictive and that deaths were a result of not only the choice to smoke, but also second hand smoke. Finally people can make an educated choice whether to expose themselves to the affects of smoking and second hand smoke. Where is our choice? Why are we forced to be exposed to wind turbines so close to our home that we can feel the vibration....

That's it for today...

Nik

2 comments:

Leendert said...

Hey Nik and Gerrod.

Have you ever thought about having somebody come over and do any type of seismic survey? Everything I've read here leans toward vibrations at your place coming through the ground. A buddy of mine does that kind of work for the oil industry and he described his equipment as so sensitive that they record whether planes are flying over when taking seismic readings as they affect the results. Seismic readings when the turbines are spinning and when they're not -- that's got to be some pretty good hard evidence to help the cause.

Just a thought.

Len Wiltenburg

Nik said...

Thank you Len. We have talked to many experts in many fields and thought about measuring vibration also. The problem is that the wind turbine companies will deny that the vibrations are caused by the turbines and will state that there is no proof. We had visible vibration in our house, items moving off of shelves, you could feel it in the floors and walls at times. It started only after the turbines went up and it was witnessed by company representatives, local city councillors and others. We were told there was no proof that this was caused by turbines. In fact, we also had a noise study done and were told that our noise problems were coming from something inside our house! Thanks for the advice, we are considering every avenue. Basically, at this point, we are finalizing the renovation and then we will deal with whatever remaining issues we have...we are still hopeful the company will listen and help. Thanks again. Nik