An article from 2021 is circulating on social media with the headline „Doctors and research confirm: wind turbines kill“. The article is full of misinformation, confusing references and arbitrary conclusions.
The article begins with the claim: „Cutting-edge research shows that living near windmills is dangerous to your health. Doctors working near wind turbines have more patients. These people are advised to move elsewhere.“
The article claims that the World Health Organisation (WHO) has declared that wind turbine noise is a serious health risk and that „Professor Breitbart James Delingpole“ from Germany has taken the issue to heart, saying that wind turbines can be bad for the heart.
The article also refers to a recent research article by a professor at the University of Bergen in Norway on compensation for local residents, as well as the location of wind farms. „What is happening in Estonia is exceptional in the whole of the European Union,“ because „wind farms closer than 140 km to people are no longer accepted in the European Union“. Referring to the Norwegian researcher’s article, it is added that outside Estonia, the damage is compensated „by giving communities a significant amount of money“ or „by making them shareholders in the parks“. By way of comparison, „Estonia, unfortunately, sold its marine area very cheaply“ and „In Estonia, people get a bicycle track or a playground in the kindergarten [as compensation]. Yay!“.
It is also claimed that the port of Jaagupi in Pärnu County has been „blockaded for years to stop opposition from fishermen“. It is written that plans to dredge the harbour have been stopped by the municipality’s administration and that „people are not allowed to sell land, sea and forest“. Under the same heading, maps drawn up by Helcom (Baltic Marine Environment Protection Commission), are presented as if they were linked to the wind farm planning: „In Estonia, protected seals and fish have been excluded from the planning maps. These maps were drawn up by a company which is a shareholder in the Saaremaa wind farm and is also responsible for Rail Baltic.“
Health effects of wind turbines
The article claims that the WHO has declared wind turbine noise a serious health risk. This is false. The WHO has not produced a separate report on the health effects of wind turbines. However, the WHO has produced a guide on the effects of environmental noise and recommended limits. The guide identifies wind turbines as potential sources of environmental noise, which should be below 45 decibels.
The article points out that doctors in Amsterdam sent an „emergency letter“ to the Dutch government, which has been taken note of by the Dutch Institute for Public and Environmental Health (RIVM). The editorial of this fact check has not been able to find a source confirming that such a letter has been sent to the Dutch government. Nor has RIVM issued an official position confirming the letter or a response to it. RIVM has, however, over the years monitored studies on the potential impact of wind farms on human health.
The 2020 RIVM report suggests that links between wind farms and sleep disturbance are possible, but due to the paucity of studies, a direct link is unclear. Evidence on the possibility of sleep disturbance is largely derived from people’s personal assessments rather than objective sleep indicators. Further studies that consider subjective and objective sleep indicators together would be needed to obtain adequate clinical results.
The article quotes „German professor Breitbart James Delingpole“ as saying that „wind turbines can be bad for the heart“. First of all, there is no such person. There has presumably been a mix-up, as James Delingpole is a British journalist, who among other things, is a columnist for the dubious value US-based media outlet Breitbart News.
As for the link between cardiovascular disease and wind farms, the aforementioned RIVM report also summarises studies on the impact of wind farms on other health indicators such as cardiovascular health. The report states that studies conducted since 2017 have found no significant association between wind farms and cardiovascular diseases (such as ischaemia, stroke, hypertension), diabetes, obesity, low birth weight and cancer.
Wind farms and the local communities
A significant part of the arguments in the killer-turbines article are based on a „famous“ article written by a „top Norwegian professor“ in 2020, referring to the scientist as writing that „nowhere in the European Union have wind farms been planned in the way they are in Estonia today“. What’s more, the killer-turbines article claims that the Norwegian scientist’s study compared all the major wind farms and „what is happening in Estonia today is exceptional in the whole of the European Union“.
The referenced article is indeed written by a professor at the University of Bergen. The author of the article, Ignacio Herrera Anchustegui, does have a research interest in climate, energy and the environment, but from a legal point of view, because Anchustegui is a professor of law. Therefore, the article does not look at the impact of wind farms on the environment or on human health. Instead, Anchustegui’s article deals with the social impact and the opportunities and constraints for local people living near wind farms. The article does talk about the various compensation mechanisms offered to local people, which can be both financial and social, but also, for example, about the ’not-in-my-backyard’ mentality, which means that people may be in favour of greener energy in principle, but they do not want to see developments in their backyard.
The article gives a good overview of why local communities may be against wind farms and what economic or social measures could help local people to benefit from wind farm development and support it. However, it is arbitrary to call the article famous or influential, as it has not been published in any publication and has therefore not been peer-reviewed. The article is available on SSRN, which aggregates unpublished articles in the social sciences.
The Norwegian researcher’s article does not specifically discuss Estonia, which means that there is no assessment of Estonia’s compensation mechanisms. The claim that wind farms closer than 140 km to people are no longer accepted in the European Union is false. In 2020, the average distance from shore for wind farms in Europe was 23.3 km, and there is no standard for how far offshore wind farms should be from shore. There are those that are planned closer to shore and those that are planned further away.
Development of the Liivi wind farm
Since the article on killer wind turbines focuses on the Jaagupi harbour in the municipality of Häädemeeste, the fact-checking editorial assumes that the article sees problems around the development of the Liivi offshore wind farm, as it is the closest planned wind farm to the Jaagupi harbour. As the article on the killer wind turbines is from 2021, the Häädemeeste municipality has changed in the meantime and the municipality head mentioned in the article no longer governs Häädemeeste municipality.
The fact-checking editorial spoke to the now deputy mayor of Häädemeeste, Siim Suursilla, who is also responsible for nature and land management issues concerning the municipality. Suursild explained that the problems related to the port of Jaagup have a long history and stem from nature, which the port manager has to deal with. „Ports in this region are usually built at the mouths of rivers or streams, and Jaagupi is no exception. Moving sands block the harbour, and there is virtually no flow through Jaagupi. If you take the time to walk through it, you will see that it has completely dried up,“ Suursild explained.
Suursild responded with amusement when asked if the port had been sold to Eesti Energia, as claimed in the article. „That’s crazy talk. First of all, the harbour has been passed from developer to developer over the last few years, because the harbour is simply not profitable and it is a tiny harbour anyway and designed for very small vessels. Enefit Green, which is planning the development of the Livonian offshore wind farm, has never once said that the port of Jaagup should become a service port. The ships that service the wind farms are always large, and ports as small as the one there, do not meet the needs. If the wind farm is built, the service port will be in Pärnu or Salacgriva“.
The Helcom maps presented in the article were produced in 2020 and are intended to be used to identify areas of high ecological value in the Baltic Sea. Moreover the proposal to assess the environmental impacts of the construction of an offshore wind farm in the Gulf of Riga was only made in 2020. Enefit Green writes that the development of the wind farm is currently in the environmental impact assessment phase and the assessment is being carried out by Skepast&Puhkim OÜ.
Verdict: False. Neither the WHO nor extensive scientific research has assessed that wind turbines pose a serious health risk.
