Evaluation of annoyance from the wind turbine noise: A pilot study

• Authors: Małgorzata Pawlaczyk-Łuszczyńska , Adam Dudarewicz , Kamil Zaborowski , Małgorzata Zamojska-Daniszewska , Małgorzata Waszkowska

Abstracts

EN

Objectives: The overall aim of this study was to evaluate the perception of and annoyance due to the noise from wind turbines in populated areas of Poland. Material and Methods: The study group comprised 156 subjects. All subjects were asked to fill in a questionnaire developed to enable evaluation of their living conditions, including prevalence of annoyance due to the noise from wind turbines and the self-assessment of physical health and well-being. In addition, current mental health status of the respondents was assessed using Goldberg General Health Questionnaire GHQ-12. For areas where the respondents lived, A-weighted sound pressure levels (SPLs) were calculated as the sum of the contributions from the wind power plants in the specific area. Results: It has been shown that the wind turbine noise at the calculated A-weighted SPL of 30-48 dB was noticed outdoors by 60.3% of the respondents. This noise was perceived as annoying outdoors by 33.3% of the respondents, while indoors by 20.5% of them. The odds ratio of being annoyed outdoors by the wind turbine noise increased along with increasing SPLs (OR = 2.1; 95% CI: 1.22-3.62). The subjects' attitude to wind turbines in general and sensitivity to landscape littering was found to have significant impact on the perceived annoyance. About 63% of variance in outdoors annoyance assessment might be explained by the noise level, general attitude to wind turbines and sensitivity to landscape littering. Conclusions: Before firm conclusions can be drawn further studies are needed, including a larger number of respondents with different living environments (i.e., dissimilar terrain, different urbanization and road traffic intensity).

Keywords

EN

wind turbines; noise; health effects; annoyance

• Publisher: Instytut Medycyny Pracy im. prof. dra Jerzego Nofera w Łodzi
• Journal: International Journal of Occupational Medicine and Environmental Health
• Year: 2014
• Volume: 27
• Issue: 3
• Pages: 364-388

Dates

published

2014

Contributors

author

Małgorzata Pawlaczyk-Łuszczyńska

• Department of Physical Hazards, Nofer Institute of Occupational Medicine, Łódź, Poland

author

Adam Dudarewicz

• Department of Physical Hazards, Nofer Institute of Occupational Medicine, Łódź, Poland

author

Kamil Zaborowski

• Department of Physical Hazards, Nofer Institute of Occupational Medicine, Łódź, Poland

author

Małgorzata Zamojska-Daniszewska

• Department of Physical Hazards, Nofer Institute of Occupational Medicine, Łódź, Poland

author

Małgorzata Waszkowska

• Department of Occupational Psychology, Nofer Institute of Occupational Medicine, Łódź, Poland

Identifiers

DOI

10.2478/s13382-014-0252-1

Biblioteka Nauki

2178846