May 23, 2008
England
England
Residents are worried new turbines at Suffolk’s first onshore wind farm will cause widespread TV interference.
Parham Parish Council said a report showed 29 areas stretching from Framlingham to Wickham Market would be affected by cranes brought in to put up the turbines on Parham Airfield and the turbines when working.
The council has obtained a copy of a TV reception survey from Suffolk Coastal under the Freedom of Information Act revealing the scale of the likely interference, and the difficulties and timescales involved in resolving the problems.
The report estimates up to 200 households could be affected but villagers say this could be an “under represented guesstimate”.
The council said: “Households living within the immediate area will suffer most interference but problems are likely to be widespread up to five to ten kilometres from the site.
“Possession of ‘booster systems’ far from improving the problems, will actually magnify the level of interference which may include loss of picture detail, loss of colour, buzzing or crackling on sound, disruption to text services, disruption of DTTV services, picture flashing, ghosting.
“It is very clear from this previously concealed report that the impact on television has been played down and that residents are to be subjected to months of interference commencing with the construction period with no guarantees that once identified the problems are going to resolved.”
A Suffolk Coastal report said: “At this stage what the council has before it is a baseline survey indicating that there may be a problem for anything between 50 and 200 domestic dwellings that may be affected in terms of their TV and radio reception by the installation of six 100 metre tall wind turbines at Parham.
“This approach accords with standard industry practice and the officers are aware of many other sites where there has had to be an element of mitigating works by wind farm developers in order to boost or adjust signals or to provide alternate reception facilities for TV and radio signals.”
The report stated there was never any intention to withhold the information but more of a concern that information should not be misrepresented or misunderstood.
If anyone found during the 12 months after the farm starts operating they are suffering TV interference, the wind farm developer will be required to pay for the problem to be investigated and remedied.
23 May 2008
URL to article: https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2008/05/23/wind-farm-fears-over-tv-reception/