http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/02/06/1362769/-Gov-Scott-Walker-seeks-to-fund-study-on-health-impacts-of-wind-power?detail=email
What are the odds that the state governor who gained instant fame from his obsequious smarm in a phone call to what he thought was a Koch brother would come out with a demand that we study the terrible health dangers posed by—wait for it, savor it a moment—wind power.
The two-year, $68 billion budget proposal Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker unveiled Tuesday includes a request for $250,000 to study the health impacts of wind turbines.
Walker, who apparently considers himself a bit of an expert on the subject because so many people have called him a "blowhard," is seizing on a county declaration that a local wind farm has been making some nearby residents sick because of the low-frequency noise the gigantic fan blades make when they spin.
Last October, health officials in Brown County declared that eight turbines located at the Shirley Wind Farm posed a health hazard to residents. The chairwoman of the local board of health cited "ear pain, ear pressure, headaches, nausea" and "sleep deprivation" as symptoms among nearby residents. Local reports suggest Brown is the first county in the country to reach such a conclusion.
You know what? Fine. While the conclusion is, let's say, an unusual one, I'd even be willing to give Brown County the benefit of the doubt in their case. Maybe don't put the enormous modern mega-turbines practically on top of other people's houses; as someone who has apparently superhero-level hearing compared to everyone else in my own house I'll stipulate that very quiet little noises that go on at all hours of the day and night might indeed drive a person fairly and verily nuts.
So at best, you've got a zoning issue. If we can get to the point in this nation where our most bitter health complaints over our energy sources are things like "makes an annoying noise when you stand near them" rather than, say, "cancer-causing lung-destroying death agents mixed with stuff that is modifying the planet's atmosphere in a manner that will almost certainly put many of the world's major cities under a good bit of water in the foreseeable future, sucks to be them" I think we'd all be pretty pleased with ourselves.
On the other hand, we'll go out on a limb here and suggest that $250,000 is probably more than Scott Walker has ever proposed spending on researching the effects of fracking compounds or even the ingredients of fracking compounds, and is probably more than he has budgeted for researching the effects of processing tar sands, or living near coal plants, or to investigate the side effects of having a train's worth of crude oil explode on your doorstep because an employee accidentally forgot to set the parking brake while he went out for a quick coffee. So no, we're not giving him the benefit of the doubt on this one.
Chris Kunkle, the regional policy manager for the pro-wind group Wind on the Wires, said the study proposed in the budget is "just another example of Gov. Walker's targeting of an industry that is incredibly successful in largely every other state in the Midwest."
this my friends is a favor for the Koch's they don't want competition to their coal and oil businesses and their polluting factories. by virtue of it's name really wind turbine the only thing that would endanger homeowners is that wind blowing burning smoke from Koch factory smoke stacks, this guy is turning intro the 2016 comic relief if he thinks that will fly but then again Koch money bought him this far. you have to wonder if they can reroute the keystone sieve why not pick another location away from homes subjected to noise and not pollution.
