18th November 2019 The all pervading greyness..

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Monday 18th 46F, mild but with a dark grey overcast. Two more days of overcast are promised by both competitors in the weather forecasting trials. It is no wonder the Vikings wanted to get away!

A walk to the lanes. Talked to a curious pony. Though it didn't seem impressed with the offering of a handful of grass from the verge. It is forgetting to get light today. And remained that way.

Tuesday 19th 41-45F even darker grey with a promise of rain at lunch time. Just another walk to the lanes. And, yes, it did rain at lunch time.

The New Green Danish government has announced a bribe which it is calling a "bonus" for neighbours of wind turbines. They will receive up to 5000DKK which is about £500 a year. Or £10 a week to put up with VLF noise and shadow flicker. The bonus will be paid only to those within a prescribed multiplier of the height of the turbine. I'd better check Google!

An interview with a neighbour of large windmills says he subject to noise unless he keeps his windows shut. This suggests very low frequency flutter from the blades passing the tower. The sound can be further reinforced by certain room volumes and dimensions. Wind direction and strength vary along with the subjective effects they cause.

We once lived near a major new gas pipe installation and the rumbling sound was intolerable indoors. Fortunately they stopped work in the late afternoons. A similar effect can be produced by plate vibrators in building work. I spent years researching and producing high levels of  deep bass for reproducing realistic organ music. These deep [infrasonic] sounds can be completely inaudible but still extremely distressing at high levels.

There has been ever increasing resistance to new wind turbines. Both on land and offshore. It is hoped that the bribes will make "ordinary" people less resistant to the arrival of more and much larger turbines. New neighbours will have up to a year to experience the effects or sell their homes to the wind turbine owners. Wind turbines almost always depress prices. If the homes can ever be sold at all.

Interestingly, there are many neighbours to the forces airfield where new, very noisy, F35 jets will replace the quieter F26s. There have been efforts to insulate the airfield neighbour's homes against the noise. Though residents claim it makes little real difference. Something like 1600 homes are directly affected. The cost of the hangars alone is over-running into the billions.

We suffer jet noise on an almost weekly basis as they practice for hours over Fyn. Just as we did in Gravely Blighted in our last, rural home there. Where we were on the flight path of a very large airfield. It was a daily occurrence to look up at a stream of jet fighters banked onto a wing tip at 200 feet. Or several, four engined transports similarly banked over. So close you could see the rivets and the pilot looking down at us. Frequent, overflying helicopters merely added to the racket. Thank goodness the UFOs were quiet. Even if they did fly much lower over our garden. 30 years on and still no explanation for black cheese wedges cruising over at 50 feet. 👽

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