An experimental study on annoyance scale for assessment of wind turbine noise

Abstract

Wind turbine noise referred to as "swishing sound" causes annoyance due to the amplitude modulation of the noise aerodynamically generated from blades. For the propagation characteristic of sound emitted from blade, the noise can be heard differently from place to place. For that reason, many studies on numerical index evaluating annoyance caused by wind turbine noise have been examined. The results, however, showed little correlation with change of equivalent continuous sound pressure level. In the present study, twenty-eight stimuli created by numerical simulation for the test were provided and thirty-two subjects assessed noise-induced annoyance. Additionally, a correlation analysis between sound descriptors and subjective annoyance was performed by using regression analysis with SAS software. This study shows that the maximum sound pressure level with fast time A-weighting (L AFmax ) explains well the annoyance characteristics compared to the other descriptors considered. V C 2013 AIP Publishing LLC. [http://dx.

Short-term annoyance reactions to stationary and time-varying wind turbine and road traffic noise: A laboratory study

“…The annoyance ratings of 3-9 on the ICBEN 11-point scale (Fig. 8) are similar to those of other focused tests with values of 1-8 for comparable sound pressure levels (Legarth, 2007;Lee et al, 2011;RenewableUK, 2013;Seong et al, 2013). Unfocused tests (including a reading task) by Persson Waye and € Ohrstr€ om (2002), in contrast, yielded somewhat lower ratings of 2-3 at a L Aeq of 40 dB.…”

“…2). The length of 25 s is comparable to the lengths in other focused listening tests on annoyance, with 5 s (Bolin et al, 2012), 12.5 s (Torija and Flindell, 2015), 15 s (Seong et al, 2013), 30 s (Jeon et al, 2010;Lee et al, 2011), 90 s (Legarth, 2007)…”

“…To date various laboratory studies provide evidence of the role of acoustic characteristics of wind turbines for short-term noise annoyance. Sound pressure level is a crucial factor (Lee et al, 2011;Seong et al, 2013). Besides, at a given level annoyance was found to be linked with the type of wind turbine (power, manufacturer) (Persson Waye and € Ohrstr€ om, 2002;Legarth, 2007), and to increase with the magnitude of periodic AM (Lee et al, 2011).…”

“…Besides, at a given level annoyance was found to be linked with the type of wind turbine (power, manufacturer) (Persson Waye and € Ohrstr€ om, 2002;Legarth, 2007), and to increase with the magnitude of periodic AM (Lee et al, 2011). So far, however, laboratory studies either only included WTN as the single sound source (Persson Waye and € Ohrstr€ om, 2002;Legarth, 2007;Lee et al, 2011;RenewableUK, 2013;Seong et al, 2013) or, when comparing the annoyance to WTN with other noise sources, focused on a single sound pressure level (Van Renterghem et al, 2013). Exposure-response curves for wind turbines in comparison to other sound sources, covering a wide range of sound pressure levels and established under the same controlled laboratory conditions, are currently unavailable.…”

Preface to Special Topic: Selected Papers from the Asia-Pacific Forum on Renewable Energy 2012, Jeju Island, Korea, 2012

“…6 The paper selected in photovoltaics investigates the increases of CTM CR in c-Si photovoltaic modules. 7 The papers, representative of wind energy field, deliberate on a control algorithm by considering four degrees of freedom nonlinear wind turbine model, 8 computational analysis and experimental validation for a wind turbine blade design, 9 optimized counter-rotating wind turbine design using the BEMT method corrected by VLM, 10 a simple approach for the statistical distribution of residual strength in impacted sandwich structure, 11 assessment of annoyance index for wind turbine noise using a jury test with the implemented turbine noise, 12 and a prediction method for the H-Darrieus wind turbines. 13 Although these selected papers represent only modest advances toward overcoming major scientific problems, some of these approaches might be key factors in the success of future renewable energy advances.…”