In a speech before House Republicans this week, President Donald Trump mocked the energy policies of his Democratic challenger in 2016 and claimed that wind turbines cause cancer. "Hillary wanted to put up wind. Wind!" Trump said on Tuesday. “If you have a windmill anywhere near your house, congratulations, your house just went down 75 percent in value. And they say the noise causes cancer." Critics of the renewable energy source have blamed the technology for a whole spectrum of human ills over the years. One researcher from the University of Sydney compiled a list of nearly 250 symptoms and diseases that sufferers blamed on their proximity to wind farms, including accelerated aging, alcohol abuse, blurred vision, diabetes, head aches, infertility, weight gain and loss, and, yes, a variety of cancers. But there is no evidence that the noise from wind turbines causes cancer—or that any sound does. Indeed, more than two dozen scientific reviews found no evidence that wind farms cause any serious health impact at all. One 2014 review did confirm that, depending on the windspeed, distance, and ambient noise levels, the sound windmills generate can be annoying enough to cause sleep disturbances—which could, in turn, cause physiological or mental-health problems of their own. The review found that sleep disturbances were greatest in rural areas, where background noise, which might have otherwise masked the noise of the turbines, was minimal. Meanwhile, there are countless studies linking the extraction and burning of fossil fuels to serious health problems and disease. Research has shown that people who live within a mile of oil and gas wells, as some 17.6 million Americans do, have an elevated risk of cancer and cardiovascular disease. The fossil fuel industry is a major driver of air pollution in general, which has well-documented links to birth defects, memory loss, asthma, and other respiratory illnesses, and causes more than eight million early deaths around the world every year. A 2017 study found that women who live within two miles of fracking sites are more likely to give birth to low and underweight babies. And while the noise pollution associated with wind turbines affects a limited area around wind farms, air pollution from fossil fuels can drift great distances through the atmosphere; a different 2017 study, for example, found pollution from a coal-fired power plant in Pennsylvania drifted across state borders, putting women living as much as 30 miles downwind of the plant in New Jersey at an increased risk of delivering low-weight babies, weighing less than 5.5 pounds—the weight below which babies are at risk of serious complications and have a harder time staying warm, putting on weight, and fighting off infections. Not only does burning coal for energy release pollutants into the atmosphere, coal-fired power plants also produce a toxic waste product known as coal ash—the material left over after combustion that's laced with heavy metals, radioactive elements, and aromatic hydrocarbons—a known carcinogen. Coal ash waste is disposed of in historically unlined ponds near the power plants—which have been known to leech waste products overtime or overflow during bad weather, threatening drinking water supplies. Trump's comments don't appear to have shifted Senate Republicans' views on wind energy, some of whom pushed for more funding for wind energy technology just a day after his speech.<doc-sep>No, not his craziest moment yet, but just another reminder of how Donald Trump is a complete and utter imbecile. Worse, he’s also 72 years old, and is clearly beginning to suffer from diminished mental capacity. If your father, or grandfather, started talking like this, and couldn’t complete a single, coherent sentence, you would advise that they go see a doctor. Yesterday, we showed you how he is unable to pronounce the word ‘origins’, repeatedly saying ‘oranges’, as well as how he lied about where his father was born. Oh, and he’s also the world’s worst golf cheat. Today, let’s talk about his wind turbine comment, made during a National Republican Congressional Committee fundraiser dinner on Tuesday. To start, let’s hear from the sentient naartjie’s mouth: The crowd laughs, but they knew they’re watching a man who is clearly in the midst of mental decline. A quick reminder of this gem, from his Michigan rally late last month: Watch: Trump mocks Hillary Clinton and renewable energy wind farms: “If it doesn’t blow, you can forget about television.” pic.twitter.com/PwTv9ZjMTe — Newsweek (@Newsweek) March 29, 2019 That wasn’t even the craziest thing he said that night. So why does this man say these things? Well, he hates the idea of clean energy, because his billionaire pals aren’t on board with it and he promised to rescue the dying coal industry, but also because Hillary and other liberals support it. Oh, and a particular incident that occurred over in Scotland. First, some background from the Daily Beast: For years, wind turbines have had two primary enemies: conspiracy theorists who incorrectly claim they cause headaches and nausea, and Trump, who lobbied for years against turbines near one of his Scotland golf courses. Now the conspiracy-obsessed president is continuing his war against wind power and is breathing weird new life into a claim that should have been dead decades ago… Wind turbines don’t cause cancer. Multiple studies have cleared the technology of the bogus health claims that float in conspiracy circles. In fact, most conspiracy theorists don’t even claim the turbines cause cancer. Instead, their grievances usually focus on illnesses that are harder to diagnose and easier to imagine, like nausea, stress, and insomnia. Only the fringe of the fringe believe the most extreme claims about wind turbines and Trump seems to be among them. Probably saw it on Fox News. More on the Scottish golf course showdown via another Daily Beast article: His feud with wind power started in 2006, when Trump was developing plans to build a golf course in Balmedie, Scotland, just as a renewable energy group was developing a multimillion-dollar offshore wind farm close by. The idea of windmills spoiling the view on his golf course put Trump on the offensive, and he threatened to pull out of the deal—a move that prompted more wind farm proposals and social in-fighting. “With the reckless installation of these monsters, you will single-handedly have done more damage to Scotland than virtually any event in Scottish history,” Trump wrote in an angry letter to the Scottish first minister, according to previous reporting by The Daily Beast. “I have just authorized my staff to allocate a substantial amount of money to launch an international campaign to fight your plan to surround Scotland’s coast with many thousands of wind turbines.” The golf course and resort eventually opened in July 2012 and ignited Trump’s hatred for the inanimate wind propellers. He really, really hates them: Then there’s this one, which starts off with some Rebecca Black vibes, but soon takes a dark turn: Not only are they killing bald eagles, but they’re doing it on a Friday! (Wind turbines do kill birds, but at a lower rate than other energy sources.) Obviously, Stephen Colbert had to get a few digs in: TONIGHT: Trump lashes out at the wind! #LSSC pic.twitter.com/LNToMkeCAr — The Late Show (@colbertlateshow) April 4, 2019 Let’s end it there, because that’s quite enough Trump madness for now. [sources:dailybeast&dailybeast]<doc-sep>Photo: AFP Contributor/AFP/Getty Images President Trump has long despised wind power. He has repeatedly blamed wind turbines for killing birds (which they do at a lower rate than other energy sources) and for allegedly causing electrical power to halt when the wind stops blowing (in fact, electricity grids using mixed power sources and battery storage have solved this problem). In a speech tonight to House Republicans, Trump claimed that wind turbines cause cancer. “They say the noise causes cancer,” the president of the United States asserted. Wind turbines do not cause cancer. Some people blame the noise for causing a variety of other health ailments, but these charges have zero scientific validity. Cancer is not caused by noises of any kind. A power source that does cause many health problems, including cancer, is coal, an extremely dirty fuel Trump loves and has attempted to bolster, with almost no success. Aside from costing more to produce than other sources of power, and in addition to enormous air pollution side effects, coal also emits greenhouse gases in large amounts. Though this, of course, is another aspect of science Trump rejects. In the same speech, Trump urged his fellow Republicans, “Hey, you gotta be a little bit more paranoid than you are. We have to be a little bit careful, because I don’t like the way the votes are being tallied.” Trump subscribes to wild fears over systematic Democratic voter fraud, a belief — like climate-science skepticism — that is extremely common inside his party. The Republican affinity for kook pseudoscientific claims helps explain why his allies didn’t run screaming from the room in existential terror when they heard the most powerful person in the world assert that the noise from wind turbines causes cancer. “Wind turbine noise causes cancer,” the assembled members of Congress immediately intuited; it is simply another completely insane notion that Republicans are now expected either to promote or to quietly tolerate. “Someone’s gonna leak this whole damn speech to the media,” Trump worried aloud. It was a valid fear, given that reporters were in the room and C-SPAN cameras were covering the speech live.<doc-sep>WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump has made no secret about his disdain of wind energy. In 2012, he complained that Scotland was "hell-bent on destroying (its) coastline" with proposed wind turbines to be built offshore near the site of Trump's luxury golf resort in Aberdeenshire. In 2016, he ran for the White House on a pledge to bring back coal and expand development of other fossil fuels. And in March, the president mocked the industry during a speech to a conservative organization in Washington. While wind makes up less than 7% of the power generated in the U.S., development of renewable energy sources is a key plank of the Green New Deal being pushed by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., and other progressive democrats in Congress. Speaking at a National Republican Congressional Committee dinner Tuesday, Trump brought up some of his familiar attacks on the industry but also a new one: Wind farms cause cancer. USA TODAY looked at what Trump said about wind energy and how much of it is true: What Trump said about wind and cancer "And they say the noise causes cancer. You tell me that one (makes whirring noise mimicking a turbine).” There's no evidence to suggest cancer and wind farms are linked. Critics have linked wind turbine operations to electromagnetic fields (EMF), shadow flicker, audible noise, low-frequency noise and infrasound, annoyances that could disrupt sleep, induce headaches or even cause mild nausea. But researchers who examined a number of health studies related to wind farms concluded in a 2014 report posted on the National Institutes of Health website that they pose no threat beyond that. And they said those problems could be remedied by placing turbines in a way that minimizes exposure to surrounding homes. "The weight of evidence suggests that when sited properly, wind turbines are not related to adverse health," the researchers wrote. University of Iowa researchers arrived at a similar conclusion in a study issued in January. Iowa GOP Sen. Chuck Grassley – a champion of the wind energy tax credit – said Trump's claim that wind turbines cause cancer were "idiotic" in a call with reporters Wednesday. What Trump said about about bird kills “And of course it’s like a graveyard for birds. If you love birds, you’d never want to walk under a windmill ‘cause it’s a very sad, sad sight. It’s like a cemetery. We put a little statue for the poor birds. You know in California if you shoot a bald eagle, they put you in jail for five years. And yet the windmills wipe ‘em all out. It’s true. They wipe ‘em out. It’s terrible.” The number of bird fatalities as a direct result of collisions with turbines has been hard to pin down. But government researchers in 2013 estimated that 140,000 to 328,000 birds are killed annually by collisions with monopole land-based turbines in the contiguous United States. More than 200 species of bird have been documented as killed by collision with wind turbines, with Passerines (songbirds) most commonly reported, followed by raptors that hunt by day such as hawks, eagles and falcons, according to the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service. Related:In push to be 'energy dominant,' Trump puts squeeze on polar bears, whales and sage grouse, critics say Related:Green New Deal too ambitious for some Democrats, even those who say Congress must 'do something' Researchers also said the risk to birds is growing as industry shifts to taller wind turbines. So how does that risk compare to other forms of energy? A Stanford University researcher concluded that wind farms kill birds at a rate of 0.28 bird deaths per gigawatt-hour (GWh) of energy produced – lower than nuclear power stations (0.41) but higher than fossil fuel generators (0.17). Researchers noted those rates do not take the impact climate change has on bird habitats into account. Information on mortality rates with offshore turbines is incomplete. What Trump said about wind turbines and property values “If you have a windmill anywhere near your house, congratulations. Your house just went down 75% in value." The findings here are mixed. Researchers at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) were unable to uncover any impacts to home values after analyzing more than 50,000 home sales near 67 wind facilities in 27 counties across nine states, according to a 2013 study. The lab, which conducted a 2009 study that reached a similar conclusion, is supported by the U.S. Department of Energy. But several studies highlighted by the National Association of Realtors show turbines had a negative effect on property values, including a 2012 study tracking more than 11,000 real estate transactions over nine years in northern New York that found nearby wind facilities "significantly reduced property values in two of the three counties studied." A NAR survey of members last year found that 32% said wind farms decreased the perceived property value compared to 9% that said they increased them. In addition, 34% said they had no effect, while 25% said they didn't know. What Trump said about the unreliability of wind power “I told the story at CPAC about the woman, she wants to watch television, and she says to her husband: ‘Is the wind blowing? I’d love to watch a show tonight, darling. The wind hasn’t blown for three days. I can’t watch television. Darling, please tell the wind to blow.’ No. Wind’s not so good.” The nation's power grid consists of a huge number of interconnected transmission lines that connect a variety of energy sources. Translation: When the wind's not blowing (or when the sun's not shining), power from nonrenewable sources keeps the grid going. "Adding variable renewable power to the grid does not inherently change how this process of balancing electricity supply and demand works," according to the Energy Department. "Studies have shown that the grid can accommodate large penetrations of variable renewable power without sacrificing reliability, and without the need for 'backup' generation." What Trump said about where wind turbines are made “And you know how expensive it is to make those things (turbines, etc). They’re all made in China and Germany, by the way.<doc-sep>
President Donald Trump of the United States of America has made quite the claim. At the National Republican Congressional Committee fundraising dinner earlier this week, he took a tilt at 'windmills'. "If you have a windmill anywhere near your house, congratulations, your house just went down 75 percent in value," he said. "And they say the noise causes cancer." He's referring to wind turbines, one of the leading technologies for renewable energy, and the target of a very long-running smear campaign. And, while he's at least partially right - wind farms can negatively impact property values (although the 75 percent figure is more than a little exaggerated) - he's very off-base on the cancer thing. In fact, according to an expert panel review conducted for the American and Canadian Wind Energy Associations, "there is no evidence that audible or sub-audible sounds emitted by wind turbines have any direct adverse physiological effects." It's not impossible that the noise from wind turbines could be annoying, if they were in close-enough proximity to residences. Most regions have setback laws that govern how close a wind turbine can be placed to a home, generally at least 300 metres (984 feet). At that distance, according to GE, the sound level is about 43 decibels. "To put that in context, the average air conditioner can reach 50 decibels of noise, and most refrigerators run at around 40 decibels," wrote editor-in-chief of GE Reports Thomas Kellner in a 2014 post to the company's website. That's consistent with findings from the Victorian Environmental Protection Agency in Australia. At a distance of 500 to 1,000 metres, the decibel level is around 35-45 - much quieter than the 60 decibels measured in a busy office environment. Turbines also produce sound below the range of human hearing, called infrasound. At high-enough volume, infrasound has been found to make us feel dizzy, nauseous and headachey. Generally, it's only above 110 decibels that this effect occurs. Since we can hear infrasound over about 85 decibels - a little louder than a vacuum cleaner - you would definitely be aware of the sound at that point. So, can sound cause cancer? Not that we know of. Cancer is the result of gene mutations, and there is no evidence that they can be triggered by noise. Scientists have noticed a correlation between constant proximity to traffic noise and a higher incidence of cancer… but, well, proximity to traffic noise is also proximity to traffic exhausts - a known and particularly potent carcinogen. And when it comes to causes of cancer, according to the US Government's National Institute of Environmental Health Services, "toxic outputs of fossil fuel-based power generation and transportation, such as sulphur oxide, nitrous oxides, heavy metals, and particulate matter" are of grave concern. A 2009 study found that fossil fuel air pollution accounted for 5 percent of all male cancer deaths and 3 percent of all female cancer deaths in the US between 1970 and 1994. And it's not just cancer. In 2017, a World Health Organisation report found that 570,000 children under the age of five are dying every year worldwide because of pollution-related illnesses, including pneumonia and asthma. Meanwhile, there has not been a single documented human death due to an illness caused by a wind turbine. Not one. Even deaths caused by accidents are low. Compare that to half a million children killed every year by air pollution, including that from fossil fuels. The best case scenario for President Trump's claim is that he genuinely believes what he is saying, showing he is ignorant of decades of research. That's not great, for a president. But in the worst case scenario, he is pushing a dangerous, world-destroying lie for political gain.