In 2009, The Wisconsin Wind Siting Council was established in state law WI ACT 40 for these purposes and terms:

196.378(4g)(e)  The Wind Siting Council shall survey the peer-reviewed scientific research regarding the health impacts of wind energy systems and study state and national regulatory developments regarding the siting of wind energy systems. No later than October 1, 2014, and every 5 years thereafter, the wind siting council shall submit a report to the chief clerk of each house of the legislature, for distribution to the appropriate standing committees under s. 13.172 (3), describing the research and regulatory developments and including any recommendations of the council for legislation that is based on the research and regulatory developments.

Despite a steady increase in pending wind power plant proposals including a 600 MW, ~400 square mile plant in SW Wisconsin that would be 3.7 times larger than any prior state wind facility, the Public Service Commission of Wisconsin failed to convene the Wind Siting Council by the legislation-specified, “no later” date of October 1, 2019.  

The quasi-Council that the Commission marshaled and charged with duties four years late (in July, 2023), failed to include required membership. Most glaringly, the body charged with recommending needed changes in Chapter PSC 128 regulating state wind power plants lacked the expert essential for council assessment of “peer-reviewed scientific research regarding the health impacts of wind energy systems,” which law designates:

“One member who is a University of Wisconsin System faculty member with expertise regarding the health impacts of wind energy systems .

Wis. Chapter 15.797

Unfortunately, the Commission has, instead, tried substituting faculty persons with no health or medical backgrounds. As a result, when Council members make motions to introduce studies, articles and other considerations of health and safety impacts not acknowledged in 2014, there is no expert on the Council with professional reputation at risk or professional avenues to pursue to conduct basic business such as:

• Answer questions posed by council members
• Make researched, clarifications about study findings
• Proof read PSC staff accounts of medical studies beyond their expertise
  • Move the consideration of impacts from the much larger and more powerful turbines forward.

The detrimental impact on the Council can no longer be pushed aside.

In 2023 the US Department of Energy released an agency-sponsored study accounting for larger setback distances in use with popularly used, larger, wind turbines ranging from 3.2 to 5.8 MW. Council members did not become aware of this extremely rare report until an arbitrary deadline for study submission had passed. Rather than make accommodations to insert this single report pertaining to vastly changed technologies, Wind industry appointees and members in broad support of wind development voted to reject inclusion of the study on mere basis of late submission by narrow margin.

If, at the end of a thorough process, no changes in PSC 128 setback distances or other protections are made, the council, the legislature and the citizens of Wisconsin have lost nothing by the delayed report. But rather than pausing and finding a way to meet the legislative requirements, recent minutes indicate that the Council Chair is hurrying to “finalize the report, in total, for April [2024].”

Consistent with verbal accounts of Council members representing landowner and community interests, an agenda item addressing the newer, more powerful and taller wind turbines being proposed in Wisconsin has yet to be scheduled.

If submitted in April, the Wisconsin Wind Siting Council’s report to the state legislature report would unacceptably lack:

• Input from a medical professional with expertise regarding the health impacts of wind energy systems.
  
• Informed acknowledgment of, not to mention appropriate regulation for the much larger and more powerful wind turbines being presently proposed in Wisconsin.
  
• Incorporation of the US Department of Energy’s sponsored study concerning much larger setbacks being used to meet acoustic noise standards set for much smaller wind turbines
  
• Incorporation of fundamental infrasound data for the larger turbines.
  
• Studies the Council has not yet considered taking up in their impactful decision making included:  

Effects of land-based wind turbine upsizing on community sound levels and power and energy density, Ben Hoen, Ryan Darlow, Ryan Haac, Joseph Rand, Ken Kaliski, January 2023 

Symptoms intuitively associated with wind turbine infrasound, Anu W. Turunen, Pekka Tiittanen, Tarja Yli-Tuomi, Pekka Taimisto, Timo Lanki, 2021

Does Stochastic and Modulated Wind Turbine Infrasound Affect Human Mental Performance Compared to Steady Signals without Modulation? Results of a Pilot Study, Paweł Małecki, Małgorzata Pawlaczyk-Łuszczynska, Tadeusz Wszołek, Anna Preis, Maciej Kłaczynski, Adam Dudarewicz, Paweł Pawlik, Bartłomiej Stepien ́and Dominik Mleczko,  2023

Health Effects Related to Wind Turbine Sound: An Update, Irene van Kamp and Frits van den Berg, 2021

Self-reported health in the vicinity of five wind power production areas in Finland, 
Anu W. Turunen, Pekka Tiittanen, Tarja Yli-Tuomi, Pekka Taimisto, Timo Lanki, 2021

Commercial wind turbines and residential home values: New evidence from the universe of land-based wind projects in the United States, 
Eric J. Brunner, Ben Hoen, Joe Rand, David Schwegman, 2023

Property value impacts of commercial-scale solar energy in Massachusetts and Rhode Island, 
Vasundhara Gaur and Corey Lang, Department of Environmental and Natural Resource Economics University of Rhode Island, 2021 

Visualizing Occupied Dwelling Impact Differences between Wisconsin’s 2014, 1250′ setback and the 2023 NREL-Sponsored Study’s Assumed 4,560′ setback distance for 3.4 MW Turbines.

APPROXIMATELY 392 DWELLINGS LOCATED WITHIN 1 MILE OF WIND TURBINES WOULD BECOME SUBJECT TO INFRASOUND IMPACTS PRODUCING HEALTH RISKS FOR A PERCENTAGE OF RESIDENTS. (Dwelling figures ascertained from Project “Setback” Maps on pdf pages 63, 65 & 67 in the Whitetail Wind Application)/

• APPROXIMATELY 392 DWELLINGS WOULD BE LOCATED WITHIN 1 MILE OF WIND TURBINES AND BECOME SUBJECT TO INFRASOUND/AIR PRESSURE PULSES CAPABLE OF PRODUCING UNDESIRABLE HEALTH IMPACTS FOR A PERCENTAGE OF RESIDENTS.
  

• A MAY, 2023 STUDY SPONSORED BY THE U.S. DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY RECOMMENDS AN AVERAGE SETBACK DISTANCE OF 4,560 FEET (BEIGE AREAS) FOR WIND TURBINES LIKE THOSE PROPOSED BY THE MERCHANT UTILITY DEVELOPER TO SURROUNDING LIVINGSTON, WISCONSIN.* The 3.7 greater distance compared to the 1250’ used by the developer significantly reduces exposure to sound and “SPL related requirements.” The discouraged beige impact areas include about 390 dwellings and most of the Village. *The specified GE 3.4-140 turbines align with the 1.39 km average setback for the “Future with STE” scenario. See “Effects of land-based wind turbine upsizing on community sound levels and power and energy density,” by Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Ben Hoen, Ryan Darlow, Ryan Haac, Joseph Rand and Ken Kaliski. May, 2023. Accessible at: https://bit.ly/4560ft .