New wind farm is wrecking my OTA reception (Essex County, ON)

Nothing really on the forum here regarding this type of signal interference yet. Here's what is happening now here..

A new wind farm consisting of up to a couple dozen turbines was built near here over the summer. It's looks nearly complete now in south central Essex county. The nearest turbines are about 3 miles away from me in the direction of Detroit (West and North west). Almost constant reception problems have developed nearly overnight within the last 3-4 weeks in the form of repetitive digital dropouts. Before this, Detroit UHF OTA reception was never ever this bad, even in strong winds.

Here is what I am seeing so far:

Channels most affected are UHF 60(/A\),44(CBS),43(PBS),45(NBC). More on this below. The cause is dead clear and unmistakable on analog CHWI-TV60 /A\ television repeater station broadcasting from downtown Windsor. There is a constant process of pulsing reception where the picture goes from good with colour to the loss of nearly all colour and more snowy then back again in exact intervals depending on the moving speed of the turbine blades. Looks as if someone is waving some steel mesh back and forth in front of my antenna. Also tested and replicated the same thing on two other temporary outdoor antenna setups and tuners I have tried in different areas in past days/weeks.

WWJ CBS is the most damaged of all the digital stations. It's signal is now very erratic/not reliable when there is any speed of wind even if it is light. Investigating on RF44 in NTSC mode, WWJ's amount of digital snow radically changes back and forth in it's "thickness". In digital this is causing my TV's (LN32A550 LCD) signal strength bars to go from 10/10 to 0/10 and back and all points in between. WWJ was always a good reliable station (when pointing at it) since I started watching OTA digital channels, until now.

I am quite upset about this!

The moment i learned turbines can and do screw up your TV reception, I was against them from that point on. Still... they were approved and were built quickly. Sure have been dreading the effects over the last month or so as they neared completion leading to an eventual uncorrectable,unavoidable multipath disaster. A damn shame that they are sitting directly in line with our only 24/7 reliable U.S TV market to boot. Bet someone with a good TV signal analyzer would have better proof of the damage these things are causing here. I can't be alone in seeing these new issues...anybody else in and around this specific area in southeastern Essex county area suddenly experiencing anything like what I have described over the last two weeks+?

I took a photo a last Wednesday afternoon from a high location up in a tree 50-55ft above ground on our small property here. The photo was taken looking towards the WNW-NW. Doesn't look like much, but the turbines pictured are the *the* ones in line with Detroit causing major problems.

http://s730.photobucket.com/albums/ww305/dxandmore/Antennas/windfarmdmg.jpg


Further reception details

NTSC channels
-CHWI-TV60: Horrible reception started around the second week of Aug. Affected essentially 24 hrs a day now. Constant pulsing pattern is obvious of turbine blades slicing it up.
-CBEFT-TV54 (SRC): Slight noticable pattern visible especially in any red coloured content.
-W33BY(aka WHPR-TV33): Pulsing pattern visible in the already very poor b/w reception.

ATSC channels
-WWJ-dt44 (62-1): Very unstable with extreme swings in signal readings leading to frequent to even constant dropouts. Slightly better near ground level but radical swings still exist.
-WTVS-dt43 (56-1): Second worse. Close behind WWJ for "dropout city".
-WDWO-dt18 (18-1): Third worse. Was already very weak before, now it's totalled.
-WDIV-dt45 (4-1): Can be bad at times, but far better than previous two.
-WMYD-dt21 (20-1): Not real bad, but station very hard to get now off axis.
-WKBD-dt14 (50-1): Very slight effects. There are a couple audio only dropouts noted from time to time though.
-WADL-dt39 (38-1): Worse when pointing NW. Facing nearly due north produces best result.
-WXYZ-dt41 (7-1): Was and still is Detroit's most reliable. Highest signal of all almost always.
-WJBK-dt07 (2-1): Continued great reception. No real changes noticed.

These problems ease off almost completely with times of dead calm wind, but don't necessarily stop 100%. Most times wind isn't as calm ~450ft up in turbine land.

This evening (Sep 13) in the moderate wind, the top 4 digitals listed are absolutely destroyed and unwatchable.. it's that bad.

More info about thise on the project developer's site: http://www.gosfieldcomberwind.com/

^^In the Gosfield site http://www.gosfieldcomberwind.com/abt_projects_location.html PDF file there is a compass box in the lower right corner. I am on the roadway that nearly touches the top of the compass box near the 'N' for North

NOTE: My main antenna is a Winegard hd7084p combo antenna mounted at 26 feet with a CM7777 preamp (since 2008) + near the coordinates of 42.097 -82.61. Up to date TVFOOL infromation/azimuth's are available in the album in my user profile.

 

Nothing really on the forum here regarding this type of signal interference yet. Here's what is happening now here..

A new wind farm consisting of up to a couple dozen turbines was built near here over the summer. It's looks nearly complete now in south central Essex county. The nearest turbines are about 3 miles away from me in the direction of Detroit (West and North west). Almost constant reception problems have developed nearly overnight within the last 3-4 weeks in the form of repetitive digital dropouts. Before this, Detroit UHF OTA reception was never ever this bad, even in strong winds.

Here is what I am seeing so far:

Channels most affected are UHF 60(/A\),44(CBS),43(PBS),45(NBC). More on this below. The cause is dead clear and unmistakable on analog CHWI-TV60 /A\ television repeater station broadcasting from downtown Windsor. There is a constant process of pulsing reception where the picture goes from good with colour to the loss of nearly all colour and more snowy then back again in exact intervals depending on the moving speed of the turbine blades. Looks as if someone is waving some steel mesh back and forth in front of my antenna. Also tested and replicated the same thing on two other temporary outdoor antenna setups and tuners I have tried in different areas in past days/weeks.

...

If you are within any of the Canadian stations protected contours, you may be able to make a complaint to Industry Canada's Spectrum Management branch.

Unfortunately, broadcast TV stations are only protected within their protected contours in their own country, so you have no grounds to complain about reception problems from U stations, or for Canadian stations outside their protected contours.

 

Phil, that stinks...
Wind Turbines causing interference was also discussed
in this paper a while back...

http://www.digitalhome.ca/forum/showthread.php?t=120832

I wonder if there is a way ya can get some diversity reception
to combat the new / constant multipath source, maybe
spacing two identical antennas horizontally?

 

Wow, that sucks! I'm sorry to hear that. Unfortunately, this will likely be a growing issue for many OTA'ers, as wind farms are going up or planned for just about everywhere. For example, there are turbines planned for construction in Lake Ontario, just off the shore from the Scarborough bluffs.

 

I've heard of the same type of plans for Lake Erie.

 

Yes,.. we have the same problems here, since these turbines are popping up all along the Erie shoreline like it's a marathon build. Everyday for the past year I've seen 3 or 4 big rigs hauling these massive cylinders across highway #3 destined for various windfarm locations along the Erie shores. Under the auspice of 'green energy' a quick abitrary deal with Samsung was made to get these ugly things up as fast as possible before anyone had a chance to intervene. From discussions that I have had with our government authority locally, there were never any impact studies done to determine the effects on electro-magnetic impact for this area. So far along with some areas having OTA reception issues, we have fewer birds and fewer bees. I find it hard to believe that IC was not involved in the approval of these wind sucking monsters.

 

I visited Wolfe Island south of Kingston, Ontario this past March. CKWS-TV has its transmitter on that island, and that island is covered in wind turbines, with some of them very close to the CKWS tower. Has anyone in the Kingston area seen deterioration of the Channel 11 signal since those wind turbines were erected?

 

The broadcast tower/windmill effect will likely have little effect on the signal at ground zero. It's when the tower is nearby the receiving end after travelling a distance from the tower that the air flutter and electro-magnetic field becomes corrupt by the windmill's turbine. It's not just the movement of the air through those big blades, it's the scattered electro-magnetic fields generated by these turbines[ unregulated radio frequencies if you will ] that are the issue with reception and health. The Niagara Falls generating station and nuclear generating stations are well shielded to prevent emmitting unregulated radio waves, but windmills have no emmision standards or such shielding. One windmill would not generate many spuratic emmissions, therefore there were no regulations imposed on a windmill turbine, but a farm of these turbines emmitting an array of many stray emmissions is going to become a disaster.

Believe it or not, farming issues are a warning of the ill effects of windmill farms:
Local farming issues: Some crops depend on birds, bees and varoius other insects large and small in order to yield a good crop each season. Farmers have noticed a decline in crop yield since these farms have fired up along the Erie shoreline. The ground vibrations are also suspect of effecting the health and yield of livestock breeding.

The point I'm making of the farming issues is that if these windmill farms have this much effect upon insects, birds, bees, plants and livestock,[ and possibly humans] .... Image what it's doing to the airwaves.

 

Yes, it certainly doesn't appear that proper long term research has been done on the effects (on human, animal, insect, radio signals, etc) these wind farms present.

 

Thanks for the replies everyone.
Indeed the best area in all of Canada? for OTA and now this.

This especially hits hard for me as I have been 100% over the air since i was born. Had no reason to ever consider getting pay tv either as most of the lesser stations and sub channels I have come to enjoy in this area aren't available with Satellite TV. Those persons affected are the minority right now, but i expect this will change more soon. Work has already started on the next very large wind farm about 8 miles north of here. OTA could very well be crippled for some around the Lakeshore/Comber area by this time next year.

There are right now two turbine farms in Essex county. One is just northwest of Harrow and now the Gosfield one near here. There are many times especially at night where the two current farms can be seen on U.S. NWS Doppler radar out of Detroit/Pontiac and Cleveland even.

I've heard of the same type of plans for Lake Erie.

A local company here is trying to go crazy with Lake turbines. here IMO this would absolutely drown the area and its tourism and water attractions. A ban is currently holding this company from pushing forward until a environmental study is done first. The lake bed could have quite a bit pollution like PCB's etc. that could be disturbed upon construction and pulled into the local water supply pipeline. Migratory birds have been the other big reason for public opposition. Point Pelee National park has tremendous amounts of rare bird species that pass through all throughout the year. If these projects go through, the Toledo stations could be next on the list to be no longer reliable.

If you are within any of the Canadian stations protected contours, you may be able to make a complaint to Industry Canada's Spectrum Management branch.

Don't know if right now I can justify a complaint here as CH60 contour ends a few miles NW of here even though the reception is fair. No doubt that IC doesn't have to lift a finger to remedy American ota signal trouble caused by interference originating in this country. This could very well be a different story for those on the opposite side of the wind farm though. Local Global and /A\ main towers on RF22 and RF16 to my southeast and east could very well be affected already.

Under the auspice of 'green energy' McGuinty made a quick abitrary deal with Samsung to get these ugly things up as fast as possible before anyone had a chance to intervene. From discussions that I have had with our government authority locally, there were never any impact studies done to determine the effects on electro-magnetic impact for this area. So far along with some areas having OTA reception issues, we have fewer birds and fewer bees. I find it hard to believe that IC was not involved in the approval of these wind sucking monsters.

I wouldn't be surprised if they don't even care. This area is quite unique and I despise the fact that we are being sold out and turned into the 'guinea pig of huge wind projects'. I too am keeping a eye out for any changes that I may see around here. Farming is huge down here, unfortunately its those farmers that are being almost bribed by wind energy companies. Promises of big continual energy payouts to plant the turbines on their land.

okay back OT...
No way am I giving up here...tests will continue here for at least a partial solution. Right now, 26 feet up on the roof isn't working anymore at least for UHF. VHF so far appears to be only barely affected. The longer wavelengths are making it through/around much better?

I have also found that the big boy Detroit locals are slightly less corrupted closer to ground level as they are LOS and strong enough to get there, but the weaker directional/LP stuff along with all the 2edge Toledo stations aren't possible closer to the ground. I like to DX as well, and the current antenna with rotor has bagged a ton of great DX stuff over the past 2 years I don't really want to change it.
Before winter I am going to experiment with different heights and areas even other antennas possibly. I'm gonna get my hands on a 91XG soon and see if that could help these horrible UHF troubles but not holding out for anything to change radically... This small region here could now be a damaged signal area.

Until then just hoping for many calm wind nights.

 

They've been used in parts of Scandinavia for a long time, so the effects of wind turbines are indeed well known. They don't cause problems for migrating birds (urban myth) but in regards to TV and radio reception they do cause RF interference if the blade structures include metal.

Phil81, the authorities are just tired of you winning the "tropo king" crown here all the time!

 

I know of a few places where the turbines effect Radio reception while driving. One area is around Highway 10 close to Shelburne and the other is on Highway 6 just before Ferndale.

In both instances Semi-Local stations get completely wrecked. I can only imagine what they do for TV in those areas, not to mention the amount of electrical interference that is created on the AM band.

 

Phil81, I am wondering how far you got since 3 months ago.

Here is an article of interest from the UK:

http://www.heraldscotland.com/windfarms-spoiling-your-tv-reception-have-a-free-sat-dish-1.826603

Perhaps you could club together with other affected residents and press for the electricity company to provide you with complimentary satellite installations? (I know this doesn't solve the problem with DXing or receiving smaller channels, but it's something).

-rapido

 

rapido,
Thanks for the link.

Now that the leaves have fallen off all the trees for the winter, I can now see some turbines from ground level to the west and northwest. Reception is the same or even worse than in Sep. Put up a new new 91XG very directional UHF yagi antenna up around 30 feet on the roof at the beginning of Oct. It actually made the reception worse in many cases, especially if I point almost right at a turbine. Like looking through a pipe and at the other end someone is there waving their hands in front of the opening partially blocking it.

With no leaves also means that tree multipath can be totally ruled out. I'm going to capture some short video clips of 4-5 local analog stations and one digital station WDWO 18 Detroit to show the fluttering and digital dropout effects. Will also note the wind speed and direction at the time, though it doesn't really matter as they spin around 24/7. Tonight the wind has gone calm and what turbines I can see from the ground are still rotating.

Last month (Nov) i was up at ~40 feet AGL checking on another antenna setup pointed static towards Cleveland OH. For the first time I could actually see off in the distance to the east and northeast other wind turbines (southeast Kent county?) from here. I would guess those are 13-15+ miles away.

Other numerous analog stations are in that direction, like CHCH-TV on RF51. Lots of "fluttering" on them too. Either the local Cottam wind farm is reflecting these stations back to me from the NW-W or the emissions from the farther away turbines to the E and NE are also affecting stations that must go though them to get here.

We had a big strong tropo/fog event in the mid part of November for a week or so in the region and i found noticeable fluttering even in CIII-6 from Paris, Ontario. Turbine blades must be way longer than the TV CH 6 wavelength.

I know I can't be alone in what I am seeing in regards to Wind turbines/farms in this general area. As more and more of them are built, the complaints should grow. Just this week it was announced that Siemens will be building turbine parts (turbine towers) next fall in here in Windsor, On. Also another facility will start building blades for turbines in Tillsonburg (not too far from London, On) also beginning next fall. What is this? the wind turbine capital of North America already?
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&source=hp&q=tillsonburg+turbine+blades&btnG=Google+Search

 

Hi Phil,

Curious if you can see them in your local weather radar like ya can here?

Check out the blobs in what's known as Wyoming County around here,
you'll see them as stationary blobs, might be buried in real radar echoes from
snow streaming by at the moment, but gets a point across, as those echoes
from the windfarms in western Wyoming County are always there and there is no
way to fix them radar echoes from showing up as bogus "precip".

http://www.wunderground.com/radar/r...=0&lightning=0&lerror=20&num_stns_min=2&num_stns_max=9999&avg_off=9999&smooth=0

 

They do show up on radar, but not everyday like those ones so close to BUF. More likely at night and especially when the air is more moist. Radar clear air mode shows it the most. Just look for 3 patches of non moving precip. One near Harrow, one around Cottam, and the largest one southwest of Chatham near the lake.

 

I have a friend in the weather service that has been concerned about the effects of wind farms on radar for years. Unfortunately these things seem like steam rollers on detractors here. noaa the US weather service has a healthy discussion http://www.crh.noaa.gov/mkx/?n=windfarm. The effects on OTA are also well known.

 

ota_canuck, Just a completely random curiosity question on my part: Are there any new wind turbines in your vicinity?!?

 

Wind-Turbine flutter, blade reflections and multipath concerns!

Jase88,

Local Wind Turbines? Yes!, But I don't believe I am close enough to be concerned, unless the blades can somehow cause significant signal reflection pulses that could result in flutter or multipath issues.

These Dunnville turbine farms are about 1 mile southwest into the Port Maitland area near the Erie shores and there are some more turbines about 4miles southeast in Lowbanks near the Erie shoreline. My target markets are approximately 210° west, 80° east and 30° north, so I am not recieving any signals that would pass directly through those turbine props.

They have all been on the hydro-one grid for about 1 year now.

 

Were you using OTA prior to these turbines coming online? And if so, did you notice any difference in reception?!

 

There are wind turbines on this side of Lake Erie also, just so ya know....

 

Wind turbines are signal killers.

I've been OTA since 1990! Ever since the cable company's negative billing days.

I have never noticed any reception changes since the turbines came to town , my before vs after reception results were insignificantly changed.

Over the past 4 years, I have watched these big turbines being trucked in, raised and go online.

I installed a converter box in a house down in Lowbanks a year ago, and it was a multipath, fluttering disaster. His house was about 300 yards from these 6 swirling monsters that were wide spread over a farmers field. He then went with satellite because there is no cable available in that area, and that was also a pixelating/signal dropout nightmare, but everyone of any authority will instantly dispute the suggestion that it has something to do with these Wind Turbines.

In Port Maitland, one of my clients, [a lawyer] had satellite for several years, and suddenly when all of these turbines went into service, his internet & TV reception went for a crap. The authorities again said the Turbines were not to be blamed. His Sat-Provider then told him it was because the trees had grown taller and then they sold him a friggin 40ft free standing tower. He still has the same problems, except he is now the proud owner of a free standing 40ft tower.
Yes, he is taking legal action against the BDU and against the AIM Power Gen Corporation.

There are further provincially approved plans for the construction of 176 turbines extending north to Highway 3 from Nanticoke east to Port Maitland. Haldimand county was not consulted by the province. Haldimand County is also considering taking legal action against the province [McGuinty liberals] to try and stop this secretly contracted multi-billion dollar Samsung deal.

So, to make a long story short,... if your close enough, these wind turbines are signal killers.
________________________
This is off topic, but worthy of a thread regarding any known radio spectrum signal interferences.

 

Thanks for the responses. Definitely something that relates to the reception of signals within the area where you reside. And in that context, germane to this thread (IMO).

After hearing about your issues with CHCH and other stations, I got to thinking about the wind turbines around the lake. Good to see that they don't appear to be killing anything for you...

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CEersoJLtRw

They do kill birds

 

Yes, wind turbines kill a few birds. But tall office and condo towers (especially those with lights left on all night) kill tons of birds, and nobody seems to mind when they go up.

I can see how metal turbine blades would affect electromagnetic waves; so would any tall metal structure, for that matter. (It's one of the reasons why CBC Radio 1 moved from AM to FM in Toronto; the longer AM wavelengths produced huge "dead spots" of destructive interference in downtown TO, and FM produces much smaller ones.)

Maybe I'm just a tree-hugging nut-job, but I'd much rather have wind turbines and (relatively) clean energy with a few people's TV reception inconvenienced, as opposed to more pollution and greenhouse gases in everybody's atmosphere. Then again... if you're one of The Inconvenienced, this is a pretty frosty comfort.

 

I would believe that this type of interference, you're experiencing from the wind farm, would be similar if not the same 'signal scatter' that is cause when an aircraft passes overhead causing a second signal path with a phase delay.

Using multiple stacked antennas can help solve this problem....

Thread about 'Airplane Flutter'
http://www.digitalhome.ca/forum/showthread.php?t=103432

My answer to 'Airplane Flutter' problem
http://www.digitalhome.ca/forum/showpost.php?p=962332&postcount=14

Document about 'Airplane Flutter'
http://2003.iccas.org/Full_Paper/airp_ICCAS2003_5(19).pdf


DAT-75 antenna

 

I had been trying to figure out what happened to my reception for Detroit channels in the past few years - and was told by the local antenna installer, it was wind turbines. We live right by Lake Erie, near Rondeau Park. Cleveland and London stations come in well, and even Toledo and Erie are often better than Detroit stations. The installer mentioned that the when the wind is still or blows from the south (ie the blades are parallel to a line between us and Detroit), reception is OK.

So - in the past few years since this issue has become apparent, has anyone tried anyway of getting around the issue? If the issue is due to reflections off the blades, would having a super-directional antenna - such as the the ganged CM4228 approach in http://www.hdtvprimer.com/ANtennas/16bay.html work better? Or is there nothing that can handle the myriad of reflected signals.