Table of Contents
BEST IELTS Academic Reading Test 533
IELTS ACADEMIC READING TEST 533 – PASSAGE – 3
IELTS ACADEMIC READING TEST – 533
READING PASSAGE – 3
Windfall for the Environment – Downfall for Health
Wind turbines are popping up around the world as an alternative source of energy, but residents who live near them say the machines are making them sick.
Imagine the sound of a train going over a bridge, or a jet engine propeller slicing through the air, even a bee stuck inside your ear.
These are the descriptions given by residents from New Zealand, Australia, and Great Britain, all living near wind farms. What is seen by many people as a solution to the world’s growing need for electricity has become, for these residents, a force so disruptive that they have had to uproot their lives to find relief.
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Wind turbine farms are quickly becoming a popular green energy alternative for many countries, including the United States, Germany, and China. There are more than 3,000 onshore turbines in Britain alone, which increased its wind power capacity by nearly 25 percent in 2011. During the same time period, Australia expanded its wind production capacity by more than 11 percent. While organizations such as the World Wind Energy Association praise this increase in wind farms as a positive development in “community energy,” those who live close enough to them to hear their constant drone disagree.
One of those residents, Andreas, lived in Waterloo, South Australia, until last year. In October 2010, the gas and electricity provider TruEnergy installed a 37-turbine wind farm on a ridge skirting his hometown. At the time, he says he was in favor of wind energy. “I was actually a firm believer that wind turbines were going to be a good idea,” he says. “We were all for wind power.”
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However, his opinion changed when the blades started to spin at the Waterloo Wind Farm. Within weeks, he says he and his family began to experience everything from heart problems and sleep disturbances to a constant ringing in their ears. However, he didn’t immediately associate his health problems with the new wind farm near his home.
It wasn’t until a conversation with his brother, who lived nearby, that he started to link the two. “He got so angry with me for asking how he slept,” Andreas remembers. “I asked my sisterin-law, and she said, ‘I haven’t slept for a week.’ I asked another neighbor, and he said the same thing. At that point, I thought, ‘it’s not just me.”
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Looking for answers, he searched the Internet for information about the possible side effects of wind turbines, and that’s when he came across the Web site of Dr. Nina Pierpont, a doctor and researcher from New York. Andreas began an e-mail correspondence with her husband, which resulted in her agreeing to come to his home to talk to him and his neighbors in person.
He and his neighbors erupted into stories of night sweats and constant headaches, revealing that they had all experienced similar symptoms. After everyone was finished, she put her book on the table and said, ‘This is happening in Victoria, too. But not just in Victoria. It’s happening all over the world.’
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That book was Wind Turbine Syndrome: A Report on a Natural Experiment. Pierpont, first introduced the term “wind turbine syndrome” in 2006; she later published a book about it—the same one on Andreas’s table—in 2009.
Pierpont’s research involved 38 residents in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Ireland, and Italy. Her presentations on wind turbine syndrome have been widely debated within the research and medical communities. The wind energy associations of Canada, the United States, and Britain have all criticized her work, and a study conducted by a group of researchers from The University of Salford in Manchester, England, concluded that there is no such thing as wind turbine syndrome.
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Dr. Hünerbein, who specializes in the study of wind profiles and acoustic technology, was one of the five researchers who prepared that Salford University report, Research into Aerodynamic Modulation of Wind Turbine Noise, which was commissioned by the British Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs.
“There is no scientific evidence to date that there is a direct physiological connection between wind turbine noise and health,” she explains. “Having said that, there are effects, and one is sleep disturbance. The thing to point out here very strongly is the sleep disturbance and annoyance can arise from any other noise just as well as wind turbine noise.”
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Whether it can be scientifically proven that the noise from wind farms is detrimental to human health is a debate that is likely to continue as wind energy increases globally. The Global Wind Energy Council reports that by 2030 half of all the wind energy produced in the world will come from countries that have just begun to embrace turbine-produced power.
Questions 27-30
Match the letters, A-D, with the numbers 27-30.
Label who voices the appropriate following statements:
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27. Background noise from various factors can negatively affect sleep patterns.
28. Wind turbine syndrome has become a worldwide concern for many citizens.
29. Originally very supportive of the concept of using wind power, but then switched views.
30. Using imagination relating to annoying insects and transportation to describe effects.
A. The local resident at the center of this article.
B. The government funded researcher.
C. The author of the book on wind turbine syndrome.
D. The numerous locals residing nearby.
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Questions 31-36
Write your answers to questions 31-36 on the answer sheet provided. Do the following statements agree with the information given in the text? Label as
True – if the statement agrees with the information
False – if the statement contradicts the information
Not Given – if there is no information on this
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31. The figures for Britain on its own from a few years ago, showed that a quarter of turbines were constructed on wind farms in the sea off the coast.
32. All those who live near these wind farms have been affected and have set up roots elsewhere in order to find a new peace.
33. Andreas immediately linked his new health issues with the nearby recently constructed wind farm.
34. Research was conducted by Andreas on the web in an attempt to discover potential negative effects attributed to wind generating technology.
35. Criticism on the concept of wind turbine syndrome has come from many countries, including the USA, Germany, Italy, Australia, New Zealand and China.
36. Approximately just over a decade later, 50% of energy from wind will be produced in those locations just starting to use this technology.
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Questions 37-38
Choose the most suitable option from the 3-options given.
37. As a green alternate option to fossil fuels, energy obtained from wind is gaining in
A. Possibility.
B. Popularity.
C. Practicality.
38. Seen as the environmental answer by some, many families were forced to move as the effects were too great a
A. Disruption.
B. Production.
C. Criticism.
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39. When telling their stories, the symptoms felt by all those spoken to were described as
A. Immediate.
B. Changeable.
C. Consistent.
D. Similar.
40. Within the health industry and academic communities, her (Pierpont) findings at first were widely
A. Discussed.
B. Denied.
C. Studied.
D. Expanded.
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ANSWERS
27. B
28. C
29. A
30. D
31. FALSE
32. NOT GIVEN
33. FALSE
34. TRUE
35. NOT GIVEN
36. TRUE
37. B
38. A
39. D
40. A
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