TY - JOUR
T1 - Wind turbines, flicker, and photosensitive epilepsy
T2 - Characterizing the flashing that may precipitate seizures and optimizing guidelines to prevent them
AU - Harding, Graham
AU - Harding, Pamela
AU - Wilkins, Arnold
PY - 2008/6/1
Y1 - 2008/6/1
N2 - Wind turbines are known to produce shadow flicker by interruption of sunlight by the turbine blades. Known parameters of the seizure provoking effect of flicker, i.e., contrast, frequency, mark-space ratio, retinal area stimulated and percentage of visual cortex involved were applied to wind turbine features. The proportion of patients affected by viewing wind turbines expressed as distance in multiples of the hub height of the turbine showed that seizure risk does not decrease significantly until the distance exceeds 100 times the hub height. Since risk does not diminish with viewing distance, flash frequency is therefore the critical factor and should be kept to a maximum of three per second, i.e., sixty revolutions per minute for a three-bladed turbine. On wind farms the shadows cast by one turbine on another should not be viewable by the public if the cumulative flash rate exceeds three per second. Turbine blades should not be reflective.
AB - Wind turbines are known to produce shadow flicker by interruption of sunlight by the turbine blades. Known parameters of the seizure provoking effect of flicker, i.e., contrast, frequency, mark-space ratio, retinal area stimulated and percentage of visual cortex involved were applied to wind turbine features. The proportion of patients affected by viewing wind turbines expressed as distance in multiples of the hub height of the turbine showed that seizure risk does not decrease significantly until the distance exceeds 100 times the hub height. Since risk does not diminish with viewing distance, flash frequency is therefore the critical factor and should be kept to a maximum of three per second, i.e., sixty revolutions per minute for a three-bladed turbine. On wind farms the shadows cast by one turbine on another should not be viewable by the public if the cumulative flash rate exceeds three per second. Turbine blades should not be reflective.
KW - Flicker
KW - Green power
KW - Photosensitive epilepsy
KW - Rotors
KW - Visual discomfort
KW - Wind farms
KW - Wind turbines
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=44849121714&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/j.1528-1167.2008.01563.x
U2 - 10.1111/j.1528-1167.2008.01563.x
DO - 10.1111/j.1528-1167.2008.01563.x
M3 - Article
C2 - 18397297
AN - SCOPUS:44849121714
SN - 0013-9580
VL - 49
SP - 1095
EP - 1098
JO - Epilepsia
JF - Epilepsia
IS - 6
ER -