Fairfield residents say wind turbines too noisy

FAIRFIELD — It’s not birds chirping.

It’s not the wind rustling through the leaves.

Fairfield residents June and Jimmy Salamone compared the noise of the 455-foot wind turbines surrounding their home to jet engines or nails on a chalkboard, grating their nerves.

“It wakes you up. It makes you feel like your whole body is pulsing to the whoosh of the turbine,” said June Salamone, who lives on Davis Road.

In hopes of correcting the issue, Iberdrola Renewables — which owns the Hardscrabble Wind Farm — installed a noise-reduction system at four turbines in Fairfield shortly after a June town board meeting, said Bernard Melewski, an environmental lawyer based out of Altamont representing the towns of Fairfield and Norway.

Both towns recently announced approval of the systems and require Iberdrola to report its findings in September.

Since the Hardscrabble Wind Farm was installed in the towns in 2010, two post-construction noise studies requested by the towns have been conducted by Iberdrola. They found there were times when certain turbines exceeded the towns’ permit limits of 50 decibels — the sound of a moderate rainfall, according to American Speech-Language-Hearing Association.

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