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The Old School, East Baldwin, Isle of Man. IM4 5EP. Tel. (01624) 851482 Email [email protected] Further Information – Planning application section 22. The proposed Solar Photovoltaic (PV) array and wind turbine are associated with a proposed conversion of the Narradale West Farm buildings, now derelict, into an eco house. This application will provide renewable energy to power the proposed eco house. The proposed eco house planning application is being submitted via Kay Associates, chartered architects. The drawings and documents associated with this planning application are:
The proposed wind turbine is a SD Wind Energy SD6, rated at 6KW electrical output, and is designed for domestic use. It is mounted on a 9m self-supporting tower. Being self-supporting means no guy wires are needed. The rotor diameter is 5.6m. The tower and turbine assembly tilts down for ease of installation and maintenance. The whole assembly is supported on a 2.6m square by 0.9m deep reinforced concrete base. The turbine is located away from any hedge and will therefore not effect the foraging area for any birds as these will generally forage in or close to a hedge. From a visibility point of view, the tower is hot dipped galvanised steel grey. The turbine body and blades are matt black. These colours mean the turbine assembly blends into the background when viewed against a hillside or wooded area from a moderate distance.
It is proposed to site the wind turbine in the field to the south of the proposed eco house. The turbine will be 150m away from the eco house and 170m away from the nearest farm buildings of the neighbouring Cronk Aaling dairy farm. The PV array is also located in the same field but closer to the proposed eco house in a location that does not suffer from shading due to buildings or trees. It is a south facing ground mounted array of 40kWp rating comprising 3 rows of PV panels.
The proposed wind turbine location will be visible from the Sulby Bridge area and the surrounding area, but at a distance of 1.3km or more will be difficult to see due to the backdrop of hillside and trees. The shortest distance to the Narradale road is 200m and this is past the Cronk Aaling dairy farm entrance heading up to the hill area where there are no properties. All cabling to the turbine and PV array will be underground.
The turbine self regulates at a maximum speed of 300rpm (revolutions per minute), which is quite slow. It does not use a gearbox assembly. These two design parameters mean the noise produced by the turbine is low. Noise measurements produced by the manufacturer indicate the turbine does not produce noise levels significantly above the ambient wind noise.
The manufacturer measured noise levels are: For a 50m.p.h. wind speed: Background wind noise produced mainly from the wind blowing through small trees 5m away from the point of the measurement – 60dB. Turbine noise read at a point 2m from the tower base and with the sound meter pointed directly at the turbine rotor – 60dB
A swishing noise is heard when at the base of the turbine but this does not increase the sound meter reading. As a reference, a car passing on a road (car travelling at 40mph, and the sound reading taken 15m from the road) gave readings between 70 to 80dB.
The BWEA standard noise measurements are shown in the SD Wind Energy wind turbine planning support document.
The PV ground mount arrangement is shown in the included datasheet. The array will be formed as 3 rows of ground mount panels each row being 19m long. Each row of panels will be separated by a spacing of 3m to prevent one row shading the panels of the next row.
The energy policy of the Isle of Man Government supports power generation from sustainable means as a way of reducing the Islands dependency on imported fossil fuel. This proposal would contribute to the IOM commitments to reduce the effects of climate change. This proposed combined wind turbine and PV installation will save an estimated 14800kg of CO₂ (the main greenhouse gas) emissions per annum based on an assumed average CO₂ emission of 0.309kg/kWh and a combined output estimate of 48000 kWhrs.
The generated power will be used by the eco house (subject to a separate but associated planning application).
The power generated by the wind turbine and PV array will be transfer to the barn where it will be transformed via inverters and then on to the eco house all via buried cables. The electrical system will be grid tied and also consist of a local battery storage system.
View from the PV array location towards wind turbine location (turbine position indicated by the grey tower marker in the field corner).
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