Once again it's the energy-at-any-cost that is causing the damage. Wind farms and coal-seam gas both put energy before the people that the energy is meant to benefit. In the first case it drives people mad. In the second it poisons their water.
Where's the sense in that?
Future generations will look back with wonder that we were (are) so reluctant to embrace solar.

No, I think it is more bowing to political pressure when the populist science is half baked.

Wind farms, the new smoking, only this time the vice is government backed.

Solar is alive and well, big installations are now on the drawing board. There is always going to be a place for wind turbines. Nuclear has suffered a big swing against any more installations.

I'm a light sleeper, and I rented for some time at a place which was close to a busy road. Despite the noise problems, I did not have to abandon my home or suffer severe sleep deprivation. Earplugs are cheap and readily available at all good pharmacists.

For those who regard such a solution as far too simple and obvious, they could always do what my old man did - he suffers from tinnitus, which earplugs won't help with, so he built himself a white noise generator which apparently helps.

I have tinnitus , but i don't know what a white generator is. People live beside railway tracks. When a mining co was going to set up near me years ago, the EPA put a noise measuring devise in my backyard for 2 weeks, to measure day sound and night sound. The night sound was around 25DB and the day sound was 55 db. A barking dog puts up 85 DB. Nothing ever come of the mining project.
The thing is when you are subject to such low noise levels at night, then something comes along that increases that level, it takes time to get accustomed of the added noise level. The EPA says noise levels of 80 BD is an acceptable noise level.
People that live near wind mills, will before long take no notice of them. And you will get over your sickness, of the mind.

It is distressing that we can get public policy so wrong, so much of the time and then take so long to fix it.

Max, you references do not justify your conclusion.

Prince Phillip: he thinks we are unlikely to be able to store power. That is all.
Moller and Pederson: big turbines shift the noise about a major third down. That is hardly significant. If it were a couple of octaves, it might be.
Simon Chapman: he raises legitimate objections to Nina Pierpont's self-published book--amongst others, that it hasn't been given blind reviews.
Daniel Shepherd: told a court that people get annoyed by turbines, and the annoyance causes stress. Extraordinary.
The Senate Committee: asks for a study. That is all.

579,

I feel for you... by all accounts, tinnitus is a bitch. A white noise generator generates white noise:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_noise

My Dad built his from a kit - I'm not sure whether the kit was ordered online or purchased somewhere like Dick Smith's. Although according to that link I just posted, a radio tuned to static does the same job for less money and effort.

Thanks for that TAR, Im must be virtually doing that now, i sleep with a speaker under my pillow, slightly off station. Some small rural towns are funding their own wind turbines, and sharing the proceeds.

The contribution underlines the importance of the conclusions from the Federal Senate enquiry that scientific study is required into the health effects of wind farms. This should have some urgency as the 'disease' is spreading rapidly.
I have a hope, naive I know, that there would also be an independent engineering enquiry into the environmental and cost claims made by wind proponents. There has been enough time with wind farms connected to electrical power grids in Eastern Australia to allow a detailed look at real measured data from grid operators. Studies [e.g. Bentik looking at Colorado and Texan grids, Udo looking at the Irish grid] overseas suggest that balancing needs in the grids to avoid excessive frequency and voltage deviations, due to wind power fluctuations, minimise greenhouse gas emission savings and increase operating costs. The governments involved in supporting this technology have a responsibility to us to ensure that the aims and claims are met.

Max, you need to do some more research. Many of the 'peer reviewed articles' connecting wind turbines to ill health that you mentioned were published in The Bulletin of Science and Technology. This dodgy journal has been researched by Professor Simon Chapman and Dr Ken Clarke and found to be of very questionable standing (see http://ramblingsdc.net/Australia/WindHealth.html#Bulletin_of_Science_Technology_and_Society).

No scientific journals of any standing have ever published any papers definitely linking wind turbines with illness.

If you, like me, looked into the facts at any length, you would understand that turbines are incapable of causing illness. (Yes, some people who live near turbines have become ill, but the evidence points to anxiety and unjustified fear being the cause, not the turbines.)