I refer to your article in MaltaToday of Sunday 26 October, (Wind Energy - Small scale wind turbines’, Martin Galea De Giovanni and am very concerned at the fact that no mention was made of any of the dangers to human wellbeing, or any other disadvantages associated with the installations of wind turbine generators in residential areas.
From my bedroom window I can see a wind turbine generator installed by my neighbour in the garden of her residence in Marsascala. Needless to say, this resulted in months of agony, hearing the terrible noise such wind turbines generate, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. I say months because it took slightly more than a year for myself, and other residents of the area, to have our voices heard and for MEPA to make the owner bring it down.
Today, the unit is still in our neighbour’s garden since, believe it or not, she is hopeful that she will get the required permit for such an installation, which she will put up again irrespective of the fact that a nice residential area will be permanently ruined for all the people living there.
This behaviour puts paid to the term “Good Neighbourliness” which is a requisite for all planning applications all over the world, and hopefully also in Malta.
Therefore, I must state that wind energy, like other renewable energy system, while being a very important thing for us and the world’s wellbeing, it must be designed not to adversely affect people living in the area.
If you visit the Homemate shop in Mriehel, and just imagine your bedroom to be situated where the shop’s front door is, you can judge for yourself if you can manage to sleep with the noise created by the ‘small’ wind turbine situated across the street at the entrance to the waste collection centre situated there.

Mario Psaila
Marsascala

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