When Stephen Munday spent £20,000 on a wind turbine to generate electricity for his home, he was proud to be doing his bit for the environment.
He got planning permission and put up the 40ft device two years ago, making sure he stuck to strict noise level limits.
But neighbours still complained that the sound was annoying - and now the local council has ordered him to switch it off.
Officials declared that the sound - which Mr Munday says is 'the same pitch as a dishwasher and quieter than birdsong' - constituted a nuisance, and issued a Noise Abatement Order.
This is despite the turbine being more than 164ft from the nearest neighbour's house, as ordered by the planners. The ruling could have serious implications for the Government's drive to promote wind power and the use of renewable domestic energy if repeated across the country.
Electrician Mr Munday, 55, and his wife Sandra, a veterinary nurse, challenged the decision by the Vale of White Horse district council in Oxfordshire.
But Didcot magistrates rejected their appeal and they were left to pick up the £5,392 court costs as well.
The turbine generated five kilowatts of electricity a day - the equivalent of boiling 300 kettles - and provided two-thirds of the family's energy needs. It also saved them an average of £500 a year in electricity costs.
Sandra Munday said she and husband Stephen have been slapped with a £5,000 fine after the turbine caused a spate of complaints
Mr Munday, of Stanford in the Vale, near Abindgon, said: 'I am very disappointed.
'We were trying to cut down on our electricity bills and help the environment but have been clobbered for doing so.
'Everyone is encouraged to be environmentally friendly and we wanted to do our bit. We never dreamed that going green would land us in court and £25,000 out of pocket.'
More...Losing the plot... Gardener's fury as he is thrown off his allotment for not growing enough veg
The Government planning inspector granted planning permission on the condition that the turbine did not make more than five decibels of noise above that of the 'prevailing background'.
It stands in a paddock 230ft from the Mundays' four-bedroomed detached house.
Stephen Munday claims the hum emitted by the turbine is softer than birdsong or dishwasher
But five neighbours complained about the noise after the turbine began generating power in February 2007.
Patrick Legge, team leader of the council's environmental protection team, said: 'We accept that the noise did not breach the conditions in the planning application but it was decided that the character of the noise was a nuisance.
'There are no strict overall noise limits but each case is examined by their independent circumstances.'
Michael Stigwood, an independent noise and nuisance adviser to the council, told the court that the noise affected people's ability to 'rest and relax'.
'The noise was continual,' he said. 'It's irritating and gets under your skin and is intrusive.'
Neighbour Virginia Thomasson, 49, said: 'I can hear it inside and outside my house - at night, in the daytime, all the time.
'I cannot sleep with the window open.
'I am a tolerant person but with this noise it superimposes itself over everything I hear.'
Another resident, Michael Brown, 49, added: 'The rhythmic mechanical noise is very irritating and incessant.'
Chairman of the bench Liz Holford told the Mundays, who represented themselves in court, that the council's order was 'reasonable and necessary'.
Now their only option is to appeal to the High Court - but they cannot afford to do so.
According to the BWEA, the wind industry trade body, more than 10,000 small wind turbines have been set up since 2005 and an estimated 600,000 could be installed by 2020.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1187936/Green-homeowner-hit-noise-abatement-order-40ft-wind-turbine-driving-neighbours-mad.html
You need to call me first, then the lawyer (or lair, as friend calls them)
Won the Lottery? First, Call Your Lawyer
While the odds are against you if you play the lottery, you might get lucky and win the jackpot. But if you do, your first call shouldn’t be to friends or family to tell them of your good fortune. It should be to your lawyer.
Once you tell others of your winnings—or they learn about it in the newspaper or on television—they’ll congratulate you. But then, they’ll come to you looking for a handout. Long-lost friends will appear out of nowhere, likewise requesting assistance. Financial experts will contact you and offer their assistance in helping you invest your newfound monies. And of course, the taxman will want his share as well.
However, if you can keep your mouth shut, you can keep the entire matter private. Once you learn that you’ve won the lottery (or received a large inheritance, etc.) simply call your lawyer.
That’s what the winner of a recent US$144 million Powerball jackpot in Maryland did. Instead of accepting the funds directly, he set up a limited liability company (LLC) and named his lawyer as the LLC’s registered agent. Then, he sent the lawyer to collect the check.
This wise winner will never see his in the headlines or on television. Neither will any legal or personal “parasites.”
In this manner, our anonymous Powerball winner will avoid the fate of past lottery winners such as William "Bud" Post, who won US$16.2 million in the Pennsylvania lottery in 1988. He now lives on a social security paycheck and food stamps.
Once word got out of Mr. Post’s good fortune, his former girlfriend sued him for a share of the winnings. She won the lawsuit. Next, his brother hired a hit man to kill him, hoping to inherit the winnings, or at least part of them. Other family members harassed Post until he invested in their pet businesses. All of them failed, resulting in more financial losses. Today, Post says, “"I wish it never happened. It was totally a nightmare."
Naturally, our anonymous Powerball winner will need to take other precautions to enjoy his newfound fortune without falling victim to the common foibles of lottery winners. He might want to avoid casinos and drugs, for instance. Both have been the downfall of numerous lottery winners. And if he’s smart, he’ll invest the bulk of the money outside the United States, where prospective litigants won’t be able to track it. (Of course, he’ll need to make a full accounting to the IRS of his offshore earnings.)
Our Powerball winner should avoid conspicuous consumption as well—at least in his own name. If he wants to live in a new luxury home, fine—but he should have his attorney make arrangements to purchase it through an appropriate structure that doesn’t compromise his identity. Ditto for any luxury vehicles he might want to drive.
Ultimately, if you find yourself the recipient of an unexpected windfall, take a deep breath before you do something stupid. Then, call a lawyer!
Copyright © 2009 by Mark Nestmann
http://nestmannblog.sovereignsociety.com/
China warns Federal Reserve over 'printing money'
China has warned a top member of the US Federal Reserve that it is increasingly disturbed by the Fed's direct purchase of US Treasury bonds.
Richard Fisher, president of the Dallas Federal Reserve Bank, said: "Senior officials of the Chinese government grilled me about whether or not we are going to monetise the actions of our legislature."
"I must have been asked about that a hundred times in China. I was asked at every single meeting about our purchases of Treasuries. That seemed to be the principal preoccupation of those that were invested with their surpluses mostly in the United States," he told the Wall Street Journal.
His recent trip to the Far East appears to have been a stark reminder that Asia's "Confucian" culture of right action does not look kindly on the insouciant policy of printing money by Anglo-Saxons.
Mr Fisher, the Fed's leading hawk, was a fierce opponent of the original decision to buy Treasury debt, fearing that it would lead to a blurring of the line between fiscal and monetary policy – and could all too easily degenerate into Argentine-style financing of uncontrolled spending.
However, he agreed that the Fed was forced to take emergency action after the financial system "literally fell apart".
Nor, he added was there much risk of inflation taking off yet. The Dallas Fed uses a "trim mean" method based on 180 prices that excludes extreme moves and is widely admired for accuracy.
"You've got some mild deflation here," he said.
The Oxford-educated Mr Fisher, an outspoken free-marketer and believer in the Schumpeterian process of "creative destruction", has been running a fervent campaign to alert Americans to the "very big hole" in unfunded pension and health-care liabilities built up by a careless political class over the years.
"We at the Dallas Fed believe the total is over $99 trillion," he said in February.
"This situation is of your own creation. When you berate your representatives or senators or presidents for the mess we are in, you are really berating yourself. You elect them," he said.
His warning comes amid growing fears that America could lose its AAA sovereign rating.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financetopics/financialcrisis/5379285/China-warns-Federal-Reserve-over-printing-money.html
It is all about media bias and politics, 6 months ago this headline (or at least the article) would have vastly different. President Bush, would have been heralded with failed policies and look at the dead and think of the families and how could this heartless President do this and so on. What a shame...
May: U.S. troop deaths up in Iraq; 20 killed
May is already the deadliest month for U.S. troops in Iraq since September.
This month's death toll reached 20 when the military reported a soldier was killed by a roadside bomb Wednesday. The total is due in part to an unusually large number of non-combat deaths, including a mass shooting at a Baghdad military base. An American soldier has been charged in that case.
Still, the spike in fatalities has coincided with a spurt of violence in Iraq in recent months. Militant groups such as al-Qaeda in Iraq have stepped up their campaign of suicide bombings and assassinations at a time when U.S. troops are preparing to withdraw from urban areas by June 30 per a deal with the Iraqi government.
Gen. Ray Odierno, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, has said that he would be willing to stay longer in hot spots, such as Mosul, if asked by the Iraqi government. Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has said that he expects all U.S. troops to withdraw as scheduled.
"There needs to be some flexibility in the disposition of these forces," said James Phillips, a Middle East analyst at the Heritage Foundation in Washington. "I understand why the Iraqi government would want to stick to its public pronouncement, but the reality on the ground might force the need for adjustment."
Even with the recent surge in violence, the American death toll remains relatively low compared with 2006-2007, when a fierce insurgency raged through parts of the country, often killing more than 100 U.S. troops per month.
The 20 deaths for May include five servicemembers fatally shot May 11 at a mental health clinic at Camp Liberty in Baghdad. Army Sgt. John Russell has been charged by the military with murder in that incident.
Eight of the U.S. troop deaths this month have been combat-related, according to the U.S. military, a number in line with recent months. There have been 4,303 U.S. troops killed in Iraq since the start of the war in 2003.
Phillips said that it's likely Americans will increasingly be targeted in the weeks and months ahead as the U.S. military reduces its presence.
He said that it's also concerning that the Iraqi government has failed to pay thousands of members of the Awakening movement, Sunni militiamen who turned against al-Qaeda in Iraq and allied with U.S. forces.
"The consequences could be of major concern if the Iraqi government continues to backpedal from its commitments," he said.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/iraq/2009-05-27-iraqtroops_N.htm
Just to get it off my chest, this flap about the pick for the Supreme Court and her radical comment. If she would have been picked by a republican president and would have been white and either male or female, the Democrats and the press would have hounded them. It would have been in the papers everyday as a headline and all the Democrats would have been talking about it none stop.
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