Safety issues in wind power construction of communication base stations

The hazards and risk associated with wind turbine testing and maintenance is very similar to the same tasks performed on other generation equipment and are well understood by the industry. It is recommended that the precautions and safe work practices contained in manufacturer's literature be adhered to when performing maintenance or testing.

According to RenewableUK, although there are generic (not specific to wind energy) onshore and offshore health and safety standards available, outside of this it is left to each individual wind energy company to interpret what is an adequate standard.

Therefore, it is beneficial for the wind energy sector to develop well-defined electrical safe work practices and procedures for maintaining and operating the associated wind farm equipment throughout the facility's operational life cycle.

Issues such as construction and operational safety, flicker, electromagnetic radiation, noise, vibroacoustic disease and wind turbine syndrome have all been studied to determine their effect on the health and safety of people living in the vicinity of wind turbines, but the impact that these same issues could have on workers is not available.

Worldwide thousands of base stations provide relaying mobile phone signals. Every off-grid base station has a diesel generator up to 4 kW to provide electricity for the electronic equipment involved. The presentation will give attention to the requirements on using windenergy as an energy source for powering mobile phone base stations.

To ensure that health and safety remains a top priority throughout the wind industry and that it continues to be seen as a safe and responsible jurisdiction in which to work and with which to do business, more research is required on the OSH implications for staff working on wind turbine projects.