Welcome
The International Acoustics Research Organization (IARO) with its secretariat in Palmerston North, New Zealand, is composed of a group of international senior academics, engineers and health professionals operating, at present, in 13 countries with more likely in the coming months, measuring and documenting industrial very-low-frequency and pulsed-noise emissions, and their effects on human and animal health. Those in the group have accumulated more than 300 years of research work in acoustics and related engineering and health studies. Their work is voluntary, this is not a consulting company. They are not interested in publishing for the sake of enhancing their CVs or focusing on the number of papers published and performance targets, where published papers are simply paper-studies of other authors’ paper-studies, with no actual physical measurements involved. The IARO researchers are simply dedicated to helping people who are adversely affected by these types of noise emission and have been ignored by local and government authorities.
A member of the group will visit such sites taking measurements, and often training the local residents to continue the measurements, linking them with a personal diary of times when the immissions trigger health concerns. The measurements are then later analysed and reports written in plain English so that they can be understood by the layperson. The group is not afraid to question local authority or government actions or policies where it is felt these are based on incorrect data or misinformation, and often will make submissions to the relevant select committee.
The present work stems from original research in the early 1970s relating very low frequency industrial sound to endemic dysentery among nearby residents. This research unwittingly developed into some non-lethal weapons used to disperse crowds resulting, in those exposed, to epileptiform attacks, severe vomiting and at least one brain hæmorrhage. The use of such non-lethal weapons on crowds was subsequently banned under the Second Geneva Convention 1976.
Today the group’s research is concentrated largely on pulsed sound emitted by wind turbines and its adverse health effects on nearby residents, where some residents report severe effects while others in the same family or area feel no ill effect. It is now surmised that the hearing mechanism may not be involved, other than perhaps adding to annoyance and stress, but that the adverse health effects are due to resonance in body organs and cavities being stimulated by direct transmission of sound and/or vibration passing into the human framework. Just as a manual worker may develop calluses on their hands from overuse, so continual vibrations on the visceral pleura of the lungs may cause pulmonary fibrosis to develop. People come in all sizes, their organs and cavities similarly with different resonant frequencies, hence the likely reason why some people may be affected while others in the same family are not.
To discuss the possibility of IARO helping to resolve an issue regarding possible adverse health effects in a place of human or animal occupancy, resulting from an outside man-made noise source, and the possible costs involved, contact the IARO Secretariat at: