The Fight for Real Organic Food Continues

Waking Times
by Alex Pietrowski

Greed and power in the food industry is turning a trip to the grocery store into an objectionable experience, as processed and factory foods are further pushed onto the unwitting public.

On the positive side, however, most of us now have plenty of organic options, providing we know where to shop and how to find the good stuff. From fresh organic produce, to organic and compassionately farmed animal products, to a variety of delicious organic packaged foods, it is now easier than ever to eat healthy and stay away from unwanted pesticides, antibiotics, GMO ingredients, and synthetic additives in our food.

And now that Proposition 37 in California to label GMO foods has been defeated by the food industry and a sleeping populace, it is more important then ever to know how how to access and support the organic food movement. In a big way, your life depends on it.

Consumers must be prepared to demand and fight for high-quality organic options in our supermarkets, or we will be faced with a further degradation of production standards, questionable business practices, and conflict of interest matters.

Big Agra Conflict of Interest

A recent issue raised by various organic food industry watchdogs has been the presence of conflict of interest that has influenced decisions on what food additives are approved for use in organic packaged products. US organizations, such as the Cornucopia Institute and Center for Food Safety, have recently raised the issue of Big Agra business encroaching on the independent oversight that the US National Organic Standards Board (NOSB) has over what synthetic items can be added to the approved National List. This list includes processed synthetic items and processes that are approved for use in organic packaged products.

The following video from Cornucopia Institute provides a thorough overview regarding this issue:



A conflict of interest question has been raised regarding who makes the decisions about what contractors and consultants conduct technical or TAB reviews of materials on the National List of approved organic ingredients. Currently, the NOSB does not hold the final decision in this; instead, the USDA’s National Organic Program (NOP), the designated federal officer that participates in NOSB meetings, and the USDA Office of Ethics are said to carry an unethical influence over these decisions.

The decisions of the NOSB significantly affect the direction of the organic industry and what synthetic items are actually considered acceptable organic food components. Questionable items are already approved, such as the food additive Carrageenan, which was re-approved for use in organic food processing as of the Spring 2012 NOSB meeting.

“Degraded carrageenan,” which is present in all food-grade carrageenan, is classified as a “possible human carcinogen” by the International Agency for Research on Cancer of the World Health Organization (WHO) and the National Academy of Science in United States. – Cornucopia Institute

Who Owns Organic

It can be quite shocking to realize that we’re at a stage of having a “possible human carcinogen” approved as an ingredient in our organic products. Perhaps as awareness of this grows, concerned industry players, consumers and government officials will implement new checks and balances to ensure that less conflict of interest exists in the NOSB in the US, and in similar organic industry authorities worldwide. Industry oversight will grow in importance now that most non-organic, all-American brands, many of which are supporting Monsanto’s no GMO labeling efforts, are the same companies that have been heavily investing in the organic industry over the last 15+ years.

Some of the big food companies that have given money to the [GMO] anti-labeling cause also own organic brands, such as Kellogg Co., which owns the Kashi cereal brand, Dean Foods Co., owner of the Horizon organic dairy line and J.M. Smucker Co., which owns several organic brands. – Wall Street Journal

Here’s a PDF of the top food companies in the US and their ownership ties to well-known organic brands (as of June 2009)

Click here to download a short video created by Dr. Phil Howard, Assistant Professor at Michigan State University about who owns some of the more well-known organic brands.

How to Shop Organic

Let’s agree that buying food is much more complicated than it used to be, especially for the aware, health-conscious individual. There are more choices than ever, but these choices come from fewer companies. For shoppers, it is vitally important to understand the labeling process currently employed in the organic food industry. This is why people who want to label GMO foods are so passionate about this cause: labels are one of a few ways, if not the only way, that consumers can make informed decisions about what food they buy.

The USDA’s NOP offers some insight on its website about the labeling requirements of organic products, which can be viewed in the Labeling Organic Products PDF.

Here’s a quick video with Anne Lappe, author of “Grub: Ideas for an Urban Organic Kitchen,” offering an overview of how to identify organic foods in stores:



In the video, Lappe mentions that buying organic produce is easy – it’s either organic or not. But what if your organic produce selection is limited? Or you’re on a budget, and shopping all organic is breaking the bank. Here’s a quick review of what fresh produce is typically most heavily treated with pesticides and which is not.

Here is another article with some insight regarding organic dairy, meat and seafood.

Think Local

If you already buy organic products or just want to eat healthier, don’t get discouraged by this article. It is a resource. Take this opportunity to learn from the wealth of information available here, and start making even better food choices. In our world, it is difficult to be 100% organic. But there are ways you can move closer toward this goal. Support smaller organic food producers and local farms. Eat fresh and raw foods. Start an organic garden or become involved in a community urban farming project. And stay informed and educated, so YOU are the one who decides on what food ends up on your dinner table.

Related:   GM Wheat May Damage Human Genetics Permanently

Vaccine Bombshell: Baby Monkeys Develop Autism Symptoms After Obtaining Doses of Popular Vaccines

Vanguard

by Sola Ogundipe

Following a recent study conducted by scientists at the University of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania which revealed that many infant monkeys given standard doses of childhood vaccines as part of the new research,developed autism symptoms, question marks over the ultimate safety of vaccines have come to the fore.

The groundbreaking research findings presented at the International Meeting for Autism Research (IMFAR) in London, England, have revealed that young macaque monkeys given the typical CDC-recommended vaccination schedule from the 1990s, and in appropriate doses for the monkeys’ sizes and ages, tended to develop autism symptoms. Theirunvaccinated counterparts, on the other hand, developed no such symptoms, which points to a strong connection between vaccines and autism spectrum disorders.

This development which deconstructs mainstream myth that vaccines are safe and pose no risk of autism, was brought on by after studies on the type of proper safety research on typical childhood vaccination schedules that the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) should have conducted — but never has — for such regimens.

Included in the mix were vaccines containing Thimerosal, a toxic, mercury-based compound that has been phased out of some vaccines, but is still present in batch-size influenza vaccines and a few others.

Also administered was the controversial measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccine, which has been linked time and time again to causing autism and various other serious, and often irreversible, health problems in children.

“This research underscores the critical need for more investigation into immunizations, mercury, and the alterations seen in autistic children,” said Lyn Redwood, Director of SafeMinds, a public safety group working to expose the truth about vaccines and autism.

“SafeMinds calls for large scale, unbiased studies that look at autism medical conditions and the effects of vaccines given as a regimen.”

Adding to the sentiment, Theresa Wrangham, president of SafeMinds called out the CDC for failing to require proper safety studies of its recommended vaccination schedules. Unlike all other drugs, which must at least undergo a basic round of safety testing prior to approval and recommendation, vaccinations and vaccine schedules in particular do not have to be proven safe or effective before hitting the market.

“The full implications of this primate study await publication of the research in a scientific journal,” said Wrangham. “But we can say that it demonstrates how the CDC evaded their responsibility to investigate vaccine safety questions. Vaccine safety oversight should be removed from the CDC and given to an independent agency.”

Mayor Bloomberg's soda ban will cause New Yorkers to poison themselves with more aspartame

Natural News

Ah, the hilarity of the nanny state knows no bounds, it seems. Especially not in New York City, where Mayor Bloomberg oversaw a large-sized soda ban that just became law. The really hilarious part of the law? It does not apply to aspartame-laced "diet sodas" which, by any honest measure, are far more toxic to your health than regular sodas made with HFCS.

HFCS may cause diabetes and obesity, but aspartame causes neurological damage and early-onset Alzheimer's. But that's just what New York needs, it seems: A wave of crabby soda-drinking senior citizens who are half blind and can't remember where their apartment building is located. (Or has that already happened?).

That the New York city health board actually thinks diet soda is healthier than regular soda is a sad, sad commentary on the state of nutritional ignorance in NYC. So under this nanny state plan, citizens will be pushed to consume more neurotoxic aspartame -- gee, what a brilliant plan! Why not ban vitamins, too, and just force everybody to take a daily chemotherapy pill and call it a "public health initiative?".

Soda prohibition will only create a new black market.

I'm mesmerized by the arrogance of nanny state governments that think they can alter reality via decree. Bloomberg and the entire city health board somehow believes they will magically make people healthier by taking away their choice. So instead of actually educating New Yorkers about the dangers of HFCS and phosphoric acid -- two of the primary health-destroying ingredients in sodas -- they pull a nanny state / police state fast one and criminalize the selling of those sodas.

This, of course, will only create a black market in high-capacity sodas. So now, instead of people buying their sodas at legitimate establishments with relative compliance with public health regulations, they're going to be buying "contraband" sodas in dark alleys where crime runs rampant. This is the upshot of all such prohibition laws by any government: economic transactions that used to be above the board are now driven underground. (Marijuana, see?)

Before long, tyrants like Bloomberg will dutifully announce "there is a crime wave of illicit soda sales taking place!" and therefore the city needs to create a soda prohibition task force to hunt down soda sellers and infiltrate their operations.

Yep, it's time to declare the "War on Soda" ... kind of like the War on Drugs, except even more of a waste of taxpayer money.

Then we'll see the NYPD hiring "undercover soda buyers" to infiltrate soda selling establishments, posing as regular customers. They'll ask for -- OMG! -- a "13 oz. soda" and see if the vendor actually serves it up. If they do, they're arrested on the spot and processed as a soda criminal. Because, you know, they're obviously a danger to society and need to be taken off the streets, right?

You see, the problem with creating new laws is that you then criminalize an entire segment of the population; then you need law enforcers to hunt those people down and "process" them with fines or criminal penalties. So instead of gaining public health, the city actually loses public freedom and creates a new crime enforcement overhead paid by taxpayers.

A nation with the most laws has the least freedom

The more laws you create in any jurisdiction, the less freedom you have remaining. Laws always have good intentions, of course, but they also have unintended consequences (such as driving people to drink more aspartame).

Such is the problem with trying to micromanage everybody from a centralized government: You can never successfully shape their behavior to your liking because people are individuals and they want to make up their own minds about things. Even if they do stupid things like drinking a Big Gulp soda sweetened with genetically modified corn syrup tainted with mercury. Yeah, it's STUPID beyond belief, but it's still their choice.

With this soda ban, Mayor Bloomberg is treating the citizens of New York like stupid little children. Or even like house pets. "Bad soda drinker! Bad!" It is a silly, dignity-crushing stance for any government to take, and it only breeds contempt among the People who increasingly see their local government "rulers" as power-hungry maniacs trying to micro-manage every little detail of their private lives.

What's next? Is Bloomberg gonna pull a Singapore and ban chewing gum, too?

Or how about banning "dirty thoughts?" That could be a real windfall for the prison industry system.

Mark my words: In a year, New York's obesity problem will be WORSE

The really hilarious realization in all this is that banning large sodas won't make a bit of difference in the city's obesity problem. A year from now -- or five -- you're going to have even more cases of obesity, diabetes, heart disease and cancer.

And why is that? Because most of these diseases are caused by nutrient deficiencies. Banning diet soda does nothing to get people more vitamin D, selenium, zinc or magnesium -- the things that help prevent chronic degenerative disease. Diabetics, in particular, usually lack chromium, magnesium and vitamin D.

Banning people from buying large sodas does not magically make people take up exercise or consume fresh fruits and vegetables. You can't legislate people to want to be healthy, especially when half the people writing and passing these laws are obese, cancer-ridden desk jockeys in desperate need of a colon cleanse.

Look, society is SICK. Disease is rampant. The food supply is toxic. People are eating themselves to death with GMO, HFCS, MSG, aspartame and more. But that's mostly because huge food corporations dominate the legislation process and the poisons they put into the foods never get questioned.

Mayor Bloomberg doesn't question aspartame, MSG or GMO. Neither did Michelle Obama with her newly-release grocery shopping guide. There's never any real talk about the real poisons in your food. Instead, it's just this watered-down nanny state mish-mash of pure political bunk.

I don't drink soda, but that's because I'm an intelligent person who doesn't wish to poison my body with phosphoric acid and mercury-laced HFCS. I don't need some silly government mandate to tell me that soda is poison. That should be obvious to anyone with half a brain.

I also don't smoke marijuana, don't eat bacon and don't drink coffee. But again, that's my choice. I don't believe any one group of people has the right to tell another group of people what they can eat, drink or smoke. So why do we bow down, lick boots and surrender our freedoms over these things to the government?

Folks, if you live in NYC, you need to leave anyway. Not due to Bloomberg's silly nanny state initiatives, but because the city will become a death zone in the coming economic collapse. NYC is the absolutely last place you want to be when it all comes down.

Fukushima radiation now detected in the U.S. food supply

Natural News

Scores of experts and analysts have feared for months that it would happen, and now it has: Radiation from the heavily damaged nuclear power plants at Japan's Fukushima complex has made it into the seafood chain off the coast of America.

Small amounts of cesium-137 and cesium-134, both radioactive elements released after a major earthquake-caused tsunami damaged at least three reactors at the site along Japan's northeastern coast in March 2011, have been found in at least 15 tuna that were recently caught off the coast of California, scientists have said.

The finding suggests that the fish may have carried the contamination across the Pacific Ocean faster than wind or water has been able to do, and months earlier than wind and water brought debris from the damaged nuclear plant across the ocean to the shores of Alaska and the Pacific Northwest, said Reuters.

Researchers said that, so far, the levels of cesium found in the fish are not high enough to harm humans if consumed, according to data published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

'Not a large amount at all'

Daniel Madigan of Stanford University's Hopkins Marine Station did not make a determination about the safety of the fish, though he did say the amounts of radiation detected in the tuna are far less than Japan's safety limit.

"I wouldn't tell anyone what's safe to eat or what's not safe to eat," Madigan told Reuters. "It's become clear that some people feel that any amount of radioactivity, in their minds, is bad and they'd like to avoid it. But compared to what's there naturally [...] and what's established as safety limits, it's not a large amount at all."

Madigan said researchers found higher levels of two radioactive isotopes of the cesium element, 137 - which was present in the eastern Pacific before the disaster at Fukushima Daiichi - and 134, which is caused only by manmade activities and wasn't present before the tsunami smashed into the plant.

Since cesium 134 only exists through human activity, such as nuclear power plants and the manufacture of nuclear weapons, Madigan's team figured the 134 they were measuring had to have come from Fukushima.

"There was about five times the background amount of cesium 137 in the bluefin tuna they tested, but that is still a tiny quantity, Madigan said: 5 becquerels instead of 1 becquerel (It takes 37 billion becquerels to equal 1 curie; for context, a pound of uranium-238 has 0.00015 curies of radioactivity, so one becquerel would be a truly miniscule proportion)," Reuters reported.

Not much contamination, but how much is too much?

Bluefin tuna only spawn in the western Pacific, off the coasts of the Philippines and Japan. The researchers believe that the elevated radioactive isotopes came from Fukushima because of the way the tuna migrate across the Pacific Ocean. As young fish, some of them tend to migrate off the coast of California, and then remain there as they grow.

Judging by the size of the tuna examined (about 15 pounds), researchers believe the fish left the waters off Japan about a month after the accident.

Most of the radiation from the damaged plant was released only for a few days in April 2011. Unlike some other compounds, radioactive cesium doesn't sink quickly but instead remains spread out from the ocean's surface to the seafloor. That means fish can swim through it and ingest it through their gills, researchers said, or by either taking in contaminated sea water or contaminated organisms.

Madigan said bluefin tuna off Japan's coast soon after the accident probably had much higher levels of cesium 134 present in their bodies, perhaps as much as 40-50 percent more than normal.

Still, the fact that any radioactive contamination has showed up off the nation's coastline at all should be cause of concern because, as Madigan himself noted, it's hard to say what levels of contamination in our food are ultimately dangerous enough to cause harm.

Related:  Should We Hide Low-Dose Radiation Exposures From The Public?
Op-Ed: N. America's radiation threat: another mainstream news blackout

The GMO Film Project: In Defense of Our Seeds

Today in the United States, by the simple act of feeding ourselves, we unwittingly participate in the largest experiment ever conducted on human beings. Massive agro-chemical companies like Monsanto (Agent Orange) and Dow (Napalm) are feeding us genetically-modified food, GMO's, that have never been fully tested and aren't labeled. This small handful of corporations are tightening their grip on the world's food supply—buying, modifying, and patenting seeds to ensure total control over everything we eat.

The GMO Film Project (Untitled) tells the story of a father's discovery of GMO's through the symbolic act of poor Haitian farmers burning seeds in defiance of Monsanto's gift of 475 tons of hybrid corn and vegetable seeds to Haiti shortly after the devastating earthquake. After a journey to Haiti to learn why hungry farmers would burn seeds, the real awakening of what has happened to our food, what we are feeding our families, and what is at stake for the global food supply unfolds in a trip across the United States in search of answers.

Are we at a tipping point? Is it time to take back our food? The encroaching darkness of unknown health and environmental risks, seed take over, chemical toxins, and food monopoly meets with the light of a growing resistance of organic farmers, concerned citizens, and a burgeoning movement to take back what we have lost.

We still have time to heal the planet, feed the world, and live sustainably. But we have to start now.

A film by Compeller Pictures http://gmofilm.com

Nurses Are Losing Faith In Vaccines, Becoming Distrustful of Health Authorities

Waking Times
by Dave Mihalovic

It’s music to my ears and a symphony to my soul. Nurses may finally be coming around and grasping the gravity of how vaccines are damaging our bodies. A study in Vaccine shows that nurses trust in health authorities and vaccination is at an all time low following the H1N1 flu pandemic that was ultimately proven to be a hoax.

The 2009 H1N1 pandemic fraud perpetrated by health authorities worldwide seems to have backfired on those orchestrating the plot. Instead of reinforcing the “claimed” effectiveness of vaccination, it only created more doubt even within conventional medical practitioners themselves.

The study in Vaccine titled “What lied behind the low rates of vaccinations among nurses who treat infants?” is evidence of a growing resistance to vaccinating infants in the developed world.

What is unfortunate is that many of these nurses refuse the vaccinations themselves, yet proceed to administer these poisons to infants to protect their employment. That is quite cowardly, contradictory and at the very least shameful, not only as a health practitioner, but as a human being.

The aim of the study was to identify the barriers and reasons why nurses did not vaccinate themselves against pertussis despite the fact that the pertussis vaccine is the vaccine these nurses administer to infants every day. Two major and two minor themes were identified based on qualitative methods as described in the literature.

Lack of Trust in Health Authorities

The majority of nurses in all focus groups expressed, to varying degrees, lack of trust in the health authorities regarding their recommendation to be vaccinated. This was related to the recent influenza pandemic.

“…there was a drastic change in trust…”

“…I feel a real crisis in trust due to the swine flu affair.” The general mistrust generated during the A/H1N1 pandemic was directed to the pertussis vaccine when they were asked to vaccinate themselves.

Treatment of Nurses By The Employer

The nurses expressed their frustration with the administration and complained of the treatment they received from the administration that had no respect for them as individuals.

Some of the comments were related to the pertussis vaccine

“They should treat us like human beings.”

“…we are not soldiers…”

Most of the comments were related to the influenza vaccine:

“…we were threatened, we got multiple emails asking who got vaccinated and if not why not…”

The Right For Autonomy

The nurses expressed strong feelings against the Ministry of Health’s (MOH’s) recommendation for Health Care Workers (HCW’s) to be vaccinated. They do not want to be told what to do and want to make the decision themselves.

Regarding pertussis:

“One nurse in the hospital got pertussis, and infected someoneor not- don’t know. So then ‘wham’ all the nurses have to get immunized, so no one got immunized and they are right!…what are we?- in Soviet Russia?…on principle I am not getting vaccinated this year.”

Regarding influenza:

“…if I want to, I will get the vaccine, I am a grownup, I am responsible, if I want I will get vaccinated, it will not help whatever he says (the MD).”

Within this conflict between self and profession they wanted to be given the opportunity to decide for themselves if to get vaccinated.

They knew they had to work by “the book” regarding the infants they treat. However, they do not accept the recommendations blindly for themselves.

“…the line runs between me giving vaccines and receiving vaccines, I can personally be against vaccinations but am not against the national policy regarding vaccines, whoever wants can get vaccinated…”

“I don’t want anybody to make me get immunized, I do not want to, even if it is mandatory, even if it is pertussis, I don’t want to get it.”

Mistrust of Health Information

Many nurses felt the information they received was not adequate and did not answer their needs. They felt the information they received did not help them counsel families or make decisions regarding their vaccinations. This was in the context of their mistrust in the MOH.

“With the swine flu there was a lot of disinformation at the beginning, there was a lot of confusion at the beginning.”

“…you can’t brain wash us, they expect us to forget what they said three months ago or a year ago and start again, part of what we did was not so good, now we do something else… .you can do that at work but not in my private life, I can’t…”

Being a Role Model

Most nurses did not see themselves as role models and did not think they should reveal their personal behaviors or beliefs to patients who ask them about themselves. However, a few nurses found their decision not to be immunized problematic and debates between nurses started in all focus groups.

“What I do as a person and my beliefs are not relevant at all as a professional.”

Fear of Side Effects

The nurses reported on their experiences of side effects of vaccines.

They felt that the risk of contracting the diseases and the severity were not worth the risk of being injected with a vaccine that was not in use long enough to know what the side effects were. This was directed towards both influenza and pertussis vaccines, and they felt the authorities were using them as guinea pigs.

The Tides are Turning And The Vaccination Game Will End

I have no doubt that we will see the end of vaccinations one day and it will be exposed for the barbaric practice that it is, especially on infants and children.

The antivaccinationist ideals the nurses expressed are an indication of the resistance within medical circles. Emotions and attitudes such as fear of the vaccines and mistrust in the health authorities and leading factors in lower compliance rates.

These attitudes and emotions may influence their actions toward other vaccines in the future. Eventually physicians and medical students themselves will begin to question vaccine wisdom. The house of cards is crumbling and the vaccination hoax health authorities have promoted to the population is being exposed.

If still believe in vaccination to prevent disease, I promise that one day you won’t!

Wind farm noise does harm sleep and health, say scientists

Telegraph

Wind farm noise causes “clear and significant” damage to people’s sleep and mental health, according to the first full peer-reviewed scientific study of the problem.

American and British researchers compared two groups of residents in the US state of Maine. One group lived within a mile of a wind farm and the second group did not.

Both sets of people were demographically and socially similar, but the researchers found major differences in the quality of sleep the two groups enjoyed.

The findings provide the clearest evidence yet to support long-standing complaints from people living near turbines that the sound from their rotating blades disrupts sleep patterns and causes stress-related conditions.

The study will be used by critics of wind power to argue against new turbines being built near homes and for existing ones to be switched off or have their speed reduced, when strong winds cause their noise to increase.

The researchers used two standard scientific scales, the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index, which measures the quality of night-time sleep, and the Epworth Sleepiness Scale, which measures how sleepy people feel when they are awake.

“Participants living near industrial wind turbines had worse sleep, as evidenced by significantly greater mean PSQI and ESS scores,” the researchers, Michael Nissenbaum, Jeffery Aramini and Chris Hanning, found. “There were clear and significant dose-response relationships, with the effect diminishing with increasing log-distance from turbines.”

The researchers also tracked respondents’ “mental component scores” and found a “significant” link – probably caused by poor-quality sleep – between wind turbines and poorer mental health.

More than a quarter of participants in the group living near the turbines said they had been medically diagnosed with depression or anxiety since the wind farm started. None of the participants in the group further away reported such problems. Each person was also asked if they had been prescribed sleeping pills. More than a quarter of those living near the wind farm said they had. Less than a tenth of those living further away had been prescribed sleeping pills.

According to the researchers, the study, in the journal Noise and Health, is the first to show clear relationships between wind farms and “important clinical indicators of health, including sleep quality, daytime sleepiness and mental health”. Unlike some common forms of sleep-disturbing noise, such as roads, wind turbine noise varies dramatically, depending on the wind direction and speed. Unlike other forms of variable noise, however, such as railways and aircraft, it can continue for very long periods at a time. The nature of the noise — a rhythmic beating or swooshing of the blades — is also disturbing. UK planning guidance allows a night-time noise level from wind farms of 42 decibels – equivalent to the hum made by a fridge. This means that turbines cannot be built less than 380-550 yards from human habitation, with the exact distance depending on the terrain and the size of the turbines.

However, as local concern about wind farm noise grows, many councils are now drawing up far wider cordons. Wiltshire, for instance, has recently voted to adopt minimum distances of between 0.6 to 1.8 miles, depending on the size of the turbines. Dr Lee Moroney, director of planning at the Renewable Energy Foundation, said: “The UK noise limits were drawn up 16 years ago, when wind turbines were less than half the current size. Worse still, the guidelines permit turbines to be built so close to houses that wind turbine noise will not infrequently be clearly audible indoors at night time, so sleep impacts and associated health effects are almost inevitable.

“This situation is obviously unacceptable and creating a lot of angry neighbours, but the industry and government response is slow and very reluctant. Ministers need to light a fire under their civil servants.” The research will add to the growing pressure on the wind farm industry, which was attacked last week by the junior energy minister, John Hayes, for the way in which turbines have been “peppered around the country without due regard for the interests of the local community or their wishes”. Saying “enough is enough”, Mr Hayes appeared to support a moratorium on new developments beyond those already in the pipeline.

He was slapped down by his Lib Dem boss, Ed Davey, the Energy Secretary, but is unlikely to have made his remarks without some kind of nod from the top of Government. George Osborne, the Chancellor, is known to be increasingly sceptical about the effectiveness of wind power, which is heavily subsidised but delivers relatively little reduction in carbon dioxide. Wind farms generate about a quarter of their theoretical capacity because the wind does not always blow at the required speeds. Earlier this year, more than 100 Tory MPs urged David Cameron to block the further expansion of wind power. Whatever the Government decides, however, may not matter.

The Sunday Telegraph has learnt that the EU will shortly begin work on a new directive which may impose a binding target for further renewable energy, mostly wind, on the UK. There is already a target, which is also Government policy, that 20 per cent of energy should come from renewables by 2020.

But Brussels is considering imposing an even higher mandatory target to be met over the following decade, according to Gunther Oettinger, the EU energy commissioner. “I want an interesting discussion on binding targets for renewables by 2030,” he said earlier this year.

Two weeks ago, a senior member of his staff, Jasmin Battista, said that Mr Oettinger was “open to” forced targets, though no decision had been made.

The European Parliament has voted for mandatory increases in renewables by 2030 and Mr Davey has also said he favours them. The issue will be considered at a European Council of Ministers meeting next month.