TreeHugger.com: Common Eco-Myth: Wind Turbines Kill Birds
pythagoras
· 3 years ago
i'll tell you why that myth is spread, its because LIPA and all these other power corporations don't want to spend there money on research when they could just make a few press releases about the evils of green energy. and what really gets me angry is that the people getting angry at the wind mills are probably 95 percent meat eaters. they're all hypocrits...
Chingy
· 3 years ago
Hear Hear!!! Time the anti-wind a**wipes find another piece of propaganda. The Dutch also did a nice study on this, it can be found here:
Hey, I know, you anti-wind wackos can latch onto the idea that turbines will slow the planet's rotation down, causing untold climatological disasters! I think Sci-Fi Channel has a movie of the week coming up about that. :D
Peter
· 3 years ago
Thanks for making this known.
I would add that right now the off shore Cape Wind project on Cape Cod is in danger of being killed because of myths like this. I encourage those who care to support Cape Wind.
Donny
· 3 years ago
Even if a few birds die imagine the amount of wildlife saved from decreased amounts of pollution. People also don't seem to care if their airplanes destroy birds.
Shea Gunther
· 3 years ago
Nice!
I wrote something about this on my blog a few months ago (http://sheagunther.org/blog/?p=156), watch out for the anti-wind nuts to pour out of the woodwork to argue this one.
Darren
· 3 years ago
Thanks so much for this article, and I'm in total support of wind energy.
Although I must say that I'm not in support of using phrases like "probability of Tweety being smashed to bits" and references to "bird-o-matic" wind turbines which will only upset people already sensitive to this topic and in turn may keep people like myself from forwarding this article along to those sensitive people.
Just my .02 cents.
DG
· 3 years ago
Yeah, it seems to be an argument designed to either a) allow wealthy liberals to engage in NIMBYism while pretending that they're really concerned about wildlife, or b) allow antienvironmentalists to attack environmentalists as hypocrites.
Anonymous
· 3 years ago
Rock on. Now go educate the ignorant masses instead of the choir.
MGR
· 3 years ago
"Now go educate the ignorant masses instead of the choir."
There's nothing we'd like more.
Don't be shy, spread the word, send journalists our way, forward this article to non-choir-persons..
Hopefully it'll rank high in Google for "wind turbines kill birds".
Dominic Brown
· 3 years ago
John, thanks for a good sound article. It's unfortunate that the cleanest of clean power has acquired a bad name so unfairly.
I think, however, that you should revisit that bike-gear analogy. You said that a high gear involves fast chain movement with only a little wheel movement. That's backwards; you get that result in a low gear.
Think of it this way. Suppose your smallest sprocket (high gear) is a 13-tooth, and your largest sprocket (low gear) is a 28-tooth. In low gear, 13 links worth of chain movement produces one full wheel rotation; in high gear, less than half a rotation.
I suspect this would become easier to rephrase if the you got clear in your mind which part of the crank/wheel system is analogous to which part of the turbine/generator system. In the bike, the big spinny thing is the load, and the small part is the power source; in the turbine, the opposite is true.
Keep up the good work.
Dom
Andrew Krause
· 3 years ago
Misinformed nature lovers are only half the problem. Some of the best sites for wind have humans living on them, and the NIMBY crowd complains about the 'ugliness' or 'noise' generated by wind turbines. Now noise isn't really an issue unless you're standing right next to these things, but you can't argue with ugly. I think they're beautiful myself, and would love nothing more to open my drapes in the morning and see a 250 foot prop quietly generating the energy that runs my coffee pot.
MGR
· 3 years ago
This post has been submitted to Digg.com (and has generated some discussion over there too).
"but you can't argue with ugly. I think they're beautiful myself, and would love nothing more to open my drapes in the morning and see a 250 foot prop quietly generating the energy that runs my coffee pot."
From my completely non-scientific survey, I'd say that younger people tend to like the sight of wind turbines more than older people.
It could be that the "ugly" factor will recede with time, as more and more people are familiar with wind turbines from a very young age and as the population in general becomes more eco-conscious.
I bet the people of Denmark and certain regions of Germany smile more on windy day! Once people realize wind is a natural resource that creates money and jobs for their area, they might change their minds.
eric okeson
· 3 years ago
Helix based wind turbines such as Aerotechture (http://www.aerotecture.com/) and Quiet Revolution (http://www.quietrevolution.co.uk/) don’t kill birds. I know the designer of Areotechture, he’s seen birds fly straight through the turbine with out being injured. Not to mention they look cooler than common prop turbines.
Carl
· 3 years ago
'Ugly' may depend on your viewpoint, as well. I remember reading that when Khrushchev was visiting the USA, and was riding along the Jersey Turnpike, he saw the proliferation of active smokestacks and said it 'looked beautiful'. To him, the evidence of significant industry was a sign of economic strength. He might also have been referring to the implication that there was bountiful worker employment in the region.
In my opinion, I find wind turbines beautiful for very similar reasons.
Elissa
· 3 years ago
It seems to me that it's more the NIMBY's than the power companies themselves. LIPA is actually trying to put in some turbines off the south shore of Long Island, but people are complaining that it will "ruin their view" The whole bird excuse is really just a mask for the "ugly" argument. How about instead of windmills or no windmills, a view of windmills or smokestacks? Suddenly they look a whole lot better.
David
· 3 years ago
Wrong: "Wind turbines don't kill birds."
Right: "Wind turbines rarely kill birds."
Anonymous
· 3 years ago
5 bucks says birds die more from when they are sitting on the turbines, then the wind moves the turbines slightly, so the bird slides off and falls to the ground, than they do frum running into the turbines.
Emo1313
· 3 years ago
I was sitting at a StarBux some time ago with a friend, we were sitting outside. As we were sitting there a bird flew into the window, snapping its neck killing it instantly, it fell into my friends lap... I say BAN STARBUCKS NOW, STARBUCKS KILLS BIRDS.
GorgeBoy
· 3 years ago
I love the concept of wind power and live in a very windy spot (the Columbia River Gorge). I had heard the bird mortality info before and it made me second guess wind power.
I think the reason the bird death risk gets so much traction is due to the impact of water turbines on salmon & steelhead from hydroelectric something we all thought was a pure, ‘free’, non-impacting power source 30 years ago.
Net-net: I think explaining how/why bird death risk is NOT the Achilles’ heel of wind power will go a long way towards making us salmonoid huggers get on board.
Keith
· 3 years ago
I have been working with my Professor Bill Leithead, who is an expert in wind turbine design in europe. With regards to bird's death caused by wind turbine, the percentage is so small compared those creatures killed by colliding into window panes and building structures.
With abundant wind energy over the coast and high offshore wind speed, it is important that researchers and developers take advantage of such event to harnass the power for the grid. The cost of wind energy is so little, with an average life expectancy of about 30 years, thus makes a good investment opportunities for investors.
Wind energy is environment-friendly, so why not?
BG
· 3 years ago
Um, these windmills are doing us all a servce. Haven't they heard of avian flu?
mark b
· 3 years ago
Near where i live they are planning to build a windfarm, which has faced much opposition & only recently been under threat of being canned because of potential damage to a rare species of bird..
The thing is though, the people protesting against the windfarm are wealthy landowners who don't want their precious view destroyed by turbines. It saddens me to think that they only now are prepared to jump on the enviromental bandwagon to save some bird, nevermind the gas guzzling SUVs they all drive..
Clay
· 3 years ago
If it's all the meat-eater, wind-hating folks - wouldn't they want the birds to die? It provides many meals! Since you know, I come across anti-windites all the time. That's the most ridiculous thing - if anyone's complaining about death tolls of 2.19 birds per turbine, it's PETA.
Dave W
· 3 years ago
The problems with the wind turbines is all the extra ugly pylons that have to be built. Usually across areas with the most natural beauty.
It makes sense to produce power closer to big cities. Windmills are fine if they are offshore, and undersea transmission lines are used.
Regarding birds, the report actually references transmission lines as the biggest killer.
scruss
· 3 years ago
eric okeson, I'd love to see a bird flying through an aerotecture. It's a high-solidity design that would require the bird to be carrying a chainsaw to pass through it.
Birds will collide with anything; it doesn't have to have the illusion of being open space.
matchbookhymnal
· 3 years ago
Very useful and informative post! I would love to see bird deaths per kilowatt for wind power ranked against bird deaths per kilowatt for coal power. Don't forget, global warming is an extremely effective bird-killer.
Slow?
· 3 years ago
How can you say that rotor blades move slow when you don't give us the math? A blade of 20 m moving 20 times a minute is moving about 150 km/h. Birds will be hit. We have this problem i Norway. Soaring eagles can not easily avoid this.
==== author's response follows ====
If you have a math background you obviously appreciate that the speed of the blade segment decreases with closeness to the hub. Citing the speed of the outer-most arc as the "H" factor would be biased. Perhaps the midpoint would be the right speed? When you say eagles "soaring" that would be only one behavior that contributes to "E": also to be accounted for would be diving, taking flight, wheeling, etc. Which behavior would be prevalent at mid-rotor elevation range. For this we would have to rely on an experienced ornithologist for guidance, relative to the proposed site. I am supposing that "soaring" would expose eagles to the blades at mountain passes in critical hunting and breeding habitats: exactly the places that wind farms should not go. We are not far apart it seems to me.
Joseph Willemssen
· 3 years ago
Odd that no one gets up in arms about automobiles and roadkill.
Tony
· 3 years ago
Unfortunately, wind turbines DO kill BATS. In large quantities. Check out http://www.batcon.org - they regularly report on detailed studies on this.
There are things that can be done about it. It's not that wind power and bats are incompatible, but rather that the power companies aren't interested in spending a bit more to protect the bats.
Stu
· 3 years ago
I eat meat and am in favour of windfarms... is this allowed?
Mike Ellis
· 3 years ago
I just finished a physics course in "Energy Sources in the Early 21st Century." It became abundantly clear that with China and India industrializing rapidly and peak oil happening between 2005-2010 (2010 if you include strip-mining Alberta for the tar sands) that there is absolutely no option besides wind power.
-Solar is too expensive (for now)and needs the exlusive use of huge tracks of land
-Fission will run out of fuel in less than a decade of providing the planet's needs
-Fusion isn't likely to produce power in industrial quantities until after 2050 (if ever)
Unfortunately for the forseeable future it's going to be coal, wind, and hydro.
Canadians like myself have to learn to use 50% less energy in the next four decades. This means home and business thermostats will have to be set at 14C or 57F during the day, and lower still at night; and every vehicle will need to get hybrid efficiencies.
The bird argument may slow windmills down, but reality will set in sooner or later.
-Mike
josh
· 3 years ago
i can't believe you wrote such a long article about this. those people are morons and the world will go on without them. i believe in protection of endangered species by film. in other words, i believe in natural selection and humans documenting the process all the long way. :)
Erik
· 3 years ago
Author -
You sort of admitted to but failed to address that 'average' issue one poster brought up. You can't use the arguement that prop speed is decreasing. Is the average (distance from tip to hub) speed increasing or decreasing?
Also, if E equals exposure, then you are increasing E if you are increasing the number of windpower stations. The whole issue to begin with is that you going to add to your kill count by adding the stations.
==== author's response follows ======
RPM's have gone down absolutely. The props got longer but the outer most tip of the new props go relatively slow in radial velocity compared to middle of the older prop blades. In some cases blades are fewer as well.
To model total risk we have to decide if the hazard is "faced one turbine at a time" or cumulatively, which will be based on spacing in 3 dimensions. Here I am out of my skill set and will have to leave it to those with more field experience and knowledge of bird behavior.
My point was not to construct an operating model, real time, in a blog but to help deconstruct a meme that made little sense. Bottom line is that bird kill rates (mortality) can be diminished if people work hard to lower both H and E, using best practices and common sense to guide the siting and design processes.
One last tidbit. Reaction to risk always is shaped by the extent to which it is voluntary: e.g. we tolerate 50 thousand people getting killed in traffic accidents each year because each of us "knows" that we are in control of how we drive; but we are very intolerant of a far lower hazard created by another party or a factor out of our control. 'Bird kills at my house are ok but not by a wind farm owner'.
That being said, I'm in favor of windpower and think that the nay-sayers and NIMBYs are throwing up a smokescreen.
Scott
· 3 years ago
> Citing the speed of the outer-most arc as the "H" factor would be biased. Perhaps the midpoint would be the right speed?
Okay, let's do that, but with real numbers. A Vestas V100 has a rotational speed of 13.4rpm and a blade diameter of 100meters. Let's use the midpoint, so we have a diameter of 50meters, a circumference of 157meters, swept 13.4 times per minute, times 60 minutes/hour = 126km/h at the blade midpoint. (252km/h at the tip) How, exactly, does this make it safe? I do, however, take issue with the "midpoint" idea... The swept area is a function of the square of the radius. Therefore, the midpoint of the blade represents the one-quarter/three-quarters swept area boundary. In simple english, on a Vestas V100, on three quarters of the swept area of the blades, the speed of the blades is greater than or equal to 126km/h. I don't like those odds if I'm a bird, no matter what your bike chain says.
==== author's response follows =====
Great job of starting a working model definition for "H". As my post asserted however, "M" is a function of "E" as well. And you and I are probably not very good at intuiting how a bird will respond to "H or really understand why. Same for bats. One hypothesis we could pursue to tease out "E" in detail would be: "past a certain rotational average velocity, certain avain species are unable to percieve, and therefore unable to avoid" moving obstacles". "E" becomes random after a certain speed in otherwords. This is quite similar to how so called "mosquito repellants" work. They don't really repel at all. What does happen is that the insect's heat detection sensory organs are disabled by binding with a repellant vapor, so the squitos are no longer able to orient to a mamalian heat source. As a result, only a few bugs "collide" without skin.
For bats an "E" would be far more complex due to their looping flight patterns as they follow prey and because of their use of echo location and possible interaction of sonar with blade or rotor noises.
Jacknut
· 3 years ago
I wonder if you can get over the ugly arguement by making wind towers look like windmills at the local mini-golf. No one argues with mini golf.
Planxty
· 3 years ago
1. If the speed closer to the hub is slower on large blades, it is on small blades as well. The larger blade area on giant new turbines presents a much greater danger, sweeping a vertical air space of over an acre.
2. The industry cites the information from one old study at the Stateline facility in Washington. They prevent any independent research on the issue, as they now also do about bats after studies found thousands being killed at one facility in the Appalachians.
3. Since it is obviously an issue of cost vs. benefit (thus the strained argument that wind power saves more birds (or bats) than it kills), then where is the evidence of the benefit?
4. Wind power facilities also disturb nesting, particularly with prairie birds. That can have an even more negative effect on populations than outright killing.
5. The most attractive places to wind power developers are often popular flyways. Since little is known of local details about migratory pathways, especially of night flyers, developers resist making adequate preconstruction studies. That arrogance has contributed to the state of Vermont apparently planning to reject a proposal on East Mountain.
6. If anyone looks ridiculous, it's environmentalists attempting to downplay the negative impacts of their chosen industrial development.
==== author's response follows =====
These are sensible arguements that deserve serious attention. However, not all the cited Exposure factors apply equally and some may not apply at all depending on the proposed site.
EnergyOrganic
· 3 years ago
Here is the best rebuttal to this argument I have heard. I believe it is from wind expert, author, Paul Gipe.
The 3,000+ wind turbines operating near Altamont Pass (CA) would have to operate for more than 500 years to be responsible for the same number of birds the Exxon Valdez killed in less than one week.
So, which energy source do you prefer?
pete veilleux
· 3 years ago
altamont pass is in the middle of the highest populations of some rare and spectacular species - such as the golden eagle. it doesn't take many collisions to decimate this species. perhaps there needs to be a call to replace the old-style bird-manglers w/ the new and improved, bird-friendly turbines at this site - or maybe at least those turbines which are most responsible for bird killings. that might be a wise preventive measure for wind power proponents to take while these raptors are still amongst us. 50,000 human deaths per year in auto collisions does next to nothing to affect our survival as a species, but we are talking about a significant disruption to the entire population of some species. if we begin to speak in terms of percentages of total numbers of a given species, then we can assess the risk that we are assuming more clearly.
Gary McPants
· 3 years ago
Why is there no mention of species and their density? I think the comparison to car windows etc. is uninformitive if we don't know if if they are the same birds that we are worried about during migration through windfarms
Gary McPants
· 3 years ago
Ok. I am beating a dead horse here but an argument to put turbines on hawks ridge in Duluth should not be based on the number of dead Cedar Wax Wings found in NE Minneapolis.
Chad
· 3 years ago
Everyone seems to be pulling out their calculators so I thought I'd do the same. You say that everyday living in the US is estimated to kill 100-1000 million birds per year in the US, so I'll take the average of 550 million. Over a population of 295 million that's 1.85 birds/person/year.
I just thought that put the 2.2 birds/turbine/year in a bit of perspective.
PS To other commenters, please do not blend vegetarianism with wind turbines, I strongly suspect that this type of hybridisation does not help the cause one iota.
Mallory
· 3 years ago
As a personal "anti windfarm a** wipe," I'd like to speak up for the educated side of us. Most people who are opposed to wind farms are realistic enought to realize that the birds killed from wind warms are stupid. The big reason to be against wind farms is the disappearing prairie land. Only 2 percent of prairies exist today. They are the most endangered ecological system in the U.S. Once you destroy a prairie by tilling the land, or altering it, it is never the same. Prairies can not be recreated by man either.
Wind farms should be placed in placed that aren't endangered. I believe other energy sources should be used before we turn to wind power. Try biomass, solar, or water.
mike
· 3 years ago
Man o' man, we just can't do anything. We all insist we get off of oil b/c it is damaging the planet so we look at wind. We can't do that b/c it will damage the planet (using prairie land) so, we can look to solar...oops see second one about prairie land. What are we to do? I guess all humans should just die. At least it would stop one thing....The incessant whining.
I'm in favor of wind farms. I'm in favor of solar. I'm in favor of alt fuels and living cleanly and getting off of foreign oil but, we cannot completely tie our hands at every single turn stopping us from doing anything at all.
gerald duffy
· 3 years ago
Greed power, how come towers kills are a problem. Cornell and others have conferences on this topic. Wind turbines are safe? Lets see 140ft, 8 1/2 ton blade strobe lights are a must. Now get migration going on dark phase of the moon and a cloudy night birds are drawn to the lights. Greed power at its best. Blasdes made in Brazil, Base of towers Vietnam, Nacel from Denmark. All this woulod ot happen with solar and we would protect our rural enviorment. Next conscern how much energy goes into making these machines and how much free power do they get off the grid. I would like to know thhis answer, it sceems a pretty well kept secret on what return is from these. What Vibro-Acoustic disease And Wind Turbines?
Tom Gray
· 3 years ago
gerald duffy's post is misinformed: there is no evidence that I know of to indicate that migratory birds are attracted to flashing lights on foggy nights. They are attracted to steady-burning lights, of which wind turbines have . . . none.
eric okeson writes that helix-based turbine designs do not kill birds. Where is the data? There are many studies that have been conducted at wind farms with propeller turbines. Since birds collide with buildings, I see no reason to assume that they won't collide with anything that sticks up out of the ground.
emo1313, thanks for the Starbucks story--it is right on the money.
Gorgeboy says, "I think explaining how/why bird death risk is not the Achilles’ heel of wind power will go a long way towards making us salmonoid huggers get on board." It's not the Achilles heel because the number of collisions is so small. If the U.S. obtained all of its electricity from wind--100%--and the collision rate remained the same, wind turbines might account for 1% of human-related avian deaths.
Planxty says, "Since it is obviously an issue of cost vs. benefit (thus the strained argument that wind power saves more birds (or bats) than it kills), then where is the evidence of the benefit?" The benefit is generating electricity with no air pollution, no water pollution, no waste, and no mining or drilling for fuel. I won't claim that it saves more birds or bats than it kills, but I will claim that it benefits the environment compared with other energy sources.
Planxty says, "Wind power facilities also disturb nesting, particularly with prairie birds. That can have an even more negative effect on populations than outright killing." Good point. As a matter of fact, the wind industry has just joined in funding a four-year cooperative study of impacts of wind on grassland bird species. Still, these species are subject to many other forms of human intrusion--roads, ranchettes, oil pump jacks, gas compressors, agricultural burning, and so on. It will be interesting to see how the effect of wind turbines is isolated from these other sources of disturbance.
Planxty says, "The most attractive places to wind power developers are often popular flyways. Since little is known of local details about migratory pathways, especially of night flyers, developers resist making adequate preconstruction studies. That arrogance has contributed to the state of Vermont apparently planning to reject a proposal on East Mountain." "Flyways" is an often misused term. Tens of millions of birds migrate through San Gorgonio Pass in southern California each year, but very few collide with the hundreds of wind turbines there, because birds generally migrate at elevations well above turbine heights. The state of Vermont is over the top, asking for heavy-duty studies on a project with only 4 turbines.
pete veilleux writes, ". . . perhaps there needs to be a call to replace the old-style bird-manglers w/ the new and improved, bird-friendly turbines at this site - or maybe at least those turbines which are most responsible for bird killings. that might be a wise preventive measure for wind power proponents to take . . ." Sounds good. But the wind turbine operators in Altamont Pass have already agreed to a multi-year plan in which all of the turbines will be replaced by larger machines believed to be less hazardous. The plan also includes removing entirely a number of turbines in sites that seem to be especially hazardous.
Gary McPants writes, "Why is there no mention of species and their density? I think the comparison to car windows etc. is uninformitive if we don't know if if they are the same birds that we are worried about during migration through windfarms." Interesting issue. The fact is that wind energy is one of the most thoroughly studied sources of avian mortality. If you look for the number of birds killed by buildings each year, you will find a range of 100 million to 1 billion, because no one has studied the question closely enough to come up with a narrower range. Studies of transmission lines and roads are very poor and fragmentary, with little info on species composition.
Chad says, "You say that everyday living in the US is estimated to kill 100-1000 million birds per year in the US, so I'll take the average of 550 million." The range seems low. For buildings it is 100 million to 1 billion. For house cats, one can make a reasonable case for 2 billion. Autos, transmission lines, communications towers are each in the 5-100 million range. Pesticides too. More info available here.
Another thoughtful resource on the bird issue (I just ran across it again today) is Confessions of a Bird Lover by Mike Tidwell, director of the Chesapeake Climate Action Network. It includes a strongly worded quote from noted environmentalist Bill McKibben: "The choice is not between wind power and unspoiled nature. The choice is between wind power and the destruction of the world's biology."
Actually, you are citing a paper put out by wind industry lobbyists so of course they paint a rosy picture. Let me paint another one. The truth is 1) wind turbines are the most recent pressure on birds in addition to domestic and feral cats (worst), cars, communication towers, and even though the kill may be low today because of the low numbers of wind farms, if you look at the rapid growth of the industry due to economics (the small players have been purchased by GE, Goldman Sachs and other big players) you'll see that soon wind turbines will rank up there with cats for killing birds; 2) there are almost no pre-construction studies on migratory songbirds which are most vulnerable from 2-3 hours after sunset as they gain altitude, and 2-3 hours before sunrise when they lose altitude. Wind energy companies refuse to do nocturnal surveys for birds or bats which is why thousands of bats are killed every year in West Virgina.3)these birds cannot be counted in "body counts" as they evaporate upon impact, or are eaten by predators so they are not included in the rosy figure of 2.whatever birds per turbine; 4) despite studies that show that migratory birds fly low over ridges, turbines are built on idges; 5) the only mitigation available for unacceptable kills of migratory songbirds is to turn the turbines off seasonally or to remove them.
Tim Bogers
· 3 years ago
Any one ever thought of kill free wind mill? I have been testing mine,not one dead bird yet. I could have ten working and not one dead bird, most folks would not even notice them. Wind must prevail as a step forward to eliminating our green house problems. Any one look out the window lately? The weather is sending us a big message, we must make some changes.
I also designed a hydrogen production system on all of our cars and trucks at home and have reduced the emissions huge, not to mention savings at the pump. There is technology out there right now and has been there for quite some time now, but the walls are high to overcome and there are too many in control who are only intrested in the big buck and not the enviroment.
We will get out there, and no beter time than the present.
tomgray
· 3 years ago
The truth is 1) wind turbines are the most recent pressure on birds in addition to domestic and feral cats (worst), cars, communication towers, and even though the kill may be low today because of the low numbers of wind farms, if you look at the rapid growth of the industry due to economics (the small players have been purchased by GE, Goldman Sachs and other big players) you'll see that soon wind turbines will rank up there with cats for killing birds;
No, this is simply not true. It is certainly true that the absolute number of birds that die in collisions with wind turbines is relatively small because of the small number of turbines, but the mortality rate is also low. If we obtained 100% of our electricity in the U.S. from wind, bird kills by wind turbines would probably be less than 1% of overall human-related mortality from the sources you mention plus many others: buildings, pesticides, farm mowing equipment, etc.
2) there are almost no pre-construction studies on migratory songbirds which are most vulnerable from 2-3 hours after sunset as they gain altitude, and 2-3 hours before sunrise when they lose altitude.
Wind energy companies refuse to do nocturnal surveys for birds or bats which is why thousands of bats are killed every year in West Virgina.
It is certainly true that many bats are being killed, but it's not true that wind energy companies are refusing to do research. A number of them are jointly funding a bat research program with Bat Conservation International, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and the U.S. Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Laboratory. More info about this here. Wind companies have also paid for extensive radar studies of migrating birds in the eastern U.S.
3)these birds cannot be counted in "body counts" as they evaporate upon impact, or are eaten by predators so they are not included in the rosy figure of 2.whatever birds per turbine;
Sorry, but the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service was one of the groups involved in developing the NWCC fact sheet cited above.
4) despite studies that show that migratory birds fly low over ridges, turbines are built on idges [sic];
Not true either. References please. Birds migrate across a broad front and do not follow ridgelines.
5) the only mitigation available for unacceptable kills of migratory songbirds is to turn the turbines off seasonally or to remove them.
I think this is probably true. However, since there have been no such kills, it's just a hypothetical question.
Any one ever thought of kill free wind mill? I have been testing mine, not one dead bird yet. I could have ten working and not one dead bird, most folks would not even notice them. Wind must prevail as a step forward to eliminating our green house problems. Any one look out the window lately? The weather is sending us a big message, we must make some changes.
I agree with you about global warming, but you will need to back up your claims about no kills for them to be credible. Since birds run into houses routinely, it's hard to believe they will not collide with any wind turbine that sits above ground. There is a whole science of conducting surveys to monitor avian mortality. You can find out more about it from the National Wind Coordinating Committee site.
Until my patents are finished I will not disclose too much info on my prototype.I can tell you that it works great even at low wind.It spins with the help from other types of energy than just wind.
I can tell you that there are no sharp leading edges and that if a bird were to come into contact with the mill it will simply bounce off.The blades are fexible and again have no sharp leading edges.I even have a picture of a squirrel enjoying a ride on it.
Trust me when I say,at times I have more respect for animals than I do for people,sad to say.
Chidade
· 3 years ago
I am keen to make the power grids cleaner, especially in my home counry of Australia where coal is so readily available that energy companies are lax to try using anything else.
But I can't say I'm a big fan of wind energy, for all the reasons cited. Birds and bats are just one of them. Then there's the 'ugliness' or at least the almost violent interruption of nature views especially in coastline and mountain areas.
It can reduce land value, it could be noisy if you live near one and most importantly, it's only useful while the wind is blowing.
I'd like to see more promotion of tidal power (or 'lunar power' as it's being marketed although that's a bit of a misnomer). Tides can be easily predicted, and even then, the turbines could be put somewhere where there is a permanent current, like river mouths. It's out of sight, much more powerful than wind energy, and with some basic netting or similar, can help protect most marine species from the fate of the birds and bats.
Because we are effectively having an energy crisis, wind energy could be used now, but I'd hope it's only a transitional power source, until better and technology like fusion becomes mainstream.
But I'd much rather have tidal over wind and I wish TH and everyone who reads it would do more to promote and support it.
Kent Beuchert
· 3 years ago
"i'll tell you why that myth is spread, its because LIPA and all these other power corporations don't want to spend there money on research when they could just make a few press releases about the evils of green energy."
Once again, the environmentalists always try
to blame corporations. In this case, it's the general public and the bird environmentalists and those environmentalists that oppose wind power for other reasons that are spreading the misinformation.
Seldom, if ever, have I heard
of a corporation speaking against wind power, although I've heard a lot of them speaking in favor of it. Utilities are the corporations that woould be affected , and most of them now love the idea of a power source whose rates can be contracted ten years in advance and guranteed not to increase. That is an ENORMOUS
advantage for wind power. It's always the local yokels who
lie about bird kills, noise, and claim the towers are
destroying their precious
visual horizon. In nearly all cases, the horizon looks a lot better to me with the towers
than without.
Chidade
· 3 years ago
In nearly all cases, the horizon looks a lot better to me with the towers than without.
Oh I'm terribly sorry, I didn't realise! I guess since you like the view of great big machines in the middle of otherwise untouched landscape, that mean windpower is A-OK then! My bad. And here was me thinking that my opinion on what looks nice mattered!
--
editor note: While personally I like the look of wind turbines, I understand that some people don't. But we have to remember the stakes; it's not about the view, it's about global warming and air pollution. The choice is between coal and renewables, and while solar and wave energy have a lot of potential, we'll need everything we can throw at the problem including lots and lots of wind power.
Tim Bogers
· 3 years ago
So you would rather see a great big line of brown hase instead of a wind mill?Wrong!Your idea of solar or lunar power is not far off either.All the suits need to make their cash first.Thank God for tree huggers,without us we would all be at the bank cashing in our hard earned $$$ to buy good ol O2, so then we could buy some gas and start it all over again.(sort of speak)It is give and take here folks.We can't have our cake and eat it to!Too late for that I am afraid.
Chidade
· 3 years ago
Like I said before, I like green energy, and I'm happy that there's some in the form of solar and wind. But there's better forms out there, and we have to make the move to the newer forms of green energy.
Quickly too, so that less windfarms need to be built. I'm not saying that coal is better than wind, I'm saying that other green power sources are better than wind.
Tim Bogers
· 3 years ago
This was not an jab at you mate.We are on the same team.Green energy must start up like the car did,first the pony then steam the gas then....who knows what will be next.Stats say that alot more folks are dieing because of global warming not to mention animals.We have to start some where.I would put my last buck into green enrgy...Wait,I did.It is not about money,it is about my kids,your kids and their kids and so on.
PS
I spent a year in Australia,and loved evey min. there.Lots of creepy crawlers though.Have a great day my friend.
KPod
· 3 years ago
Anyone read The Onion this week? Big headline: "Sparrow Aviation Administration Blames Collision On Failure To Detect Pane Of Glass; Mysterious Phenomenon Kills Millions Each Year."
Not really relevant but very very funny.
jane eyre
· 3 years ago
if wind turbines kill birds then they should be taken down but untill they have solid evidence then they should be kept up
Anonymous
· 3 years ago
"if wind turbines kill birds then they should be taken down but untill they have solid evidence then they should be kept up"
Well, I think we should have priorities. If we're taking down things because they hurt wildlife, we should start with cars, pet cats, buildings, coal plants, etc. Wind turbines are pretty low down the list, IMO.
Micah
· 3 years ago
This is possibly the most pethedic article i have ever read\. You people have no lives and if you care so much about this why dont you get in a plane, try being a bird, and fly threw a giant wind turbine. Hopefully you can go be with your preciousbird conterparts in your little bird heaven. Have a nice day
Gerald Duffy
· 3 years ago
Well wind power just makes money from the good old tax payers of this great country. J P Morgan and Gold Sachs. Coal is the real poluter, and China and India use more coal than the USA. One of the biggest poluters in California is from Chinas coal fired plants. Clean up coal and not polute the country with wind turbines. The reality of this activity? Wild places are under attack! The birds are at risk of a horrible death.
Their habitats are being damaged.
Gordon Garrett
· 2 years ago
I was looking for information regarding what someone in geofraphy class claimed that they had read that wind turbines cause damage to the ground below and the worms. No joke. Anyone know. GG
=== author's response follows ===
In the spring when the soil is very wet you can chase worms out of the ground by pounding in a piece of iron rebar and then striking it sideways to set up waves of vibration. It is conceiveable the vibration from poorly anchored turbine towers could do something simiilar. But so could light standards or any structure that sways in the wind.
If the tower base were in contact with a rock outcropping, say a friable limestone rock outcrop, it is conceivable that the added weight and vibration could cause stress fractures and lead to changes in groundwater flow, but at a very local level...not regionally.
Goober Bob
· 2 years ago
I enjoyed this post. I admittedly did not have the time to read it all, but I can shed a little more info for your readers.
In the Altamont Pass area - North to Vasco road and beyond, the older turbines rotate extremely fast and thus birds get killed. They are now moving toward the 65 meter and 80 meter tower turbines made by Mitsubishi at a cool $1,000,000 each. THese turn at an optimum rate of 28 MPH which will drastically reduce the bird kills.
I worked on the replacement of the wind mills along Vasco Road 38 wind turbines that are now up and running. they are very impressive - but far from "Quiet". There are vitually no homes to condend with at this site. Antoher site we are working is over by Rio Vista. Out there we have to maintain 1500' distance from house due to noise.
as far as the wormies.... The bases on these windmills are 15' diameter foundations and 15' deep. Were they are placed is at the top of ridge lines so I doubt there would be any disruption in ground water flow or stress fractures.... but that is not my field.
One point that just kills me is that the folks on the East Coast.... Martha's Vinyard are opposed to Wind Turbines being placed offshore. They don't want to disturb their view of the open Ocean ? I jus think that is the height of Audacity ! We need the power and it won't make an oil slick.
Gil Greenwood
· 2 years ago
I have been a remote radio facility owner/operater for eighteen years. Twelve of those years I have used small wind turbines to offset diesel generator costs to power my nine constructed sites. In all those years of operation, I have yet to find one bird injured or killed by the operation of the turbines. I also look for remnant feathers each time I visit these sites (bi-monthly) in the event a ground animal might have removed a dead or injured bird. One of my hobbies is to feed the various types of birds that frequent my radio facilities. Many will actually land on my hand to feed. All of my sites are primarily solar powered in similar fashion. I have witnessed raptures, crows, and ravens flying around my facilities when the turbines are active. They all appear to be extremely aware of the turbines operation and give them a wide area of clearance. I am not a treehugger, nor am I a "rape the earth" business operator. I do try my best to remain in harmony with the local environment, however, by causing only a minimal impact in the area. It seems to me there are only two types of environmental organizations, extremely left or right. Are there any practical organizations that believe in common sense and are centered?
Gil Greenwood
Lori
· 2 years ago
As one who resides in Vermont, I want information that wind turbines will have minimal impact on peregrines. I'm certainly not a NIMBY. If feasible, I would have one on my hill -- the part that's pasture.
I grew up near coasts, and, as far as I'm concerned, most barrier islands should never have been developed. In ecological terms, barrier islands are too important to be mauled by humans. On the east coast, they represent significant migratory paths for birds, etc. The seasonal inhabitants of Cape Cod / Nantucket / Martha's Vineyard may be reprehensible in many ways, but there are issues re: wind turbines and migratory birds that need to be explored.
Obviously, careful siting of turbines and improvement of safety
are priorities.
I came to Treehugger hoping to find leads to well-written articles exploring the rare bird vs. wind turbine issue, as what I had read about Smola concerned me. Unfortunately, I seem to have come across wind industry proponents and/or those who would rather argue than explore the issues.
By the way, I'm not a vegetarian, a PETAn, nor do I shop at a 'greener' WalMart. (But I did go to town meeting last week.)
I do believe in the ethical treatment of the animal whose meat I consume, rare species, and employees.
Bart
· 2 years ago
One commenter said:
-Solar is too expensive (for now)and needs the exlusive use of huge tracks of land
>>> true. But the same is true of wind power.
-Fission will run out of fuel in less than a decade of providing the planet's needs
>>> No. Breeder reactors could run for centuries.
-Fusion isn't likely to produce power in industrial quantities until after 2050 (if ever)
>>> hard to say
Bottom line: the question is quality, not quantity. True, the gross numbers of birds killed may be small compared to the entire bird population, but as some commenters have noted, those birds that are killed tend to be slow breeding endangered types.
Marcus
· 2 years ago
The number of birds killed by windmills has to be next to nonexistent standing next to the number all of the birds killed by oil tanker spills.
--
editor note: The biggest bird killers are power lines, buildings (windows..) and house cats. Next to those, everything else is very small, except maybe for the less of forests and, in the mid to long term, global warming.
zaxxon
· 2 years ago
if we just built kentucky fried chickens below the turbines our problems would be solved.
Serulean
· 2 years ago
thanks for writing such a detailed analysis on this.
i just hope that they implement more of wind turbines up in the Northern territories.
Frank Sitchler
· 2 years ago
How about attaching whistles to the vanes, tuned to the frequency that scares off the birds?
Tom Gray
· 2 years ago
In the Altamont Pass area - North to Vasco road and beyond, the older turbines rotate extremely fast and thus birds get killed. They are now moving toward the 65 meter and 80 meter tower turbines made by Mitsubishi at a cool $1,000,000 each. These turn at an optimum rate of 28 MPH which will drastically reduce the bird kills.
The tip speed of the newer, larger turbines is roughly the same as the tip speed of the older, smaller ones--in the 150-180 mph range. I think you must mean 28 rpm, not mph, although that seems a little high.
I think a more important statistic, which I heard just a day or two ago from an ornithologist, is that some of the numerous older turbines in Altamont Pass are just 30 feet apart. Larger turbines must be spaced farther apart, so there is more room for birds to pass between them. BUT: this is just my opinion, not supported by any scientific study that I know of.
I worked on the replacement of the wind mills along Vasco Road 38 wind turbines that are now up and running. they are very impressive - but far from "Quiet". There are virtually no homes to contend with at this site. Another site we are working is over by Rio Vista. Out there we have to maintain 1500' distance from house due to noise.
I wouldn't doubt it, but I'd be interested to know more about the decibel levels. Turbines are not silent, but neither are they especially noisy--typically you can stand at the base of the modern ones and carry on a conversation in a normal tone of voice.
As one who resides in Vermont, I want information that wind turbines will have minimal impact on peregrines.
I can't say this for certain, but I can say it's very likely. Raptor kills in significant numbers (significant in terms of the local population of the species involved) have occurred at only a few sites in the world--Altamont Pass in California, Smoela in Norway (which you mention below) and one location in Australia. I can only really speak to Altamont, which is a site of very heavy, year-round raptor use. There is no indication to date that sites in the Eastern U.S. would encounter similar problems, based on experience from the wind farms in place to date in this region.
I'm certainly not a NIMBY. If feasible, I would have one on my hill -- the part that's pasture.
Glad to hear it. It is important to keep in mind the urgent need to develop clean alternative energy sources like wind and solar in order to fight global warming.
I grew up near coasts, and, as far as I'm concerned, most barrier islands should never have been developed. In ecological terms, barrier islands are too important to be mauled by humans. On the east coast, they represent significant migratory paths for birds, etc. The seasonal inhabitants of Cape Cod / Nantucket / Martha's Vineyard may be reprehensible in many ways, but there are issues re: wind turbines and migratory birds that need to be explored.
Perhaps. However, again, there is no indication that wind turbines pose a problem for migratory birds. California's San Gorgonio Pass is a strong indication of the opposite--with tens of millions of birds migrating through the pass each year, and thousands of wind turbines, there are very few bird kills. The Cape Wind project has already been the subject of far more scrutiny than fossil-fueled generating plants in Massachusetts. How much is enough?
Obviously, careful siting of turbines and improvement of safety are priorities.
I came to Treehugger hoping to find leads to well-written articles exploring the rare bird vs. wind turbine issue, as what I had read about Smola concerned me. Unfortunately, I seem to have come across wind industry proponents and/or those who would rather argue than explore the issues.
Well, there is a fundamental problem here, and you've put your finger on it: do we consider wind power from a "macro" (large-scale) point of view or only from a "micro" perspective? Looking at it under a microscope, one does find local impacts, like shadow flicker (flickering shadows cast by rotating turbines), sound that is audible at times, occasional bird kills, and other issues. But stepping back for a moment and looking at the macro point of view, the benefits are huge: electricity generated from a domestic, inexhaustible resource that is very abundant across most of the U.S. with no air pollution, no water pollution, no water use, no global warming pollution, no mining and no drilling. Is it really surprising that many people feel strongly that the big-picture benefits outweigh the risks?
-Solar is too expensive (for now)and needs the exlusive use of huge tracks of land
>>> true. But the same is true of wind power.
No, it is not. 95-98% of the land within a wind farm's boundaries remains free for farming or ranching, even after allowing for the turbine bases, access roads, etc. That is why it is such a no-brainer for farmers.
Bottom line: the question is quality, not quantity. True, the gross numbers of birds killed may be small compared to the entire bird population, but as some commenters have noted, those birds that are killed tend to be slow breeding endangered types.
Sources, please: I know of no evidence to support this assertion. In fact, many of the birds that die in collisions with wind turbines are common ones, like rock doves.
How about attaching whistles to the vanes, tuned to the frequency that scares off the birds?
A number of ideas like this one have been suggested, and some have even been tested in the field (painting turbine nacelles to make them look like giant predators, painting rotor blades with special paint to make them visible in a wider range of visual frequencies, installing anti-perching devices on lattice tower crossbars, using tubular towers instead of lattice towers). Some have worked and been generally adopted, and some have not. This specific suggestion seems to have some weaknesses: 1) the whistles have to be pretty robust structurally, since the blades are moving at 150 mph plus; 2) they would create the potential for increased sound volume and disturbance to neighbors and other wildlife (e.g., big game); and 3) it is difficult to find a sound to which birds do not habituate (think of the difficulty some cities have with starlings).
CA A.G. Bill Lockyer, to the Almeda County Board of Supervisors in his letter of July 6, 2005:
"The ongoing harm to protected bird species at the APWRA is serious and unacceptable."
"Because the APWRA is the largest of its kind in the world, what happens here could set an important precedent for how these issues are addressed elsewhere in California and the United States."
Scientific community:
“Increasingly, the operators of wind farms are recognizing that siting is a critically important factor in the construction of new facilities, with some sites causing less environmental damage than others. The local, national and international concerns about the operations at Altamont attest to the reality that Altamont is not an appropriate site for wind farms.”
“We agree with those spokespeople of the industry who point out that many more birds are killed by collisions with windows, wires and towering structures including skyscrapers. Domestic and feral cats take an unacceptable number of birds and other wildlife. But golden eagles, red-tailed hawks, burrowing owls, and other species of particular concern are killed in disproportionate numbers at Altamont.”
“Citizens of Alameda County place an increasing value on wildlife. This value must now be a component of longer-term planning. Wind farms will provide energy but will kill birds and bats; they must therefore be located, at least in the future, in areas where damage is minimal.”
Peter H. Bloom
W. Grainger Hunt
Hans J. Peeters
Robert W. Risebrough
Brian J. Walton
“Our combined credentials include more than 175 years as practicing scientists in fields related to wildlife conservation with a particular focus on raptorial birds.”
By Chris Metinko, Inside Bay Area 4/24/07
“According to a study released in 2004 by the California Energy Commission, an estimated 1,700 to 4,700 birds die each year by flying into whirling turbine blades or being electrocuted by transmission lines that thread through the 50,000-acre Altamont Wind Resource Area.”
"116 golden eagles, 300 red-tailed hawks, 333 American kestrels and 380 burrowing owls, the study found."
"A lawsuit filed against the county in October by the Golden Gate Audubon Society, Californians for Renewable Energy and four other local Audubon chapters challenged the county’s decision o renew permits for Altamont Pass wind turbines. A subsequent settlement forces the wind industry to commit to a 50 percent reduction in raptor deaths by November 2009, and remove the deadliest turbines and continuing winter shutdowns of the wind machines."
"That settlement assumes there are 1,300 golden eagles, red-tailed hawks, American kestrels and burrowing owl deaths in that Livermore area each year.”
=== author's response follows ===
No one doubts the seriousness of avian mortality in the Altamount region. One does not need to be a professional biologist to see that corrective action is needed. But to infer that a single bad siting choice such as Altamont can be extrapolated everywhere else would be inappropriate. Just as inappropriate as saying all rock festivals will end as badly as the legendary Stones jaunt in Altamont.
Tom Gray
· 2 years ago
Thanks, Barbara, good post. I don't agree with all of the opinions expressed in it, but the facts are what they are. One salient fact that is missing: there are more than 5,000 turbines operating in the pass. If one accepts the highest number of annual bird kills in your post (4,700), that means that each turbine, on average, kills a bit less than 1 bird per year.
That is not to say that the raptor kills or the overall bird kills are acceptable; as you say, it's just a fact.
[In response to this comment:] Bottom line: the question is quality, not quantity. True, the gross numbers of birds killed may be small compared to the entire bird population, but as some commenters have noted, those birds that are killed tend to be slow breeding endangered types.
Sources, please: I know of no evidence to support this assertion. In fact, many of the birds that die in collisions with wind turbines are common ones, like rock doves.
Sorry, wasn't thinking clearly. The statement is true for Altamont Pass in California, where raptor kills have been a serious issue. Raptors do tend to be longer-lived. Generally across the U.S., however, the birds that occasionally collide with wind turbines tend to be small migrants that are not slow breeders. And even in Altamont Pass, common birds do make up a significant share of the kills.
100 million to 1 billion bird strikes involving windows, per year in the United States? Before I'll buy any numerical statistics, I've got to have some trust that *all* stats in an article are reasonable. Now, in this one, no references are cited, which raises my BS meter to begin with. now, 1 billion bird window-strikes/year? Let's have a look at this, shall we?
There are some 80 million homes in the United states. I live in one of them. I have lived in a home in the United States for every one of my 53 years of existence. During my tenure, I have either experienced or found smudge evidence for a total of 3 bird deaths from striking windows in homes where I have lived. Multiply this by 80 million homes, then divide by 53 years, and, presuming my experiences are average, I can account for about 5 million bird deaths/year, on average, over the past half century due to colliding with residential home windows.
5 million. 1 billion would be 1,000 million, or some 200 times more, on average, than I have experienced in 53 years of life. Has a *single* reader out there experienced his or her "average" share of window-killed birds (that'd be about 600 bird deaths per household, per 53 years, or a dozen or more, each and every year, for each and every home in the US)? Are you getting yours?
Does this discrepancy bother anyone else? If it turns out to be hyped, what does this say about other statistical evidence presented?
Folks, there is important work to be done. Do we really need to base it on hyped statistics and pseudo-science?
Tom Dooley
· 2 years ago
I am totally into renewable energy but, like Dave, I also have a problem with these ridiculous bird-kill comparisons.
Comparing the total number of birds killed by windows, buildings, cars, airplanes and cell phone towers, to the total number killed by wind turbines is a profoundly misleading comparison. Using the same faulty logic, I could argue that heroin is relatively safe because the number of people who overdose is so small compared to those who die from cancer, stroke, and heart attack. Why insult our intelligence by even offering such a stupid comparison?
Although the environmental benefits of renewable energy are undeniable, I think those who care about the environment enough to buy a turbine are, by and large, the same people who feel sick when they accidently kill a bird, squirrel or whatever. Bird kill rates are not a rhetorical abstraction when they drop in your own back yard.
To overcome this marketing obstacle, and dispel the fears of nature lovers, more research and definitive information is necessary (and less bullsh*t).
Barbara Durkin
· 2 years ago
The avian issue is valid. USFWS, the Sierra Club, Greenpeace, MA Audubon and many other wildlife groups have created wind tower siting guidelines. Locating wind towers in migratory flyways, areas of endangered species and in Important Bird Areas is not recommended. A Congressional Subcommittee has been formed to address the issue of unacceptable numbers of birds dying by poorly sited wind towers.
Bill Lockyer, A.G. of CA July 6, 2005:
"The ongoing harm to protected bird species at the APWRA is serious and unacceptable." "Because the APWRA is the largest of its kind in the world, what happens here could set an important precedent for how these issues are addressed elsewhere in California and the United States."
A.G. Locklear is likely referring to Cape Wind.
The Altamont Pass Wind Resource Area causes the deaths of as many as 4,700 birds per year, including red-tail hawks and Golden Eagles in a flyway as is Nantucket Sound.
“We agree with those spokespeople of the industry who point out that many more birds are killed by collisions with windows, wires and towering structures including skyscrapers. Domestic and feral cats take an unacceptable number of birds and other wildlife. But golden eagles, red-tailed hawks, burrowing owls, and other species of particular concern are killed in disproportionate numbers at Altamont.”
“Increasingly, the operators of wind farms are recognizing that siting is a critically important factor in the construction of new facilities, with some sites causing less environmental damage than others. The local, national and international concerns about the operations at Altamont attest to the reality that Altamont is not an appropriate site for wind farms.”
Peter H. Bloom
W. Grainger Hunt
Hans J. Peeters
Robert W. Risebrough
Brian J. Walton\
“Our combined credentials include more than 175 years as practicing scientists in fields related to wildlife conservation with a particular focus on raptorial birds.”
Mike
· 2 years ago
You guys really need to broaden your resource base not all "anti-environmental" information comes from or is funded by "evil capitalists", the mere fact we have energy options is because our country is so rich (because of free market), spit your ramblings to proverty stricken emerging markets, think about economic factors, weigh the good and bad ....
Mike
· 2 years ago
You guys really need to broaded your resource base not all "anit-environmental" information comes from or is funded by "evil captilists", the mere fact we have energy options is because our country is so rich (because of free market), spit your ramblings to provery stricken emerging markets, think about economic factors, weigh the good and bad ....
Barbara Durkin
· 2 years ago
Why construct an industrial wind facility in a migratory flyway, with endangered species present , when we know the risks to endangered species presented by a poorly sited wind project?
The American Wind Energy Association, GE, and all who are hoping for the shift of public wealth, monetary, and resources, from the public to them think that wind towers belong everywhere.
Wind energy has failed to deliver on promises made by those in possition to profit by wind energy.
What GE, AWEA, Cape Wind and the food chain don't want you to know, but I'm delighted to share with you:
According to the Danish Trade Council, Denmark's energy sector wind turbine exports account for $1.5 US. billion annually.
Of course they work! Or do they?
Flemming Nissen head of development at West Danish generation company ELSAM (one of Denmark’s largest energy utilities):
“Increased development of wind turbines does not reduce Danish CO2 emissions”
Neils Gram of the Danish Federation of Industries:
“In green terms windmills are a mistake and economically they make no sense…”
“In just a few years we’ve gone from some to the cheapest electricity in Europe to some of the most costly.”
Aase Madsen, an MP who chairs energy policy in the Danish Parliament, is emphatic:
“For our industry it has been a terribly expensive disaster.”
Henning Rasmussen, Danish engineer:
“When the wind arrives on or two hours later than forecast, we get nothing and we have to ask our neighbors to rescue us.”
Gundolf Dany, chief engineer at Aachen:
“Until we invent a way of storing huge amounts of electricity, wind energy can never be relevant to our future.”
Sir Martin Holdgate, former chairman of the British Renewable Energy Advisory Group:
“The trouble with wind farms is that they have a huge spatial footprint for a piddling little bit of electricity..."
Richard Courtney a Reviewer for the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change:
“Wind farms are "environmentally damaging money wasters whose large scale use increases power demand. The New Age dream of a world operated by wind farms will remain a dream because the laws of physics do not allow it in an industrialized world. If wind power were economic then oil tankers would be sailing ships."
The Copenhagen Post ran this story on the first day of January:
“ENERGY GIANTS SAY WIND POWER IS HOT AIR”
“The country's energy companies are not convinced that wind power is the way of the future. Management at Denmark's energy companies, DONG Energy and Vattenfall, do not subscribe to the current mindset that wind energy will be especially prominent in the future, reported national public broadcaster DR. The companies believe that coal-powered electricity will still be the largest supplier of the nation's energy, despite the trend toward environmentally friendly sources. 'Wind energy can't solve the energy problem in the near future because it's too unstable and possibly too expensive,' said Anders Eldrup, chief executive of Dong Energy [Denmark’s largest energy company].
Professor David Bellamy:
"Huge amounts of tax payers money for scant environmental and electrical benefit make them a scam. Wind-farms are inefficient, destroy the landscape and far more could be achieved through energy efficiency. If you lagged the roofs of 500 homes it would have the effect of putting up one turbine. They can only work 30% of the time at very best, in Denmark it is only 17%. We have to keep other stations running, spinning in reserve, inefficiently pouring out carbon dioxide and sulphur dioxide. These turbines are 22 storeys high put on hills where everyone can see them. They kill bats and birds and need 1,000 tonnes of concrete as well as a road infrastructure. It beggars belief that some environmental groups can say they are 'green'."
“The nation that leads the world in wind-farm development is going cool on the environmentally friendly source of power. Since the boom year of 2000, when as many as 748 turbines were erected, the number being built in Denmark has steadily fallen. So far this year, only six new wind turbines have been put up. While many countries around the world are clamouring to buy Danish wind turbines, Denmark’s government is finding it difficult to convince its own population to accept an increase in the domestic use of the green technology. Describing turbines as “poorly located, noisy and unsightly”, a number of local authorities, backed by grass-roots campaigners, are rejecting plans for new wind farms.“
Dave Culp, I believe that you are confused. The statistic was that 100 million to 1 billion birds are killed due to flying into WINDOWS. You calculated the windows in HOMES only. Have you completely forgotten about skyscrapers that are covered with windows, or other buildings such as offices, schools, hospitals, etc?
Dan Boone
· 2 years ago
This was a well-written but poorly researched article that succeeds in putting forth the bias of the author.
Tom Gray of AWEA and boosters of this wind industry trade group would have us ignore the severe threat which industrial wind energy development in the Appalachian mountain region poses to bat populations, forest habitat and public lands. One booster whom Tom has praised has even gone so far as to publish an article claiming that wind turbines are actually good for bats. It's quite Orwellian!
However, a recently published peer-reviewed scientific paper has estimated that approximately 111,000 bats may be killed annually by 2020 due to the likely "wind farm" development slated for the Mid-Atlantic Highlands Region - see: http://www.vawind.org/#Kunz . This is considered by bat experts to be an unsustainable mortality rate, which likely will drive some bat populations to become endangered.
Johnnyb
· 2 years ago
The Wind Industry is a scam that is preying on naiviety and technical ignorance of the General Population. These things are bad for the local ecosystem, do little to mitigate CO2 emissions are entirely dependent on government largess and raise the cost of electricity for everyone. The more of these things that they put up the worse it is for everyone and the environment.
If you love nature and love the environment, then kill these things where ever you see them. And by kill them, I mean KILL THEM. Buy a high powered rifle and shoot the generators, with any luck you might hit the oil resevoir and ruin the damned thing.
==== Editor's Note ====
TreeHugger does not condone Monkeywrenching, whether it's done by government officials twisting climate science or by individuals opposed to renewable power.
Such tactics as proposed by Johnnyb in this comment are counter-productive to the public debates that must be repeated in hundreds of locales if alternative energy sources are to be fairly examined.
Misty
· 1 year ago
Contradicting this article, a Dutch study says:
"The study showed that large wind turbines producing more than 1.5 megawatts of power killed slightly more birds than smaller, older windmills, but Bird Protection noted that the bigger windmills produce five to 10 times more electricity.
"In contrast to what might be expected, it seems that the number of bird victims has almost no relationship with the size of the wind turbine," the report said."
Which study is accurate? Who knows? I'm undecided because of the lack of unbiased information.
The "b-b-but cars kill more!" argument doesn't work for me either. Why should allowing wind power that is documented to kill birds be allowed just because another form of technology kills more?
Again, I'm undecided. If wind power is indeed hurting/killing animals we need to hold off putting up more farms until a bird-safe turbine is designed.
gdf
· 1 year ago
Kills birds? Bummer. Guess we'll build a nuke reactor instead.
destin
· 1 year ago
so it may not kill all that many birds, but its not all that green either. as the coal fired plants must be kept on standby while turbines are running in case the wind dies down. factor in the trucks needed to support the turbines and more emissions are beibg released than before, wind power is a scam to get a few people rich!!!!
VVA
· 1 year ago
This might be a silly question:
Is it not possible to install a small ultra-sound, high frecuency emisor on every turbine to encourage birds to take another direction? You know, just like a sound lighthouse ...
It works to send dogs and cats away ... May it work to wind turbines?
Feel free to comment on the idea ...
Larry
· 1 year ago
Wind farms are Ugly and far from zero eco impact land has to be cleared to erect them and maintain them animals are displaced in this process and there habitat destroyed. turbine don't put out enough power to cancel out these facts.
Anonymous
· 1 year ago
quote "Is it not possible to install a small ultra-sound, high frecuency emisor on every turbine to encourage birds to take another direction?"
so you would run off any animals that returned to the area to save a couple birds. the animals habitat was already disrupted but building a wind farm on top of there habitat. so you want to make sure they don't come back?
VVA
· 1 year ago
quote: "so you would run off any animals that returned to the area to save a couple birds. the animals habitat was already disrupted but building a wind farm on top of there habitat. so you want to make sure they don't come back?"
It's not sending them away (as I know I said) as not right onto the turbines ... Maybe a better example could be lights on top of antennas. They don't make planes to go away, just let them know they are there and make them go some meters up ...
State Ag Issues Team-wind turb
· 1 year ago
First off, this is two members from the state AG issues team of '08. Our topic was wind turbines thank you very much. And first off, very few birds are killed from these turbines and the blades are shaped in such a way that the birds should be in no harm. Birds CANNOT rest on the turbines either because they are slanted. More birds die from flying into buildings or windows. And, the US has to have 20 percent of energy coming from another source other than coal. 75 percent wants wind turbines to take affect in most rural areas. They will also help with pollution, and lowering gas prices which you all should want unless you insist on riding a bike. Home grown energy is for a more profitable future and not from coal. We are running out of coal and we are burning it up and losing a lot of money from it. Property tax payments from utility projects provide much needed revenue for building new homes bridges roads and other community infrastucture. There is no cost to the landowner, and replacement parts are at no cost to the landownder and these turbines barely make a noice, they are as loud as the hum of a refridgerator and if you can live with your refridgerator you can live with a turbine.
They do not pollute, and they do not harm animals rarely, they do not make noise, they also will not fall over or blow over because they are set 12 FT. into the ground.
john
· 1 year ago
Bird death by wind turbines was brought on by the Altamont Pass wind Farm in Northern California. This site had many old small fast rotating wind turbines with lattice towers. I have been there and have observed birds perched on these lattice towers (though the wind turbine was not operational at the time)
If they were tube towers and larger turbines, as mentioned in this article, then bird deaths greatly reduced.
George Marsh
· 1 year ago
There is absolutely no credible evidence which supports the oft-claimed belief that the newer "monopole-based" wind turbines kill fewer birds than the older-style "lattice-based" wind turbines. The scientific research into bird mortality at wind turbines does NOT support the notion that wind turbines with monopole towers are any safer for wildlife than the older lattice-style generators.
Also, the speed (movement velocity) of the wind turbine's blades does not vary appreciably between the older turbines and newer, larger (but slower RPM) "modern" wind turbine generators.
Rick Smith
· 1 year ago
I agree with a we need a group that is neither far left or far right on these issues. There is a middle ground. It requires that we think the issue through and find common ground.
I am for energy independence. We need to get away from depending on the "global community" and get back to American independence.
There are new technologies that we must try but not commit to, such as wind, solar, geothermal, and nuclear.
Some of the new wind technology that I have seen looks very promissing and can be used in city instead of taking up valuable natural areas. The same can be said of solar.
Ultimately we will go to an intergrated system of electricity from many sources (safest alternative for independence and sustainablity) that will power not only our factories and homes, but transportation as well. But it won't come cheap, but it is better to bite the bullet now than wait for the new dark ages when the lights go off.
Life is full of compromises and we can allow NIMBY and self interest freeze our innitiative.
GCQ
· 1 year ago
Interesting that another article published just 1 year before this found the opposite results. Now I will admit that as far as total kills wind turbines are low on the list but do the birds really need another man made barrier that increases mortality? The new models need to have more research done on them so we need to move forward with extreme caution, especially along major migration flyways and areas where there are nesting endangered and threatened species. I still don't understand why they must turn in the vertical and can turn in the horizontal which would likely reduce kills. I also say shot all feral cats and move towers from flight paths but that will take time, this is something we can get right from the start and not have to fix it after it has any major impacts. Some solutions could be a simple as the hieght of the towers or the color of the blades. Some could be far more complicated to solve. No one should be completely for them no matter what the cost and the other side needs to way the costs as to how much if any are the most prone species capable of handling.
Joe
· 1 year ago
This is great info and analysis of this subject. I wish someone would apply the same logic to fossil fuel energy - i.e. take the emotion out of man made CO2 by comparing the amount of naturally occurring CO2 vs. man made CO2 vs. the percentage of other naturally occurring "so called" green house gasses. To reverse the analogy would be to claim the small percentage of bird kill associated with wind generation is the man made tipping point that will wipe out the entire endangered bird of prey population.
jeff
· 1 year ago
I am the lead technician at a wind farm in Iowa and felt like throwing my two cents in here. In 2 years of working on wind turbines in Iowa I have only found 1 dead sparrow next to our turbines. I have found more dead bats. As far as the comment saing our turbines are destroying prairies, some of our turbines are in prairie land and have virtually no impact on that. If anything the ones on prairie land are helping to protect that land by providing the owner with income that he would otherwise be getting by tilling the land and farming it.
Smilodon
· 1 year ago
I think it's best to bear in mind that it doesn't have to be one or the other. The problem is that even green energy projects (wind and solar) incur environmental impacts. Alll sides are interested in reducing those impacts. Defiitely, anyone who simply points fingers without offering suggestions, alternatives, or otherwise understanding certain realities, is not helpful. When it comes to dealing with wind energy projects, it is important to know that bird deaths can happen simply because bird behaviors are not all well-studied, same with bird populations in all potetnial wind aras - the money simpy doesn't exist to perform all these studies. And, wind energy projects very commonly are placed in areas of strong wind patterns - these same areas are used during migration and also by certain soaring species. Hence one very dicey problem. But whoever your opponent is, please let's refrain from teasing and name calling. Given that the death of certain bird species represents broken federal and state laws, the issue is more serious than is evident that kind of making fun. Oh yes, there has been a bit of lattice vs conical tower research done at Altamont Pass, supported by the California Energy Commission. And, to emit ultrasonic from turbines could further attract bats, which are already attracted to turbines, and is another huge issue in the Eastern US and possibly more soon in the West.
Rhoda Bryan
· 1 year ago
People are concerned with bird and bat kills BECAUSE the death of such by windows, cars, buildings and such have always been RATIONALIZED AWAY for years now.
Millions of people around the world have ignored the deaths of thousands, if not millions, of wildlife the last 200 years....and all of this wildlife were sacrificed "in the name of progress."
The name of progress is still the same old game, whether its windows, cars or wind farms.
This time around, BEFORE wind power is even established in the USA, many of us in the public want the wind farms safe for wildlife. And that safety factor should not be rationalized away because a high number of wildlife have already been killed by human inventions (which by the way were never made wildlife-friendly because of human indifference and rationalizations) !!!
What good is going green if we are still being destructive to wildlife and habitat ?
Steve Roake
· 1 year ago
I read two articles in the first 10 minutes of trying to catch up on this subject. Here's the other one:
It contains more actual facts, less opinion and is MUCH less biased that yours, which is based largely on conjecture.
Who is the propagandist?
Lance
· 1 year ago
Nice try, but this shows you are ignorant about physics. A slow rotating turbine that is very large still produces a very fast TURBINE TIP SPEED. The tip speed can approach the speed of sound.
I am an engineer in the tower industry and make my living off of turbines, but the eco damage from turbines is extensive.
The latest designs in nuclear reactors are safe and eco friendly and are the way to go to produce the amount of electricity we need.
Erik Molvar
· 1 year ago
Slower blade speed killing fewer birds is intuitively obvious. However, from the scientific literature on bats, most bat mortality happens in windspeeds less than 6 meters per second, and experts are recommending that turbines not "kick in" until winds reach higher speeds.
Also, the idea that bigger blades of new arrays cause fewer mortalities is also misleading. Excluding Altamont Pass (which uses a very different, older generation of turbines), the newer, larger and more powerful turbines (>1 MW) have significantly higher rates of killing both birds and baths than the smaller modern versions used for industrial-scale generation. The rule of thumb is, more rotor-swept area and taller height leads to greater bird kill.
Additionally, while the height of the facility has a linear increase in bird mortality, for bats the relationship is exponential, meaning that mortality rates go through the roof with the tallest arrays.
Sorry to mythbust the mythbusting, but it's important to go directly to the primary science for the facts.
Laura
· 1 year ago
Actually - more birds (especially song birds) are probably killed by our pet cat population each year.
If you own a cat - please keep it in the house where it will be healthier and will not be a threat to native birds
thanks
Chad Kopet
· 1 year ago
Lets take down all the wind generators and build more coal fired plants. I personally would much rather see the haze and pollution then the wind mills. Besides, why should we only be killing birds and bats....thats seems prejudiced, lets kill the polar bears and ring seals too. Why not...lets take out a few thousand or so other species while we are at it. No, things are going just great the way things are. We wont run out of oil or coal for at least 50 years or so, we can worry about that then. Planning for the future is a big waste of time. Another great benefit of letting things continue to run as is would be the flooding of what..about a 3rd of Florida and almost all coastal lands. Bummer, the Everglades, oh well, theres another thousand or so species we won't ever have to deal with again...thank God. Oh and these fuel cell things, what nonsense, all the water our cars would be kicking out would only raise the humidity. Why can't people wake up and realize what we are doing to our only home. Wind farms are actually one way to preserve the land. It's not perfect but it beats tilling it up and planting corn for fuel. Another great idea, fricken box of corn flakes is now 6 bucks. Our sun kicks out more energy in 1 second, then our entire planet could use in a year, not to mention it should be around for some 4 or 5 billion more years. Lets learn how to use that, solar arrays and wind farms (yes...wind farming is a form of solar power). Sure it will be expensive, R & D always is, but either we pay that price or our children and grandchildren will have to pay a much, much higher price, and I'm not talking money. I know some of those who have responded to this article are truely worried about the birds, but the rest are just using it as an excuse for their ignorance. oh, one tidbit, Dave had written he had only 2 birds fly into his windows in 53 years, this summer already I washed 3 bird smears from just one window at my moms house, and that is in town, not on some flyway. This is truely a global problem and it will only be fixed if it is done on a global scale. Why can't people realize that, why can't you all stop thinking of yourselves and your comfort of living for just one minute and put that energy into getting together with all of our neighbors to find a solution to our global energy and global warming problems. Don't even start, I know better then most the fact our planet goes through warming and cooling trends all on its own, but only the most ignorant of folks can believe we havent accelerated the warming swing. But I guess no one will be happy untill Earth looks more like Venus. At least then we wont need gas to heat our homes.
Dick
· 1 year ago
Folks like Cheney probably hate wind mills cause they only kill a few birds, while the polution from oil and coal plants kill far more birds and shortens the life span of people as well. Also you cant go to war over wind. There are whole companies built on war, death and sickness. Wind is bad for the economy.
i care about the enviroment but hey the birds have to be stupid not to miss those huge things now come on it's their fault they're dead not man's
BetterWays
· 1 year ago
That is one obnoxious article.
And whether or not other things we do kill more birds, it's still an issue to consider and find a solution. I don't even see how people can work and manage a mirrored glass building if it does indeed kill hundreds of birds and not do something about it. And besides we're not talking about the same birds out there in the country side and mountain tops. Many of the birds in those habitats are even more endangered.
John
· 1 year ago
You admit repeatedly that turbines kill birds. So what's the myth? The real myth is that all wind turbines look and act alike. There are alternative designs. http://www.tmawind.com/</p>
mileymandy
· 1 year ago
Windmills should be taken away from our ecosystem becuase birds are more important. especially bats because they eat mosquitoes!!!
maddy
· 1 year ago
Actually, wind turbines DO kill a significant number of birds and bats. Not only that, but they alter their flight paths and act as a barrier. If you want actual scientific peer-reviewed information on this topic, then you should probably read actual scientific peer-reviewed journals such as the journal of wildlife management, journal of applied ecology, or North American Wildlife and Natural Resource Conference. Environment Canada also has a nice document entitled "Wind turbines and birds" which you can trust has correct information. Do not trust all these personal websites for your information (especially ones like this where most of the people are highly unqualified to be analysing this issue).
John
· 10 months ago
The data at the end of the article is the most damaging to wind turbine bird death counts. Simple math on cars does not equal the 2.19 bird deaths per year per turbine. I've owned and driven about 10 cars over the last 40 years, and I can only remember one bird death when I was driving. Lots of insects. Not many birds. My house windows have injured maybe a handful over the last 33 years. My kids nursed back two of them to health. Wind turbines will need improvements in detering birds. I'm looking at an 8 ganged wind turbine unit, and according to this article that would count out 17-18 bird deaths per year. Holy moley! I'd like to figure out how to knock out just crows. They could use some whittling down. Frankly, this article does significant PR damage to turbines.
Aly
· 9 months ago
Yes, windmills are just as much bird killers as planes, trains, cars, etc. I agree with all those points. However, you know those people who don't agree with logging due to the endangering of the spotted owl? If you are one of those people and you are writing on this blog as a pro-windmill, then you sound like a major hypocrit. Loggers could argue the same thing about how those birds die many other ways too, and that it is worth it for the good of the world in the long run, even if some birds die.
People will make up arguments for or against anything if they do or don't like it. If you're worried about logging because of the birds, then you have no right to say that windmills are okay, even if birds die too. Just make sure you're not sounding hypocritical because that is annoying.
Matt
· 9 months ago
The claim that wind turbines may kill birds is not a valid argument because our existing power plants already kill birds. I have seen many dead birds at the bases of smoke stacks. Birds will use the heat from the exhaust to rise in elevation. Unfortunately some of these birds get too close and are killed from the exhaust and or heat. So if we are already killing birds from our existing energy production what would it matter if we kill birds from a more green energy production. Secondly birds have excellent eyesight, they can see the wind turbine blades compared to heat from smoke stack from other turbines.
DJ
· 9 months ago
Back when this article was first posted, the need to keep up a sense of urgency about renewable energy was paramount, and even concerns about bird strikes had to be minimized. In fact, all that's missing from this article is the tag line, "brought to you by Vesta and Suzlon."
However, bird strikes have proven to be a bigger issue than anyone thought at the time. The WE Energies Blue Skies project in Wisconsin has had a bird strike record 300% higher than predicted when it was sited. These are not facts they're eager to release.
We're farther along the learning curve now, and this issue is not an "eco-myth." It's an eco-fact. Now the dialogue needs to change, contrasting Big Wind and small local wind, between big horizontal-axis wind farms and small vertical impellers (seen as solid objects by birds).
The need for alternative energy has proven itself for its own sake, and is now only hindered by old-school articles like this. Wind power is here to stay; we now need to choose what form it will take.
The old time windmills, with lots of big wide blades, do not kill birds. The birds can SEE the blades. The blades can turn VERY fast and still the birds can see the blades. The problem is NOT that wind power kills birds. The problem is that three bladed wind turbines with their wide spacing between the blades kill birds.
I have read a lot of posts here and I have concluded that any mention of the logic of HOW the blades kill birds, and WHY the birds do not avoid being killed by those blades is almost missing.
The argument about the tips of the blades killing the birds is correct.
The old time windmills created a huge amount of mechanical power which should be used today for electric. The new wind turbines create about 5% of that same mechanical power in the same blade sweep area. It is a known and documented fact that aerofoil lifting three bladed wind turbines are only about 5% to 7% as efficient as the same size old-time windmills. Get your facts straight. Three bladed wind turbines not only do NOT work well, but they also kill birds.
Forest
· 8 months ago
Wind turbines kill birds. It's not a myth. Simple.
As do cars, cell phone towers, wires, planes, buildings, and technology in general.
Articles like this keep liberals/greenwashed minds/conservatives at bay with their thoughts so they can be re-assured that they're thinking the right thoughts; in turn they can elect their master who will govern them as they please.
Nonetheless, it is certainly not "clean energy", nor is anything else that has come out of industrial civilization.
this civilization needs to (and will) collapse soon by the hands of this destructive culture.
chris wright
· 7 months ago
Nothing much has changed since we slaughtered the American Indians. They only killed what they needed for food. We are still the planet's parasite, slowly killing our host and justifying killing any and all animals in our quest. I'm certainly for green technology but not at the expense of killing bats, which are already stressed enough. I dislike wind turbines intensely for the noise, the visual space they take up and any deaths caused. You people think because Exon killed more birds, you're justified to kill less. I like hydro, which produces more energy than wind and solar combined, as long as aquatic life can be protected, I think solar is great if it doesn't cover the entire mohave desert. Tidal hydro has much more merit and so does nuclear power. Does anyone value the pristine landscape ? When is the last time you heard no noise other than nature? The audacity of mankind to value themselves over any other creature will be our downfall. How long will our host support this kind of egotistical thinking? The landfills are now filling up with mercury ladden florescent bulbs but it's green so it must be ok to contaminate our soils. Let's slow down and think before we rush into green technology.
pyaragaia
· 7 months ago
John said: "You admit repeatedly that turbines kill birds. So what's the myth? The real myth is that all wind turbines look and act alike."
follow the link to find a design that addresses the concerns listed about traditional wind turbines
http://www.magenn.com/
from the site:
AVIAN MORTALITY:
Birds and bats tend not to fly into objects directly in front of them. Birds can see these objects and bats can sense them. Current terrestrial wind turbines are large fast-moving blades slicing through the air, hitting birds and bats from the side without the animals sensing the presence of blades. In contrast Magenn wind turbines are three-dimensional, softer objects. Birds and bats will more easily be aware of the turbine's presence.
The MARS developers also address Visual Impact, Noise and Height Restriction.
Anonymous
· 7 months ago
I just saw an article in today's Washington Post
saying how the birds, the flying cranes, would
be caught in the wind turbines and that the wind
turbines are "blowing bats up"....and that they
are working on producing sonar to help the Bats
to avoid the Turbines.
So, In Indiana, we are now the Largest growing
state of active wind turbines. That is right and
growing because of the flat area of farmland and
the farmers are getting paid and jobs are being
created and of course all you have to do is
google Benton County, In. Wind Farms....and see
them...and one farm...supplies 60,00-250,000 homes
with electricity!!! We are excited!
And they are brand new! No blight to the landscape.
Anyone who knows Utah knows the power of wind, water and sun. You can see that power in Utah's sculpted arches of stone, in our majestic mountains capped with snow, and in the cracked earth of our deserts.
Nature's power is so obvious that you have to wonder why we've mostly ignored it as a source of energy to run our homes and businesses, and to propel our cars and trucks.
After all, if we did a little more to harness that power, we could begin to solve some of our most pressing environmental and economic challenges. In fact, creating electricity from the energy nature gives us is critical if we're going to reduce global warming pollution, protect public health with clean air and water, create jobs in Utah and ultimately bring down energy prices.
We know that burning fossil fuels is destabilizing the atmosphere and acidifying the oceans. We know that our dependence on oil shackles us to dangerous foreign regimes and to the escalating prices they'll inevitably charge as demand outstrips supply. But we also know how to break our dependence and free ourselves from this destructive cycle.
Why keep buying foreign crude when we could be making energy right here in Utah from sunlight, wind and geothermal power? Why rip up more pristine wilderness to extract dirty fuels when we could generate clean power from the energy nature delivers to our doorstep?
Dollar for dollar, investing in clean energy creates more jobs than investing in traditional energy sources like oil and gas. That really matters, especially when you consider that more than 30,000 Utah workers lost their jobs last year.
We've got tens of thousands of windy acres here in Utah, sites for geothermal energy abound, and the southern part of the state has tremendous potential for solar power. We will have to carefully pick renewable energy sites that don't endanger critical habitat and wilderness quality land, but the opportunity is vast.
So how can we jump start a home-grown clean energy economy?
Right now Congress is working on a landmark clean energy jobs plan that would boost the amount of wind, solar and other clean energy our country produces. The American Clean Energy and Security Act will also make our vehicles, appliances and buildings more efficient, and update our antiquated electricity grid.
Our investments in clean energy and efficiency today will pay dividends for generations. They will create good, family-sustaining jobs that can't be shipped overseas, and they will lower energy prices in the long run. They will reduce energy dependence and global warming pollution, and make our economy more competitive.
It's true that the economic and environmental challenges we confront are serious. But Americans have never encountered a challenge of any kind that we couldn't overcome by working together and applying our ingenuity.
That is what we need to do right now. The only missing ingredient is a spirit of innovation, cooperation and resolve amongst our political leaders. From the copper-domed Capitol in Salt Lake, to the halls of power in Washington, our leaders need to reconsider their allegiance to the dirty fuels industry, stop their bickering, and act boldly to move America towards a new energy economy.
In the coming weeks, Representative Jim Matheson (D-Utah) can lead the way. As a key member of the Energy and Commerce Committee, he'll play a pivotal role before Memorial Day in determining whether Congress even gets to vote on the clean energy jobs bill. Now is the time to let Rep. Matheson and all of our leaders know that we expect them to do what's right for our people, our economy, our land and our future.
[This piece first ran in the Salt Lake Tribune.]
Anonymous
· 7 months ago
"but the eco damage from turbines is extensive."
?? what? i understand there is an issue with the bats and they are working on a sonar device...and the line running across the
ecosystem out in AZ...where Migratory Ducks fly might be an issue...but...telephone lines???? They fly around poles, lines. barns...c'mon people...birds are not stupid creatures.....they WILL
learn to adapt to their environment. They now sit on top of electrical and telephone wires. Didn't anyone think back then the birds would
be dropping dead from running into these types of wires and telephone poles???? C'mon. Take down the Cell Phone Towers then if you are that concerned or are you? The Satellite towers?????
I'm sure birds collide with them. Oh no, we mustn't give up OUR things we LOVE like our cell phones and satellite dishes. NO, or our cars in which birds collide, so for nature in the long run..in the short run...this is the better deal or we aren't going to be here on this earth.
If Robert Redford is supporting it and he has been and i realize this article is old but our wind farms our popping up like flowers
and there are not going to be a lot of bird deaths. If you look
on youtube.com on Benton County Wind Farms and let them explain you will understand a bit more and out here where it's flat...hello...you don't put a turbine on a mountaintop and then complain of bats dying. So stupid. You put the wind turbines where they should be. ON flat land where wind can easily blow through and it does here on this land and don't tell me it doesn't as i grew up here and the air flows through because there is nothing to stop it due to the farms.
People can be ignorant. Man. I just don't read the stuff. I just post. Thanks.
Lizzie
scottplant
· 7 months ago
Maybe the people that are concerned about this issue DO care when other birds die for different reasons. I rescue birds that run into buildings in downtown Chicago every week. My workplace recently installed a wind turbine, and guess what? It kills as many birds every day as a skyscraper. This is a new wind turbine. Maybe the national wind power association has some kind of interest in, I don't know, selling more wind turbines. Maybe they would downplay thier effect for that reason. Windspire turbines don't create the low pressure zones that rip bats' lungs apart, and they don't have blades to kill birds. They produce less energy, but is the power you get from a bladed turbine worth the lives it takes? The best way to handle our energy needs is to reduce our need for energy.
Anonymous
· 6 months ago
Personally, i think wind turbines are beautiful!!!! they are so elegant and i love them.x
Itseemslike
· 6 months ago
Devices that create NOISE, LIGHTS and LOTS of other Bird-Warning Attributes can easily be constructed into a Wind Turbine why dont they just do that? We used to call them
SCAREACROWS
There you go even a name 4 the movement !!!
So simple. Everybody's like : "Thats just the price we pay" OR "We'll have to stop to save the birds" Geez come on folks we dont have to be so paradigm ridden. Birds & Bats can be made aware of a dangerous zone. Yes, shocking, more than 2 options!
Robert
· 5 months ago
I think that the fears of bird mortality associated with wind farms stem from an incorrect assumption. That assumption is that birds are stupid. They're not. Their great level of agility clearly demonstrates a sophisticated nervous system. They can also learn. When a bird observes another bird killed, it usually notices the event, especially if it is its mate. Those that die will die, those that don't adapt.
Mel Cooksey
· 2 months ago
As a lifelong birder and research ornithologist, I am truly concerned about bird kills by wind turbines in high migration paths. Particularly the massive new wind projects near Corpus Christi Bay and Kenedy County, Tx. These are among the heaviest traffic migration corridors in North America, and have been studied as such for decades.
Questions: Who is censusing dead birds? What method and protocol is used? What have been the results? Have they been higher or lower than the wind companies' pre-construction study estimates? What private or government entities are conducting these studies?
It would seem that these are the questions that need to be answered. Wind companies can certainly make any claims they wish as to the safety of their equipment and the low impact on bird life that it will have, but at some point, it is all nothing more than educated guesswork, without some proof. Charts, graphs, and fancy formulaic opinions won't cut it.
At some point, the American people will want to see some hard data. We have studies of road kills, tower kills, and window kills, and that data is available to the public and has been for many years. We now need some independent study on avian wind turbine kills.
calum
· 2 months ago
did you no calum is a tree hugger who grows wild garlic!!!!
tiffnay jewellery
· 1 month ago
Waffles come from irons, syrup comes from trees, and butter comes from cows. I'm ashamed of you people.
ronhouse
· 2 weeks ago
First, no reason to believe you, you haven't given any figures, second, comparing normal operation with a disaster due to negligence isn't remotely fair.
ronhouse
· 2 weeks ago
Oops, my previous was a reply to EnergyOrganic - it doesn't make sense as a reply to the article. But the article does lack figures, whereas I went to the European Environment Agency and got figures, and they don't make wind power safe for birds or bats at all.
All Comments
i'll tell you why that myth is spread, its because LIPA and all these other power corporations don't want to spend there money on research when they could just make a few press releases about the evils of green energy. and what really gets me angry is that the people getting angry at the wind mills are probably 95 percent meat eaters. they're all hypocrits...
Hear Hear!!! Time the anti-wind a**wipes find another piece of propaganda. The Dutch also did a nice study on this, it can be found here:
http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/31542/story.htm
Hey, I know, you anti-wind wackos can latch onto the idea that turbines will slow the planet's rotation down, causing untold climatological disasters! I think Sci-Fi Channel has a movie of the week coming up about that. :D
Thanks for making this known.
I would add that right now the off shore Cape Wind project on Cape Cod is in danger of being killed because of myths like this. I encourage those who care to support Cape Wind.
Even if a few birds die imagine the amount of wildlife saved from decreased amounts of pollution. People also don't seem to care if their airplanes destroy birds.
Nice!
I wrote something about this on my blog a few months ago (http://sheagunther.org/blog/?p=156), watch out for the anti-wind nuts to pour out of the woodwork to argue this one.
Thanks so much for this article, and I'm in total support of wind energy.
Although I must say that I'm not in support of using phrases like "probability of Tweety being smashed to bits" and references to "bird-o-matic" wind turbines which will only upset people already sensitive to this topic and in turn may keep people like myself from forwarding this article along to those sensitive people.
Just my .02 cents.
Yeah, it seems to be an argument designed to either a) allow wealthy liberals to engage in NIMBYism while pretending that they're really concerned about wildlife, or b) allow antienvironmentalists to attack environmentalists as hypocrites.
Rock on. Now go educate the ignorant masses instead of the choir.
"Now go educate the ignorant masses instead of the choir."
There's nothing we'd like more.
Don't be shy, spread the word, send journalists our way, forward this article to non-choir-persons..
Hopefully it'll rank high in Google for "wind turbines kill birds".
John, thanks for a good sound article. It's unfortunate that the cleanest of clean power has acquired a bad name so unfairly.
I think, however, that you should revisit that bike-gear analogy. You said that a high gear involves fast chain movement with only a little wheel movement. That's backwards; you get that result in a low gear.
Think of it this way. Suppose your smallest sprocket (high gear) is a 13-tooth, and your largest sprocket (low gear) is a 28-tooth. In low gear, 13 links worth of chain movement produces one full wheel rotation; in high gear, less than half a rotation.
I suspect this would become easier to rephrase if the you got clear in your mind which part of the crank/wheel system is analogous to which part of the turbine/generator system. In the bike, the big spinny thing is the load, and the small part is the power source; in the turbine, the opposite is true.
Keep up the good work.
Dom
Misinformed nature lovers are only half the problem. Some of the best sites for wind have humans living on them, and the NIMBY crowd complains about the 'ugliness' or 'noise' generated by wind turbines. Now noise isn't really an issue unless you're standing right next to these things, but you can't argue with ugly. I think they're beautiful myself, and would love nothing more to open my drapes in the morning and see a 250 foot prop quietly generating the energy that runs my coffee pot.
This post has been submitted to Digg.com (and has generated some discussion over there too).
If you want to vote for it, follow this link.
"but you can't argue with ugly. I think they're beautiful myself, and would love nothing more to open my drapes in the morning and see a 250 foot prop quietly generating the energy that runs my coffee pot."
From my completely non-scientific survey, I'd say that younger people tend to like the sight of wind turbines more than older people.
It could be that the "ugly" factor will recede with time, as more and more people are familiar with wind turbines from a very young age and as the population in general becomes more eco-conscious.
I bet the people of Denmark and certain regions of Germany smile more on windy day! Once people realize wind is a natural resource that creates money and jobs for their area, they might change their minds.
Helix based wind turbines such as Aerotechture (http://www.aerotecture.com/) and Quiet Revolution (http://www.quietrevolution.co.uk/) don’t kill birds. I know the designer of Areotechture, he’s seen birds fly straight through the turbine with out being injured. Not to mention they look cooler than common prop turbines.
'Ugly' may depend on your viewpoint, as well. I remember reading that when Khrushchev was visiting the USA, and was riding along the Jersey Turnpike, he saw the proliferation of active smokestacks and said it 'looked beautiful'. To him, the evidence of significant industry was a sign of economic strength. He might also have been referring to the implication that there was bountiful worker employment in the region.
In my opinion, I find wind turbines beautiful for very similar reasons.
It seems to me that it's more the NIMBY's than the power companies themselves. LIPA is actually trying to put in some turbines off the south shore of Long Island, but people are complaining that it will "ruin their view" The whole bird excuse is really just a mask for the "ugly" argument. How about instead of windmills or no windmills, a view of windmills or smokestacks? Suddenly they look a whole lot better.
Wrong: "Wind turbines don't kill birds."
Right: "Wind turbines rarely kill birds."
5 bucks says birds die more from when they are sitting on the turbines, then the wind moves the turbines slightly, so the bird slides off and falls to the ground, than they do frum running into the turbines.
I was sitting at a StarBux some time ago with a friend, we were sitting outside. As we were sitting there a bird flew into the window, snapping its neck killing it instantly, it fell into my friends lap... I say BAN STARBUCKS NOW, STARBUCKS KILLS BIRDS.
I love the concept of wind power and live in a very windy spot (the Columbia River Gorge). I had heard the bird mortality info before and it made me second guess wind power.
I think the reason the bird death risk gets so much traction is due to the impact of water turbines on salmon & steelhead from hydroelectric something we all thought was a pure, ‘free’, non-impacting power source 30 years ago.
Net-net: I think explaining how/why bird death risk is NOT the Achilles’ heel of wind power will go a long way towards making us salmonoid huggers get on board.
I have been working with my Professor Bill Leithead, who is an expert in wind turbine design in europe. With regards to bird's death caused by wind turbine, the percentage is so small compared those creatures killed by colliding into window panes and building structures.
With abundant wind energy over the coast and high offshore wind speed, it is important that researchers and developers take advantage of such event to harnass the power for the grid. The cost of wind energy is so little, with an average life expectancy of about 30 years, thus makes a good investment opportunities for investors.
Wind energy is environment-friendly, so why not?
Um, these windmills are doing us all a servce. Haven't they heard of avian flu?
Near where i live they are planning to build a windfarm, which has faced much opposition & only recently been under threat of being canned because of potential damage to a rare species of bird..
The thing is though, the people protesting against the windfarm are wealthy landowners who don't want their precious view destroyed by turbines. It saddens me to think that they only now are prepared to jump on the enviromental bandwagon to save some bird, nevermind the gas guzzling SUVs they all drive..
If it's all the meat-eater, wind-hating folks - wouldn't they want the birds to die? It provides many meals! Since you know, I come across anti-windites all the time. That's the most ridiculous thing - if anyone's complaining about death tolls of 2.19 birds per turbine, it's PETA.
The problems with the wind turbines is all the extra ugly pylons that have to be built. Usually across areas with the most natural beauty.
It makes sense to produce power closer to big cities. Windmills are fine if they are offshore, and undersea transmission lines are used.
Regarding birds, the report actually references transmission lines as the biggest killer.
eric okeson, I'd love to see a bird flying through an aerotecture. It's a high-solidity design that would require the bird to be carrying a chainsaw to pass through it.
Birds will collide with anything; it doesn't have to have the illusion of being open space.
Very useful and informative post! I would love to see bird deaths per kilowatt for wind power ranked against bird deaths per kilowatt for coal power. Don't forget, global warming is an extremely effective bird-killer.
How can you say that rotor blades move slow when you don't give us the math? A blade of 20 m moving 20 times a minute is moving about 150 km/h. Birds will be hit. We have this problem i Norway. Soaring eagles can not easily avoid this.
==== author's response follows ====
If you have a math background you obviously appreciate that the speed of the blade segment decreases with closeness to the hub. Citing the speed of the outer-most arc as the "H" factor would be biased. Perhaps the midpoint would be the right speed? When you say eagles "soaring" that would be only one behavior that contributes to "E": also to be accounted for would be diving, taking flight, wheeling, etc. Which behavior would be prevalent at mid-rotor elevation range. For this we would have to rely on an experienced ornithologist for guidance, relative to the proposed site. I am supposing that "soaring" would expose eagles to the blades at mountain passes in critical hunting and breeding habitats: exactly the places that wind farms should not go. We are not far apart it seems to me.
Odd that no one gets up in arms about automobiles and roadkill.
Unfortunately, wind turbines DO kill BATS. In large quantities. Check out http://www.batcon.org - they regularly report on detailed studies on this.
There are things that can be done about it. It's not that wind power and bats are incompatible, but rather that the power companies aren't interested in spending a bit more to protect the bats.
I eat meat and am in favour of windfarms... is this allowed?
I just finished a physics course in "Energy Sources in the Early 21st Century." It became abundantly clear that with China and India industrializing rapidly and peak oil happening between 2005-2010 (2010 if you include strip-mining Alberta for the tar sands) that there is absolutely no option besides wind power.
-Solar is too expensive (for now)and needs the exlusive use of huge tracks of land
-Fission will run out of fuel in less than a decade of providing the planet's needs
-Fusion isn't likely to produce power in industrial quantities until after 2050 (if ever)
Unfortunately for the forseeable future it's going to be coal, wind, and hydro.
Canadians like myself have to learn to use 50% less energy in the next four decades. This means home and business thermostats will have to be set at 14C or 57F during the day, and lower still at night; and every vehicle will need to get hybrid efficiencies.
The bird argument may slow windmills down, but reality will set in sooner or later.
-Mike
i can't believe you wrote such a long article about this. those people are morons and the world will go on without them. i believe in protection of endangered species by film. in other words, i believe in natural selection and humans documenting the process all the long way. :)
Author -
You sort of admitted to but failed to address that 'average' issue one poster brought up. You can't use the arguement that prop speed is decreasing. Is the average (distance from tip to hub) speed increasing or decreasing?
Also, if E equals exposure, then you are increasing E if you are increasing the number of windpower stations. The whole issue to begin with is that you going to add to your kill count by adding the stations.
==== author's response follows ======
RPM's have gone down absolutely. The props got longer but the outer most tip of the new props go relatively slow in radial velocity compared to middle of the older prop blades. In some cases blades are fewer as well.
To model total risk we have to decide if the hazard is "faced one turbine at a time" or cumulatively, which will be based on spacing in 3 dimensions. Here I am out of my skill set and will have to leave it to those with more field experience and knowledge of bird behavior.
My point was not to construct an operating model, real time, in a blog but to help deconstruct a meme that made little sense. Bottom line is that bird kill rates (mortality) can be diminished if people work hard to lower both H and E, using best practices and common sense to guide the siting and design processes.
One last tidbit. Reaction to risk always is shaped by the extent to which it is voluntary: e.g. we tolerate 50 thousand people getting killed in traffic accidents each year because each of us "knows" that we are in control of how we drive; but we are very intolerant of a far lower hazard created by another party or a factor out of our control. 'Bird kills at my house are ok but not by a wind farm owner'.
That being said, I'm in favor of windpower and think that the nay-sayers and NIMBYs are throwing up a smokescreen.
> Citing the speed of the outer-most arc as the "H" factor would be biased. Perhaps the midpoint would be the right speed?
Okay, let's do that, but with real numbers. A Vestas V100 has a rotational speed of 13.4rpm and a blade diameter of 100meters. Let's use the midpoint, so we have a diameter of 50meters, a circumference of 157meters, swept 13.4 times per minute, times 60 minutes/hour = 126km/h at the blade midpoint. (252km/h at the tip) How, exactly, does this make it safe? I do, however, take issue with the "midpoint" idea... The swept area is a function of the square of the radius. Therefore, the midpoint of the blade represents the one-quarter/three-quarters swept area boundary. In simple english, on a Vestas V100, on three quarters of the swept area of the blades, the speed of the blades is greater than or equal to 126km/h. I don't like those odds if I'm a bird, no matter what your bike chain says.
==== author's response follows =====
Great job of starting a working model definition for "H". As my post asserted however, "M" is a function of "E" as well. And you and I are probably not very good at intuiting how a bird will respond to "H or really understand why. Same for bats. One hypothesis we could pursue to tease out "E" in detail would be: "past a certain rotational average velocity, certain avain species are unable to percieve, and therefore unable to avoid" moving obstacles". "E" becomes random after a certain speed in otherwords. This is quite similar to how so called "mosquito repellants" work. They don't really repel at all. What does happen is that the insect's heat detection sensory organs are disabled by binding with a repellant vapor, so the squitos are no longer able to orient to a mamalian heat source. As a result, only a few bugs "collide" without skin.
For bats an "E" would be far more complex due to their looping flight patterns as they follow prey and because of their use of echo location and possible interaction of sonar with blade or rotor noises.
I wonder if you can get over the ugly arguement by making wind towers look like windmills at the local mini-golf. No one argues with mini golf.
1. If the speed closer to the hub is slower on large blades, it is on small blades as well. The larger blade area on giant new turbines presents a much greater danger, sweeping a vertical air space of over an acre.
2. The industry cites the information from one old study at the Stateline facility in Washington. They prevent any independent research on the issue, as they now also do about bats after studies found thousands being killed at one facility in the Appalachians.
3. Since it is obviously an issue of cost vs. benefit (thus the strained argument that wind power saves more birds (or bats) than it kills), then where is the evidence of the benefit?
4. Wind power facilities also disturb nesting, particularly with prairie birds. That can have an even more negative effect on populations than outright killing.
5. The most attractive places to wind power developers are often popular flyways. Since little is known of local details about migratory pathways, especially of night flyers, developers resist making adequate preconstruction studies. That arrogance has contributed to the state of Vermont apparently planning to reject a proposal on East Mountain.
6. If anyone looks ridiculous, it's environmentalists attempting to downplay the negative impacts of their chosen industrial development.
==== author's response follows =====
These are sensible arguements that deserve serious attention. However, not all the cited Exposure factors apply equally and some may not apply at all depending on the proposed site.
Here is the best rebuttal to this argument I have heard. I believe it is from wind expert, author, Paul Gipe.
The 3,000+ wind turbines operating near Altamont Pass (CA) would have to operate for more than 500 years to be responsible for the same number of birds the Exxon Valdez killed in less than one week.
So, which energy source do you prefer?
altamont pass is in the middle of the highest populations of some rare and spectacular species - such as the golden eagle. it doesn't take many collisions to decimate this species. perhaps there needs to be a call to replace the old-style bird-manglers w/ the new and improved, bird-friendly turbines at this site - or maybe at least those turbines which are most responsible for bird killings. that might be a wise preventive measure for wind power proponents to take while these raptors are still amongst us. 50,000 human deaths per year in auto collisions does next to nothing to affect our survival as a species, but we are talking about a significant disruption to the entire population of some species. if we begin to speak in terms of percentages of total numbers of a given species, then we can assess the risk that we are assuming more clearly.
Why is there no mention of species and their density? I think the comparison to car windows etc. is uninformitive if we don't know if if they are the same birds that we are worried about during migration through windfarms
Ok. I am beating a dead horse here but an argument to put turbines on hawks ridge in Duluth should not be based on the number of dead Cedar Wax Wings found in NE Minneapolis.
Everyone seems to be pulling out their calculators so I thought I'd do the same. You say that everyday living in the US is estimated to kill 100-1000 million birds per year in the US, so I'll take the average of 550 million. Over a population of 295 million that's 1.85 birds/person/year.
I just thought that put the 2.2 birds/turbine/year in a bit of perspective.
PS To other commenters, please do not blend vegetarianism with wind turbines, I strongly suspect that this type of hybridisation does not help the cause one iota.
As a personal "anti windfarm a** wipe," I'd like to speak up for the educated side of us. Most people who are opposed to wind farms are realistic enought to realize that the birds killed from wind warms are stupid. The big reason to be against wind farms is the disappearing prairie land. Only 2 percent of prairies exist today. They are the most endangered ecological system in the U.S. Once you destroy a prairie by tilling the land, or altering it, it is never the same. Prairies can not be recreated by man either.
Wind farms should be placed in placed that aren't endangered. I believe other energy sources should be used before we turn to wind power. Try biomass, solar, or water.
Man o' man, we just can't do anything. We all insist we get off of oil b/c it is damaging the planet so we look at wind. We can't do that b/c it will damage the planet (using prairie land) so, we can look to solar...oops see second one about prairie land. What are we to do? I guess all humans should just die. At least it would stop one thing....The incessant whining.
I'm in favor of wind farms. I'm in favor of solar. I'm in favor of alt fuels and living cleanly and getting off of foreign oil but, we cannot completely tie our hands at every single turn stopping us from doing anything at all.
Greed power, how come towers kills are a problem. Cornell and others have conferences on this topic. Wind turbines are safe? Lets see 140ft, 8 1/2 ton blade strobe lights are a must. Now get migration going on dark phase of the moon and a cloudy night birds are drawn to the lights. Greed power at its best. Blasdes made in Brazil, Base of towers Vietnam, Nacel from Denmark. All this woulod ot happen with solar and we would protect our rural enviorment. Next conscern how much energy goes into making these machines and how much free power do they get off the grid. I would like to know thhis answer, it sceems a pretty well kept secret on what return is from these. What Vibro-Acoustic disease And Wind Turbines?
gerald duffy's post is misinformed: there is no evidence that I know of to indicate that migratory birds are attracted to flashing lights on foggy nights. They are attracted to steady-burning lights, of which wind turbines have . . . none.
Regards,
Tom Gray
American Wind Energy Association
www.awea.org
www.ifnotwind.org
eric okeson writes that helix-based turbine designs do not kill birds. Where is the data? There are many studies that have been conducted at wind farms with propeller turbines. Since birds collide with buildings, I see no reason to assume that they won't collide with anything that sticks up out of the ground.
emo1313, thanks for the Starbucks story--it is right on the money.
Gorgeboy says, "I think explaining how/why bird death risk is not the Achilles’ heel of wind power will go a long way towards making us salmonoid huggers get on board." It's not the Achilles heel because the number of collisions is so small. If the U.S. obtained all of its electricity from wind--100%--and the collision rate remained the same, wind turbines might account for 1% of human-related avian deaths.
Planxty says, "The industry cites the information from one old study at the Stateline facility in Washington. They prevent any independent research on the issue . . . " Oops, not true. There are many avian studies from wind farms, and all show low collision rates--see the National Wind coordinating Committee fact sheet on Wind Turbine Interactions With Birds and Bats.
Planxty says, "Since it is obviously an issue of cost vs. benefit (thus the strained argument that wind power saves more birds (or bats) than it kills), then where is the evidence of the benefit?" The benefit is generating electricity with no air pollution, no water pollution, no waste, and no mining or drilling for fuel. I won't claim that it saves more birds or bats than it kills, but I will claim that it benefits the environment compared with other energy sources.
Planxty says, "Wind power facilities also disturb nesting, particularly with prairie birds. That can have an even more negative effect on populations than outright killing." Good point. As a matter of fact, the wind industry has just joined in funding a four-year cooperative study of impacts of wind on grassland bird species. Still, these species are subject to many other forms of human intrusion--roads, ranchettes, oil pump jacks, gas compressors, agricultural burning, and so on. It will be interesting to see how the effect of wind turbines is isolated from these other sources of disturbance.
Planxty says, "The most attractive places to wind power developers are often popular flyways. Since little is known of local details about migratory pathways, especially of night flyers, developers resist making adequate preconstruction studies. That arrogance has contributed to the state of Vermont apparently planning to reject a proposal on East Mountain." "Flyways" is an often misused term. Tens of millions of birds migrate through San Gorgonio Pass in southern California each year, but very few collide with the hundreds of wind turbines there, because birds generally migrate at elevations well above turbine heights. The state of Vermont is over the top, asking for heavy-duty studies on a project with only 4 turbines.
pete veilleux writes, ". . . perhaps there needs to be a call to replace the old-style bird-manglers w/ the new and improved, bird-friendly turbines at this site - or maybe at least those turbines which are most responsible for bird killings. that might be a wise preventive measure for wind power proponents to take . . ." Sounds good. But the wind turbine operators in Altamont Pass have already agreed to a multi-year plan in which all of the turbines will be replaced by larger machines believed to be less hazardous. The plan also includes removing entirely a number of turbines in sites that seem to be especially hazardous.
Gary McPants writes, "Why is there no mention of species and their density? I think the comparison to car windows etc. is uninformitive if we don't know if if they are the same birds that we are worried about during migration through windfarms." Interesting issue. The fact is that wind energy is one of the most thoroughly studied sources of avian mortality. If you look for the number of birds killed by buildings each year, you will find a range of 100 million to 1 billion, because no one has studied the question closely enough to come up with a narrower range. Studies of transmission lines and roads are very poor and fragmentary, with little info on species composition.
Chad says, "You say that everyday living in the US is estimated to kill 100-1000 million birds per year in the US, so I'll take the average of 550 million." The range seems low. For buildings it is 100 million to 1 billion. For house cats, one can make a reasonable case for 2 billion. Autos, transmission lines, communications towers are each in the 5-100 million range. Pesticides too. More info available here.
Apologies for coming so late to the discussion.
Regards,
Tom Gray
American Wind Energy Association
www.awea.org
www.ifnotwind.org
Another thoughtful resource on the bird issue (I just ran across it again today) is Confessions of a Bird Lover by Mike Tidwell, director of the Chesapeake Climate Action Network. It includes a strongly worded quote from noted environmentalist Bill McKibben: "The choice is not between wind power and unspoiled nature. The choice is between wind power and the destruction of the world's biology."
Regards,
Tom Gray
American Wind Energy Association
www.awea.org
www.ifnotwind.org
just think of the air polution from coal or gas
Actually, you are citing a paper put out by wind industry lobbyists so of course they paint a rosy picture. Let me paint another one. The truth is 1) wind turbines are the most recent pressure on birds in addition to domestic and feral cats (worst), cars, communication towers, and even though the kill may be low today because of the low numbers of wind farms, if you look at the rapid growth of the industry due to economics (the small players have been purchased by GE, Goldman Sachs and other big players) you'll see that soon wind turbines will rank up there with cats for killing birds; 2) there are almost no pre-construction studies on migratory songbirds which are most vulnerable from 2-3 hours after sunset as they gain altitude, and 2-3 hours before sunrise when they lose altitude. Wind energy companies refuse to do nocturnal surveys for birds or bats which is why thousands of bats are killed every year in West Virgina.3)these birds cannot be counted in "body counts" as they evaporate upon impact, or are eaten by predators so they are not included in the rosy figure of 2.whatever birds per turbine; 4) despite studies that show that migratory birds fly low over ridges, turbines are built on idges; 5) the only mitigation available for unacceptable kills of migratory songbirds is to turn the turbines off seasonally or to remove them.
Any one ever thought of kill free wind mill? I have been testing mine,not one dead bird yet. I could have ten working and not one dead bird, most folks would not even notice them. Wind must prevail as a step forward to eliminating our green house problems. Any one look out the window lately? The weather is sending us a big message, we must make some changes.
I also designed a hydrogen production system on all of our cars and trucks at home and have reduced the emissions huge, not to mention savings at the pump. There is technology out there right now and has been there for quite some time now, but the walls are high to overcome and there are too many in control who are only intrested in the big buck and not the enviroment.
We will get out there, and no beter time than the present.
The truth is 1) wind turbines are the most recent pressure on birds in addition to domestic and feral cats (worst), cars, communication towers, and even though the kill may be low today because of the low numbers of wind farms, if you look at the rapid growth of the industry due to economics (the small players have been purchased by GE, Goldman Sachs and other big players) you'll see that soon wind turbines will rank up there with cats for killing birds;
No, this is simply not true. It is certainly true that the absolute number of birds that die in collisions with wind turbines is relatively small because of the small number of turbines, but the mortality rate is also low. If we obtained 100% of our electricity in the U.S. from wind, bird kills by wind turbines would probably be less than 1% of overall human-related mortality from the sources you mention plus many others: buildings, pesticides, farm mowing equipment, etc.
2) there are almost no pre-construction studies on migratory songbirds which are most vulnerable from 2-3 hours after sunset as they gain altitude, and 2-3 hours before sunrise when they lose altitude.
No, but there are many post-construction studies on avian mortality. See the National Wind coordinating Committee (NWCC) fact sheet on Wind Turbine Interactions With Birds and Bats and many refs from the NWCC site.
Wind energy companies refuse to do nocturnal surveys for birds or bats which is why thousands of bats are killed every year in West Virgina.
It is certainly true that many bats are being killed, but it's not true that wind energy companies are refusing to do research. A number of them are jointly funding a bat research program with Bat Conservation International, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and the U.S. Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Laboratory. More info about this here. Wind companies have also paid for extensive radar studies of migrating birds in the eastern U.S.
3)these birds cannot be counted in "body counts" as they evaporate upon impact, or are eaten by predators so they are not included in the rosy figure of 2.whatever birds per turbine;
Sorry, but the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service was one of the groups involved in developing the NWCC fact sheet cited above.
4) despite studies that show that migratory birds fly low over ridges, turbines are built on idges [sic];
Not true either. References please. Birds migrate across a broad front and do not follow ridgelines.
5) the only mitigation available for unacceptable kills of migratory songbirds is to turn the turbines off seasonally or to remove them.
I think this is probably true. However, since there have been no such kills, it's just a hypothetical question.
Please stop lying about wind energy. One million species may be wiped out by global warming by the year 2050, and here you are sowing false fears and misrepresentations about one of the most promising solutions.
Regards,
Tom Gray
American Wind Energy Association
www.awea.org
www.ifnotwind.org
Any one ever thought of kill free wind mill? I have been testing mine, not one dead bird yet. I could have ten working and not one dead bird, most folks would not even notice them. Wind must prevail as a step forward to eliminating our green house problems. Any one look out the window lately? The weather is sending us a big message, we must make some changes.
I agree with you about global warming, but you will need to back up your claims about no kills for them to be credible. Since birds run into houses routinely, it's hard to believe they will not collide with any wind turbine that sits above ground. There is a whole science of conducting surveys to monitor avian mortality. You can find out more about it from the National Wind Coordinating Committee site.
Regards,
Tom Gray
American Wind Energy Association
www.awea.org
www.ifnotwind.org
Until my patents are finished I will not disclose too much info on my prototype.I can tell you that it works great even at low wind.It spins with the help from other types of energy than just wind.
I can tell you that there are no sharp leading edges and that if a bird were to come into contact with the mill it will simply bounce off.The blades are fexible and again have no sharp leading edges.I even have a picture of a squirrel enjoying a ride on it.
Trust me when I say,at times I have more respect for animals than I do for people,sad to say.
I am keen to make the power grids cleaner, especially in my home counry of Australia where coal is so readily available that energy companies are lax to try using anything else.
But I can't say I'm a big fan of wind energy, for all the reasons cited. Birds and bats are just one of them. Then there's the 'ugliness' or at least the almost violent interruption of nature views especially in coastline and mountain areas.
It can reduce land value, it could be noisy if you live near one and most importantly, it's only useful while the wind is blowing.
I'd like to see more promotion of tidal power (or 'lunar power' as it's being marketed although that's a bit of a misnomer). Tides can be easily predicted, and even then, the turbines could be put somewhere where there is a permanent current, like river mouths. It's out of sight, much more powerful than wind energy, and with some basic netting or similar, can help protect most marine species from the fate of the birds and bats.
Because we are effectively having an energy crisis, wind energy could be used now, but I'd hope it's only a transitional power source, until better and technology like fusion becomes mainstream.
But I'd much rather have tidal over wind and I wish TH and everyone who reads it would do more to promote and support it.
"i'll tell you why that myth is spread, its because LIPA and all these other power corporations don't want to spend there money on research when they could just make a few press releases about the evils of green energy."
Once again, the environmentalists always try
to blame corporations. In this case, it's the general public and the bird environmentalists and those environmentalists that oppose wind power for other reasons that are spreading the misinformation.
Seldom, if ever, have I heard
of a corporation speaking against wind power, although I've heard a lot of them speaking in favor of it. Utilities are the corporations that woould be affected , and most of them now love the idea of a power source whose rates can be contracted ten years in advance and guranteed not to increase. That is an ENORMOUS
advantage for wind power. It's always the local yokels who
lie about bird kills, noise, and claim the towers are
destroying their precious
visual horizon. In nearly all cases, the horizon looks a lot better to me with the towers
than without.
In nearly all cases, the horizon looks a lot better to me with the towers than without.
Oh I'm terribly sorry, I didn't realise! I guess since you like the view of great big machines in the middle of otherwise untouched landscape, that mean windpower is A-OK then! My bad. And here was me thinking that my opinion on what looks nice mattered!
--
editor note: While personally I like the look of wind turbines, I understand that some people don't. But we have to remember the stakes; it's not about the view, it's about global warming and air pollution. The choice is between coal and renewables, and while solar and wave energy have a lot of potential, we'll need everything we can throw at the problem including lots and lots of wind power.
So you would rather see a great big line of brown hase instead of a wind mill?Wrong!Your idea of solar or lunar power is not far off either.All the suits need to make their cash first.Thank God for tree huggers,without us we would all be at the bank cashing in our hard earned $$$ to buy good ol O2, so then we could buy some gas and start it all over again.(sort of speak)It is give and take here folks.We can't have our cake and eat it to!Too late for that I am afraid.
Like I said before, I like green energy, and I'm happy that there's some in the form of solar and wind. But there's better forms out there, and we have to make the move to the newer forms of green energy.
Quickly too, so that less windfarms need to be built. I'm not saying that coal is better than wind, I'm saying that other green power sources are better than wind.
This was not an jab at you mate.We are on the same team.Green energy must start up like the car did,first the pony then steam the gas then....who knows what will be next.Stats say that alot more folks are dieing because of global warming not to mention animals.We have to start some where.I would put my last buck into green enrgy...Wait,I did.It is not about money,it is about my kids,your kids and their kids and so on.
PS
I spent a year in Australia,and loved evey min. there.Lots of creepy crawlers though.Have a great day my friend.
Anyone read The Onion this week? Big headline: "Sparrow Aviation Administration Blames Collision On Failure To Detect Pane Of Glass; Mysterious Phenomenon Kills Millions Each Year."
Not really relevant but very very funny.
if wind turbines kill birds then they should be taken down but untill they have solid evidence then they should be kept up
"if wind turbines kill birds then they should be taken down but untill they have solid evidence then they should be kept up"
Well, I think we should have priorities. If we're taking down things because they hurt wildlife, we should start with cars, pet cats, buildings, coal plants, etc. Wind turbines are pretty low down the list, IMO.
This is possibly the most pethedic article i have ever read\. You people have no lives and if you care so much about this why dont you get in a plane, try being a bird, and fly threw a giant wind turbine. Hopefully you can go be with your preciousbird conterparts in your little bird heaven. Have a nice day
Well wind power just makes money from the good old tax payers of this great country. J P Morgan and Gold Sachs. Coal is the real poluter, and China and India use more coal than the USA. One of the biggest poluters in California is from Chinas coal fired plants. Clean up coal and not polute the country with wind turbines. The reality of this activity? Wild places are under attack! The birds are at risk of a horrible death.
Their habitats are being damaged.
I was looking for information regarding what someone in geofraphy class claimed that they had read that wind turbines cause damage to the ground below and the worms. No joke. Anyone know. GG
=== author's response follows ===
In the spring when the soil is very wet you can chase worms out of the ground by pounding in a piece of iron rebar and then striking it sideways to set up waves of vibration. It is conceiveable the vibration from poorly anchored turbine towers could do something simiilar. But so could light standards or any structure that sways in the wind.
If the tower base were in contact with a rock outcropping, say a friable limestone rock outcrop, it is conceivable that the added weight and vibration could cause stress fractures and lead to changes in groundwater flow, but at a very local level...not regionally.
I enjoyed this post. I admittedly did not have the time to read it all, but I can shed a little more info for your readers.
In the Altamont Pass area - North to Vasco road and beyond, the older turbines rotate extremely fast and thus birds get killed. They are now moving toward the 65 meter and 80 meter tower turbines made by Mitsubishi at a cool $1,000,000 each. THese turn at an optimum rate of 28 MPH which will drastically reduce the bird kills.
I worked on the replacement of the wind mills along Vasco Road 38 wind turbines that are now up and running. they are very impressive - but far from "Quiet". There are vitually no homes to condend with at this site. Antoher site we are working is over by Rio Vista. Out there we have to maintain 1500' distance from house due to noise.
as far as the wormies.... The bases on these windmills are 15' diameter foundations and 15' deep. Were they are placed is at the top of ridge lines so I doubt there would be any disruption in ground water flow or stress fractures.... but that is not my field.
One point that just kills me is that the folks on the East Coast.... Martha's Vinyard are opposed to Wind Turbines being placed offshore. They don't want to disturb their view of the open Ocean ? I jus think that is the height of Audacity ! We need the power and it won't make an oil slick.
I have been a remote radio facility owner/operater for eighteen years. Twelve of those years I have used small wind turbines to offset diesel generator costs to power my nine constructed sites. In all those years of operation, I have yet to find one bird injured or killed by the operation of the turbines. I also look for remnant feathers each time I visit these sites (bi-monthly) in the event a ground animal might have removed a dead or injured bird. One of my hobbies is to feed the various types of birds that frequent my radio facilities. Many will actually land on my hand to feed. All of my sites are primarily solar powered in similar fashion. I have witnessed raptures, crows, and ravens flying around my facilities when the turbines are active. They all appear to be extremely aware of the turbines operation and give them a wide area of clearance. I am not a treehugger, nor am I a "rape the earth" business operator. I do try my best to remain in harmony with the local environment, however, by causing only a minimal impact in the area. It seems to me there are only two types of environmental organizations, extremely left or right. Are there any practical organizations that believe in common sense and are centered?
Gil Greenwood
As one who resides in Vermont, I want information that wind turbines will have minimal impact on peregrines. I'm certainly not a NIMBY. If feasible, I would have one on my hill -- the part that's pasture.
I grew up near coasts, and, as far as I'm concerned, most barrier islands should never have been developed. In ecological terms, barrier islands are too important to be mauled by humans. On the east coast, they represent significant migratory paths for birds, etc. The seasonal inhabitants of Cape Cod / Nantucket / Martha's Vineyard may be reprehensible in many ways, but there are issues re: wind turbines and migratory birds that need to be explored.
Obviously, careful siting of turbines and improvement of safety
are priorities.
I came to Treehugger hoping to find leads to well-written articles exploring the rare bird vs. wind turbine issue, as what I had read about Smola concerned me. Unfortunately, I seem to have come across wind industry proponents and/or those who would rather argue than explore the issues.
By the way, I'm not a vegetarian, a PETAn, nor do I shop at a 'greener' WalMart. (But I did go to town meeting last week.)
I do believe in the ethical treatment of the animal whose meat I consume, rare species, and employees.
One commenter said:
-Solar is too expensive (for now)and needs the exlusive use of huge tracks of land
>>> true. But the same is true of wind power.
-Fission will run out of fuel in less than a decade of providing the planet's needs
>>> No. Breeder reactors could run for centuries.
-Fusion isn't likely to produce power in industrial quantities until after 2050 (if ever)
>>> hard to say
Bottom line: the question is quality, not quantity. True, the gross numbers of birds killed may be small compared to the entire bird population, but as some commenters have noted, those birds that are killed tend to be slow breeding endangered types.
The number of birds killed by windmills has to be next to nonexistent standing next to the number all of the birds killed by oil tanker spills.
--
editor note: The biggest bird killers are power lines, buildings (windows..) and house cats. Next to those, everything else is very small, except maybe for the less of forests and, in the mid to long term, global warming.
if we just built kentucky fried chickens below the turbines our problems would be solved.
thanks for writing such a detailed analysis on this.
i just hope that they implement more of wind turbines up in the Northern territories.
How about attaching whistles to the vanes, tuned to the frequency that scares off the birds?
In the Altamont Pass area - North to Vasco road and beyond, the older turbines rotate extremely fast and thus birds get killed. They are now moving toward the 65 meter and 80 meter tower turbines made by Mitsubishi at a cool $1,000,000 each. These turn at an optimum rate of 28 MPH which will drastically reduce the bird kills.
The tip speed of the newer, larger turbines is roughly the same as the tip speed of the older, smaller ones--in the 150-180 mph range. I think you must mean 28 rpm, not mph, although that seems a little high.
I think a more important statistic, which I heard just a day or two ago from an ornithologist, is that some of the numerous older turbines in Altamont Pass are just 30 feet apart. Larger turbines must be spaced farther apart, so there is more room for birds to pass between them. BUT: this is just my opinion, not supported by any scientific study that I know of.
I worked on the replacement of the wind mills along Vasco Road 38 wind turbines that are now up and running. they are very impressive - but far from "Quiet". There are virtually no homes to contend with at this site. Another site we are working is over by Rio Vista. Out there we have to maintain 1500' distance from house due to noise.
I wouldn't doubt it, but I'd be interested to know more about the decibel levels. Turbines are not silent, but neither are they especially noisy--typically you can stand at the base of the modern ones and carry on a conversation in a normal tone of voice.
Regards,
Thomas O. Gray
American Wind Energy Association
www.awea.org
risingwind.blogspot.com
On March 14, 2007, Lori wrote:
As one who resides in Vermont, I want information that wind turbines will have minimal impact on peregrines.
I can't say this for certain, but I can say it's very likely. Raptor kills in significant numbers (significant in terms of the local population of the species involved) have occurred at only a few sites in the world--Altamont Pass in California, Smoela in Norway (which you mention below) and one location in Australia. I can only really speak to Altamont, which is a site of very heavy, year-round raptor use. There is no indication to date that sites in the Eastern U.S. would encounter similar problems, based on experience from the wind farms in place to date in this region.
I'm certainly not a NIMBY. If feasible, I would have one on my hill -- the part that's pasture.
Glad to hear it. It is important to keep in mind the urgent need to develop clean alternative energy sources like wind and solar in order to fight global warming.
I grew up near coasts, and, as far as I'm concerned, most barrier islands should never have been developed. In ecological terms, barrier islands are too important to be mauled by humans. On the east coast, they represent significant migratory paths for birds, etc. The seasonal inhabitants of Cape Cod / Nantucket / Martha's Vineyard may be reprehensible in many ways, but there are issues re: wind turbines and migratory birds that need to be explored.
Perhaps. However, again, there is no indication that wind turbines pose a problem for migratory birds. California's San Gorgonio Pass is a strong indication of the opposite--with tens of millions of birds migrating through the pass each year, and thousands of wind turbines, there are very few bird kills. The Cape Wind project has already been the subject of far more scrutiny than fossil-fueled generating plants in Massachusetts. How much is enough?
Obviously, careful siting of turbines and improvement of safety are priorities.
I came to Treehugger hoping to find leads to well-written articles exploring the rare bird vs. wind turbine issue, as what I had read about Smola concerned me. Unfortunately, I seem to have come across wind industry proponents and/or those who would rather argue than explore the issues.
Well, there is a fundamental problem here, and you've put your finger on it: do we consider wind power from a "macro" (large-scale) point of view or only from a "micro" perspective? Looking at it under a microscope, one does find local impacts, like shadow flicker (flickering shadows cast by rotating turbines), sound that is audible at times, occasional bird kills, and other issues. But stepping back for a moment and looking at the macro point of view, the benefits are huge: electricity generated from a domestic, inexhaustible resource that is very abundant across most of the U.S. with no air pollution, no water pollution, no water use, no global warming pollution, no mining and no drilling. Is it really surprising that many people feel strongly that the big-picture benefits outweigh the risks?
A 2004 international scientific study concluded that one million species might be driven to extinction by global warming by the year 2050. It's really important to keep this in mind. Wind energy is one of the technology "wedges" that other scientists have identified as being necessary to avoid this nightmare scenario.
Regards,
Thomas O. Gray
American Wind Energy Association
www.awea.org
risingwind.blogspot.com
On April 6, 2007, Bart wrote:
One commenter said:
-Solar is too expensive (for now)and needs the exlusive use of huge tracks of land
>>> true. But the same is true of wind power.
No, it is not. 95-98% of the land within a wind farm's boundaries remains free for farming or ranching, even after allowing for the turbine bases, access roads, etc. That is why it is such a no-brainer for farmers.
Bottom line: the question is quality, not quantity. True, the gross numbers of birds killed may be small compared to the entire bird population, but as some commenters have noted, those birds that are killed tend to be slow breeding endangered types.
Sources, please: I know of no evidence to support this assertion. In fact, many of the birds that die in collisions with wind turbines are common ones, like rock doves.
Regards,
Thomas O. Gray
American Wind Energy Association
www.awea.org
risingwind.blogspot.com
On May 3, 2007, Frank Sitchler wrote:
How about attaching whistles to the vanes, tuned to the frequency that scares off the birds?
A number of ideas like this one have been suggested, and some have even been tested in the field (painting turbine nacelles to make them look like giant predators, painting rotor blades with special paint to make them visible in a wider range of visual frequencies, installing anti-perching devices on lattice tower crossbars, using tubular towers instead of lattice towers). Some have worked and been generally adopted, and some have not. This specific suggestion seems to have some weaknesses: 1) the whistles have to be pretty robust structurally, since the blades are moving at 150 mph plus; 2) they would create the potential for increased sound volume and disturbance to neighbors and other wildlife (e.g., big game); and 3) it is difficult to find a sound to which birds do not habituate (think of the difficulty some cities have with starlings).
Regards,
Thomas O. Gray
American Wind Energy Association
www.awea.org
risingwind.blogspot.com
Just the facts:
CA A.G. Bill Lockyer, to the Almeda County Board of Supervisors in his letter of July 6, 2005:
"The ongoing harm to protected bird species at the APWRA is serious and unacceptable."
"Because the APWRA is the largest of its kind in the world, what happens here could set an important precedent for how these issues are addressed elsewhere in California and the United States."
Scientific community:
“Increasingly, the operators of wind farms are recognizing that siting is a critically important factor in the construction of new facilities, with some sites causing less environmental damage than others. The local, national and international concerns about the operations at Altamont attest to the reality that Altamont is not an appropriate site for wind farms.”
“We agree with those spokespeople of the industry who point out that many more birds are killed by collisions with windows, wires and towering structures including skyscrapers. Domestic and feral cats take an unacceptable number of birds and other wildlife. But golden eagles, red-tailed hawks, burrowing owls, and other species of particular concern are killed in disproportionate numbers at Altamont.”
“Citizens of Alameda County place an increasing value on wildlife. This value must now be a component of longer-term planning. Wind farms will provide energy but will kill birds and bats; they must therefore be located, at least in the future, in areas where damage is minimal.”
Peter H. Bloom
W. Grainger Hunt
Hans J. Peeters
Robert W. Risebrough
Brian J. Walton
“Our combined credentials include more than 175 years as practicing scientists in fields related to wildlife conservation with a particular focus on raptorial birds.”
By Chris Metinko, Inside Bay Area 4/24/07
“According to a study released in 2004 by the California Energy Commission, an estimated 1,700 to 4,700 birds die each year by flying into whirling turbine blades or being electrocuted by transmission lines that thread through the 50,000-acre Altamont Wind Resource Area.”
"116 golden eagles, 300 red-tailed hawks, 333 American kestrels and 380 burrowing owls, the study found."
"A lawsuit filed against the county in October by the Golden Gate Audubon Society, Californians for Renewable Energy and four other local Audubon chapters challenged the county’s decision o renew permits for Altamont Pass wind turbines. A subsequent settlement forces the wind industry to commit to a 50 percent reduction in raptor deaths by November 2009, and remove the deadliest turbines and continuing winter shutdowns of the wind machines."
"That settlement assumes there are 1,300 golden eagles, red-tailed hawks, American kestrels and burrowing owl deaths in that Livermore area each year.”
=== author's response follows ===
No one doubts the seriousness of avian mortality in the Altamount region. One does not need to be a professional biologist to see that corrective action is needed. But to infer that a single bad siting choice such as Altamont can be extrapolated everywhere else would be inappropriate. Just as inappropriate as saying all rock festivals will end as badly as the legendary Stones jaunt in Altamont.
Thanks, Barbara, good post. I don't agree with all of the opinions expressed in it, but the facts are what they are. One salient fact that is missing: there are more than 5,000 turbines operating in the pass. If one accepts the highest number of annual bird kills in your post (4,700), that means that each turbine, on average, kills a bit less than 1 bird per year.
That is not to say that the raptor kills or the overall bird kills are acceptable; as you say, it's just a fact.
Regards,
Thomas O. Gray
American Wind Energy Association
www.awea.org
risingwind.blogspot.com
Recently I wrote this:
[In response to this comment:] Bottom line: the question is quality, not quantity. True, the gross numbers of birds killed may be small compared to the entire bird population, but as some commenters have noted, those birds that are killed tend to be slow breeding endangered types.
Sources, please: I know of no evidence to support this assertion. In fact, many of the birds that die in collisions with wind turbines are common ones, like rock doves.
Sorry, wasn't thinking clearly. The statement is true for Altamont Pass in California, where raptor kills have been a serious issue. Raptors do tend to be longer-lived. Generally across the U.S., however, the birds that occasionally collide with wind turbines tend to be small migrants that are not slow breeders. And even in Altamont Pass, common birds do make up a significant share of the kills.
My apologies for the misstatement.
Regards,
Thomas O. Gray
American Wind Energy Association
www.awea.org
risingwind.blogspot.com
100 million to 1 billion bird strikes involving windows, per year in the United States? Before I'll buy any numerical statistics, I've got to have some trust that *all* stats in an article are reasonable. Now, in this one, no references are cited, which raises my BS meter to begin with. now, 1 billion bird window-strikes/year? Let's have a look at this, shall we?
There are some 80 million homes in the United states. I live in one of them. I have lived in a home in the United States for every one of my 53 years of existence. During my tenure, I have either experienced or found smudge evidence for a total of 3 bird deaths from striking windows in homes where I have lived. Multiply this by 80 million homes, then divide by 53 years, and, presuming my experiences are average, I can account for about 5 million bird deaths/year, on average, over the past half century due to colliding with residential home windows.
5 million. 1 billion would be 1,000 million, or some 200 times more, on average, than I have experienced in 53 years of life. Has a *single* reader out there experienced his or her "average" share of window-killed birds (that'd be about 600 bird deaths per household, per 53 years, or a dozen or more, each and every year, for each and every home in the US)? Are you getting yours?
Does this discrepancy bother anyone else? If it turns out to be hyped, what does this say about other statistical evidence presented?
Folks, there is important work to be done. Do we really need to base it on hyped statistics and pseudo-science?
I am totally into renewable energy but, like Dave, I also have a problem with these ridiculous bird-kill comparisons.
Comparing the total number of birds killed by windows, buildings, cars, airplanes and cell phone towers, to the total number killed by wind turbines is a profoundly misleading comparison. Using the same faulty logic, I could argue that heroin is relatively safe because the number of people who overdose is so small compared to those who die from cancer, stroke, and heart attack. Why insult our intelligence by even offering such a stupid comparison?
Although the environmental benefits of renewable energy are undeniable, I think those who care about the environment enough to buy a turbine are, by and large, the same people who feel sick when they accidently kill a bird, squirrel or whatever. Bird kill rates are not a rhetorical abstraction when they drop in your own back yard.
To overcome this marketing obstacle, and dispel the fears of nature lovers, more research and definitive information is necessary (and less bullsh*t).
The avian issue is valid. USFWS, the Sierra Club, Greenpeace, MA Audubon and many other wildlife groups have created wind tower siting guidelines. Locating wind towers in migratory flyways, areas of endangered species and in Important Bird Areas is not recommended. A Congressional Subcommittee has been formed to address the issue of unacceptable numbers of birds dying by poorly sited wind towers.
Bill Lockyer, A.G. of CA July 6, 2005:
"The ongoing harm to protected bird species at the APWRA is serious and unacceptable." "Because the APWRA is the largest of its kind in the world, what happens here could set an important precedent for how these issues are addressed elsewhere in California and the United States."
A.G. Locklear is likely referring to Cape Wind.
The Altamont Pass Wind Resource Area causes the deaths of as many as 4,700 birds per year, including red-tail hawks and Golden Eagles in a flyway as is Nantucket Sound.
“We agree with those spokespeople of the industry who point out that many more birds are killed by collisions with windows, wires and towering structures including skyscrapers. Domestic and feral cats take an unacceptable number of birds and other wildlife. But golden eagles, red-tailed hawks, burrowing owls, and other species of particular concern are killed in disproportionate numbers at Altamont.”
“Increasingly, the operators of wind farms are recognizing that siting is a critically important factor in the construction of new facilities, with some sites causing less environmental damage than others. The local, national and international concerns about the operations at Altamont attest to the reality that Altamont is not an appropriate site for wind farms.”
Peter H. Bloom
W. Grainger Hunt
Hans J. Peeters
Robert W. Risebrough
Brian J. Walton\
“Our combined credentials include more than 175 years as practicing scientists in fields related to wildlife conservation with a particular focus on raptorial birds.”
You guys really need to broaden your resource base not all "anti-environmental" information comes from or is funded by "evil capitalists", the mere fact we have energy options is because our country is so rich (because of free market), spit your ramblings to proverty stricken emerging markets, think about economic factors, weigh the good and bad ....
You guys really need to broaded your resource base not all "anit-environmental" information comes from or is funded by "evil captilists", the mere fact we have energy options is because our country is so rich (because of free market), spit your ramblings to provery stricken emerging markets, think about economic factors, weigh the good and bad ....
Why construct an industrial wind facility in a migratory flyway, with endangered species present , when we know the risks to endangered species presented by a poorly sited wind project?
The American Wind Energy Association, GE, and all who are hoping for the shift of public wealth, monetary, and resources, from the public to them think that wind towers belong everywhere.
Wind energy has failed to deliver on promises made by those in possition to profit by wind energy.
What GE, AWEA, Cape Wind and the food chain don't want you to know, but I'm delighted to share with you:
According to the Danish Trade Council, Denmark's energy sector wind turbine exports account for $1.5 US. billion annually.
Of course they work! Or do they?
Flemming Nissen head of development at West Danish generation company ELSAM (one of Denmark’s largest energy utilities):
“Increased development of wind turbines does not reduce Danish CO2 emissions”
Neils Gram of the Danish Federation of Industries:
“In green terms windmills are a mistake and economically they make no sense…”
Jytte Kaad Jensen, chief economist for Eltra, Denmark’s biggest electricity distributor:
“In just a few years we’ve gone from some to the cheapest electricity in Europe to some of the most costly.”
Aase Madsen, an MP who chairs energy policy in the Danish Parliament, is emphatic:
“For our industry it has been a terribly expensive disaster.”
Henning Rasmussen, Danish engineer:
“When the wind arrives on or two hours later than forecast, we get nothing and we have to ask our neighbors to rescue us.”
Gundolf Dany, chief engineer at Aachen:
“Until we invent a way of storing huge amounts of electricity, wind energy can never be relevant to our future.”
Sir Martin Holdgate, former chairman of the British Renewable Energy Advisory Group:
“The trouble with wind farms is that they have a huge spatial footprint for a piddling little bit of electricity..."
Richard Courtney a Reviewer for the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change:
“Wind farms are "environmentally damaging money wasters whose large scale use increases power demand. The New Age dream of a world operated by wind farms will remain a dream because the laws of physics do not allow it in an industrialized world. If wind power were economic then oil tankers would be sailing ships."
The Copenhagen Post ran this story on the first day of January:
“ENERGY GIANTS SAY WIND POWER IS HOT AIR”
“The country's energy companies are not convinced that wind power is the way of the future. Management at Denmark's energy companies, DONG Energy and Vattenfall, do not subscribe to the current mindset that wind energy will be especially prominent in the future, reported national public broadcaster DR. The companies believe that coal-powered electricity will still be the largest supplier of the nation's energy, despite the trend toward environmentally friendly sources. 'Wind energy can't solve the energy problem in the near future because it's too unstable and possibly too expensive,' said Anders Eldrup, chief executive of Dong Energy [Denmark’s largest energy company].
Professor David Bellamy:
"Huge amounts of tax payers money for scant environmental and electrical benefit make them a scam. Wind-farms are inefficient, destroy the landscape and far more could be achieved through energy efficiency. If you lagged the roofs of 500 homes it would have the effect of putting up one turbine. They can only work 30% of the time at very best, in Denmark it is only 17%. We have to keep other stations running, spinning in reserve, inefficiently pouring out carbon dioxide and sulphur dioxide. These turbines are 22 storeys high put on hills where everyone can see them. They kill bats and birds and need 1,000 tonnes of concrete as well as a road infrastructure. It beggars belief that some environmental groups can say they are 'green'."
“Danes Go Cold on Wind Farms”
November 1, 2006
http://thescotsman.scotsman.com/international.cfm?id=1613772006
“The nation that leads the world in wind-farm development is going cool on the environmentally friendly source of power. Since the boom year of 2000, when as many as 748 turbines were erected, the number being built in Denmark has steadily fallen. So far this year, only six new wind turbines have been put up. While many countries around the world are clamouring to buy Danish wind turbines, Denmark’s government is finding it difficult to convince its own population to accept an increase in the domestic use of the green technology. Describing turbines as “poorly located, noisy and unsightly”, a number of local authorities, backed by grass-roots campaigners, are rejecting plans for new wind farms.“
And more, http://www.windaction.org/quotes</p>
Additionally, Cape Wind present a clear and future danger to the public as proposed for Nantucket Sound.
http://www.congress.org/congressorg/bio/userletter/?id=297&letter_id=1208243361
Dave Culp, I believe that you are confused. The statistic was that 100 million to 1 billion birds are killed due to flying into WINDOWS. You calculated the windows in HOMES only. Have you completely forgotten about skyscrapers that are covered with windows, or other buildings such as offices, schools, hospitals, etc?
This was a well-written but poorly researched article that succeeds in putting forth the bias of the author.
Tom Gray of AWEA and boosters of this wind industry trade group would have us ignore the severe threat which industrial wind energy development in the Appalachian mountain region poses to bat populations, forest habitat and public lands. One booster whom Tom has praised has even gone so far as to publish an article claiming that wind turbines are actually good for bats. It's quite Orwellian!
However, a recently published peer-reviewed scientific paper has estimated that approximately 111,000 bats may be killed annually by 2020 due to the likely "wind farm" development slated for the Mid-Atlantic Highlands Region - see: http://www.vawind.org/#Kunz . This is considered by bat experts to be an unsustainable mortality rate, which likely will drive some bat populations to become endangered.
The Wind Industry is a scam that is preying on naiviety and technical ignorance of the General Population. These things are bad for the local ecosystem, do little to mitigate CO2 emissions are entirely dependent on government largess and raise the cost of electricity for everyone. The more of these things that they put up the worse it is for everyone and the environment.
If you love nature and love the environment, then kill these things where ever you see them. And by kill them, I mean KILL THEM. Buy a high powered rifle and shoot the generators, with any luck you might hit the oil resevoir and ruin the damned thing.
==== Editor's Note ====
TreeHugger does not condone Monkeywrenching, whether it's done by government officials twisting climate science or by individuals opposed to renewable power.
Such tactics as proposed by Johnnyb in this comment are counter-productive to the public debates that must be repeated in hundreds of locales if alternative energy sources are to be fairly examined.
Contradicting this article, a Dutch study says:
"The study showed that large wind turbines producing more than 1.5 megawatts of power killed slightly more birds than smaller, older windmills, but Bird Protection noted that the bigger windmills produce five to 10 times more electricity.
"In contrast to what might be expected, it seems that the number of bird victims has almost no relationship with the size of the wind turbine," the report said."
Which study is accurate? Who knows? I'm undecided because of the lack of unbiased information.
The "b-b-but cars kill more!" argument doesn't work for me either. Why should allowing wind power that is documented to kill birds be allowed just because another form of technology kills more?
Again, I'm undecided. If wind power is indeed hurting/killing animals we need to hold off putting up more farms until a bird-safe turbine is designed.
Kills birds? Bummer. Guess we'll build a nuke reactor instead.
so it may not kill all that many birds, but its not all that green either. as the coal fired plants must be kept on standby while turbines are running in case the wind dies down. factor in the trucks needed to support the turbines and more emissions are beibg released than before, wind power is a scam to get a few people rich!!!!
This might be a silly question:
Is it not possible to install a small ultra-sound, high frecuency emisor on every turbine to encourage birds to take another direction? You know, just like a sound lighthouse ...
It works to send dogs and cats away ... May it work to wind turbines?
Feel free to comment on the idea ...
Wind farms are Ugly and far from zero eco impact land has to be cleared to erect them and maintain them animals are displaced in this process and there habitat destroyed. turbine don't put out enough power to cancel out these facts.
quote "Is it not possible to install a small ultra-sound, high frecuency emisor on every turbine to encourage birds to take another direction?"
so you would run off any animals that returned to the area to save a couple birds. the animals habitat was already disrupted but building a wind farm on top of there habitat. so you want to make sure they don't come back?
quote: "so you would run off any animals that returned to the area to save a couple birds. the animals habitat was already disrupted but building a wind farm on top of there habitat. so you want to make sure they don't come back?"
It's not sending them away (as I know I said) as not right onto the turbines ... Maybe a better example could be lights on top of antennas. They don't make planes to go away, just let them know they are there and make them go some meters up ...
First off, this is two members from the state AG issues team of '08. Our topic was wind turbines thank you very much. And first off, very few birds are killed from these turbines and the blades are shaped in such a way that the birds should be in no harm. Birds CANNOT rest on the turbines either because they are slanted. More birds die from flying into buildings or windows. And, the US has to have 20 percent of energy coming from another source other than coal. 75 percent wants wind turbines to take affect in most rural areas. They will also help with pollution, and lowering gas prices which you all should want unless you insist on riding a bike. Home grown energy is for a more profitable future and not from coal. We are running out of coal and we are burning it up and losing a lot of money from it. Property tax payments from utility projects provide much needed revenue for building new homes bridges roads and other community infrastucture. There is no cost to the landowner, and replacement parts are at no cost to the landownder and these turbines barely make a noice, they are as loud as the hum of a refridgerator and if you can live with your refridgerator you can live with a turbine.
They do not pollute, and they do not harm animals rarely, they do not make noise, they also will not fall over or blow over because they are set 12 FT. into the ground.
Bird death by wind turbines was brought on by the Altamont Pass wind Farm in Northern California. This site had many old small fast rotating wind turbines with lattice towers. I have been there and have observed birds perched on these lattice towers (though the wind turbine was not operational at the time)
If they were tube towers and larger turbines, as mentioned in this article, then bird deaths greatly reduced.
There is absolutely no credible evidence which supports the oft-claimed belief that the newer "monopole-based" wind turbines kill fewer birds than the older-style "lattice-based" wind turbines. The scientific research into bird mortality at wind turbines does NOT support the notion that wind turbines with monopole towers are any safer for wildlife than the older lattice-style generators.
Also, the speed (movement velocity) of the wind turbine's blades does not vary appreciably between the older turbines and newer, larger (but slower RPM) "modern" wind turbine generators.
I agree with a we need a group that is neither far left or far right on these issues. There is a middle ground. It requires that we think the issue through and find common ground.
I am for energy independence. We need to get away from depending on the "global community" and get back to American independence.
There are new technologies that we must try but not commit to, such as wind, solar, geothermal, and nuclear.
Some of the new wind technology that I have seen looks very promissing and can be used in city instead of taking up valuable natural areas. The same can be said of solar.
Ultimately we will go to an intergrated system of electricity from many sources (safest alternative for independence and sustainablity) that will power not only our factories and homes, but transportation as well. But it won't come cheap, but it is better to bite the bullet now than wait for the new dark ages when the lights go off.
Life is full of compromises and we can allow NIMBY and self interest freeze our innitiative.
Interesting that another article published just 1 year before this found the opposite results. Now I will admit that as far as total kills wind turbines are low on the list but do the birds really need another man made barrier that increases mortality? The new models need to have more research done on them so we need to move forward with extreme caution, especially along major migration flyways and areas where there are nesting endangered and threatened species. I still don't understand why they must turn in the vertical and can turn in the horizontal which would likely reduce kills. I also say shot all feral cats and move towers from flight paths but that will take time, this is something we can get right from the start and not have to fix it after it has any major impacts. Some solutions could be a simple as the hieght of the towers or the color of the blades. Some could be far more complicated to solve. No one should be completely for them no matter what the cost and the other side needs to way the costs as to how much if any are the most prone species capable of handling.
This is great info and analysis of this subject. I wish someone would apply the same logic to fossil fuel energy - i.e. take the emotion out of man made CO2 by comparing the amount of naturally occurring CO2 vs. man made CO2 vs. the percentage of other naturally occurring "so called" green house gasses. To reverse the analogy would be to claim the small percentage of bird kill associated with wind generation is the man made tipping point that will wipe out the entire endangered bird of prey population.
I am the lead technician at a wind farm in Iowa and felt like throwing my two cents in here. In 2 years of working on wind turbines in Iowa I have only found 1 dead sparrow next to our turbines. I have found more dead bats. As far as the comment saing our turbines are destroying prairies, some of our turbines are in prairie land and have virtually no impact on that. If anything the ones on prairie land are helping to protect that land by providing the owner with income that he would otherwise be getting by tilling the land and farming it.
I think it's best to bear in mind that it doesn't have to be one or the other. The problem is that even green energy projects (wind and solar) incur environmental impacts. Alll sides are interested in reducing those impacts. Defiitely, anyone who simply points fingers without offering suggestions, alternatives, or otherwise understanding certain realities, is not helpful. When it comes to dealing with wind energy projects, it is important to know that bird deaths can happen simply because bird behaviors are not all well-studied, same with bird populations in all potetnial wind aras - the money simpy doesn't exist to perform all these studies. And, wind energy projects very commonly are placed in areas of strong wind patterns - these same areas are used during migration and also by certain soaring species. Hence one very dicey problem. But whoever your opponent is, please let's refrain from teasing and name calling. Given that the death of certain bird species represents broken federal and state laws, the issue is more serious than is evident that kind of making fun. Oh yes, there has been a bit of lattice vs conical tower research done at Altamont Pass, supported by the California Energy Commission. And, to emit ultrasonic from turbines could further attract bats, which are already attracted to turbines, and is another huge issue in the Eastern US and possibly more soon in the West.
People are concerned with bird and bat kills BECAUSE the death of such by windows, cars, buildings and such have always been RATIONALIZED AWAY for years now.
Millions of people around the world have ignored the deaths of thousands, if not millions, of wildlife the last 200 years....and all of this wildlife were sacrificed "in the name of progress."
The name of progress is still the same old game, whether its windows, cars or wind farms.
This time around, BEFORE wind power is even established in the USA, many of us in the public want the wind farms safe for wildlife. And that safety factor should not be rationalized away because a high number of wildlife have already been killed by human inventions (which by the way were never made wildlife-friendly because of human indifference and rationalizations) !!!
What good is going green if we are still being destructive to wildlife and habitat ?
I read two articles in the first 10 minutes of trying to catch up on this subject. Here's the other one:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2005-01-04-...>
It contains more actual facts, less opinion and is MUCH less biased that yours, which is based largely on conjecture.
Who is the propagandist?
Nice try, but this shows you are ignorant about physics. A slow rotating turbine that is very large still produces a very fast TURBINE TIP SPEED. The tip speed can approach the speed of sound.
I am an engineer in the tower industry and make my living off of turbines, but the eco damage from turbines is extensive.
The latest designs in nuclear reactors are safe and eco friendly and are the way to go to produce the amount of electricity we need.
Slower blade speed killing fewer birds is intuitively obvious. However, from the scientific literature on bats, most bat mortality happens in windspeeds less than 6 meters per second, and experts are recommending that turbines not "kick in" until winds reach higher speeds.
Also, the idea that bigger blades of new arrays cause fewer mortalities is also misleading. Excluding Altamont Pass (which uses a very different, older generation of turbines), the newer, larger and more powerful turbines (>1 MW) have significantly higher rates of killing both birds and baths than the smaller modern versions used for industrial-scale generation. The rule of thumb is, more rotor-swept area and taller height leads to greater bird kill.
Additionally, while the height of the facility has a linear increase in bird mortality, for bats the relationship is exponential, meaning that mortality rates go through the roof with the tallest arrays.
Sorry to mythbust the mythbusting, but it's important to go directly to the primary science for the facts.
Actually - more birds (especially song birds) are probably killed by our pet cat population each year.
If you own a cat - please keep it in the house where it will be healthier and will not be a threat to native birds
thanks
Lets take down all the wind generators and build more coal fired plants. I personally would much rather see the haze and pollution then the wind mills. Besides, why should we only be killing birds and bats....thats seems prejudiced, lets kill the polar bears and ring seals too. Why not...lets take out a few thousand or so other species while we are at it. No, things are going just great the way things are. We wont run out of oil or coal for at least 50 years or so, we can worry about that then. Planning for the future is a big waste of time. Another great benefit of letting things continue to run as is would be the flooding of what..about a 3rd of Florida and almost all coastal lands. Bummer, the Everglades, oh well, theres another thousand or so species we won't ever have to deal with again...thank God. Oh and these fuel cell things, what nonsense, all the water our cars would be kicking out would only raise the humidity. Why can't people wake up and realize what we are doing to our only home. Wind farms are actually one way to preserve the land. It's not perfect but it beats tilling it up and planting corn for fuel. Another great idea, fricken box of corn flakes is now 6 bucks. Our sun kicks out more energy in 1 second, then our entire planet could use in a year, not to mention it should be around for some 4 or 5 billion more years. Lets learn how to use that, solar arrays and wind farms (yes...wind farming is a form of solar power). Sure it will be expensive, R & D always is, but either we pay that price or our children and grandchildren will have to pay a much, much higher price, and I'm not talking money. I know some of those who have responded to this article are truely worried about the birds, but the rest are just using it as an excuse for their ignorance. oh, one tidbit, Dave had written he had only 2 birds fly into his windows in 53 years, this summer already I washed 3 bird smears from just one window at my moms house, and that is in town, not on some flyway. This is truely a global problem and it will only be fixed if it is done on a global scale. Why can't people realize that, why can't you all stop thinking of yourselves and your comfort of living for just one minute and put that energy into getting together with all of our neighbors to find a solution to our global energy and global warming problems. Don't even start, I know better then most the fact our planet goes through warming and cooling trends all on its own, but only the most ignorant of folks can believe we havent accelerated the warming swing. But I guess no one will be happy untill Earth looks more like Venus. At least then we wont need gas to heat our homes.
Folks like Cheney probably hate wind mills cause they only kill a few birds, while the polution from oil and coal plants kill far more birds and shortens the life span of people as well. Also you cant go to war over wind. There are whole companies built on war, death and sickness. Wind is bad for the economy.
They kill bats, however: http://www.canada.com/calgaryherald/news/city/s...>
i care about the enviroment but hey the birds have to be stupid not to miss those huge things now come on it's their fault they're dead not man's
That is one obnoxious article.
And whether or not other things we do kill more birds, it's still an issue to consider and find a solution. I don't even see how people can work and manage a mirrored glass building if it does indeed kill hundreds of birds and not do something about it. And besides we're not talking about the same birds out there in the country side and mountain tops. Many of the birds in those habitats are even more endangered.
You admit repeatedly that turbines kill birds. So what's the myth? The real myth is that all wind turbines look and act alike. There are alternative designs. http://www.tmawind.com/</p>
Windmills should be taken away from our ecosystem becuase birds are more important. especially bats because they eat mosquitoes!!!
Actually, wind turbines DO kill a significant number of birds and bats. Not only that, but they alter their flight paths and act as a barrier. If you want actual scientific peer-reviewed information on this topic, then you should probably read actual scientific peer-reviewed journals such as the journal of wildlife management, journal of applied ecology, or North American Wildlife and Natural Resource Conference. Environment Canada also has a nice document entitled "Wind turbines and birds" which you can trust has correct information. Do not trust all these personal websites for your information (especially ones like this where most of the people are highly unqualified to be analysing this issue).
The data at the end of the article is the most damaging to wind turbine bird death counts. Simple math on cars does not equal the 2.19 bird deaths per year per turbine. I've owned and driven about 10 cars over the last 40 years, and I can only remember one bird death when I was driving. Lots of insects. Not many birds. My house windows have injured maybe a handful over the last 33 years. My kids nursed back two of them to health. Wind turbines will need improvements in detering birds. I'm looking at an 8 ganged wind turbine unit, and according to this article that would count out 17-18 bird deaths per year. Holy moley! I'd like to figure out how to knock out just crows. They could use some whittling down. Frankly, this article does significant PR damage to turbines.
Yes, windmills are just as much bird killers as planes, trains, cars, etc. I agree with all those points. However, you know those people who don't agree with logging due to the endangering of the spotted owl? If you are one of those people and you are writing on this blog as a pro-windmill, then you sound like a major hypocrit. Loggers could argue the same thing about how those birds die many other ways too, and that it is worth it for the good of the world in the long run, even if some birds die.
People will make up arguments for or against anything if they do or don't like it. If you're worried about logging because of the birds, then you have no right to say that windmills are okay, even if birds die too. Just make sure you're not sounding hypocritical because that is annoying.
The claim that wind turbines may kill birds is not a valid argument because our existing power plants already kill birds. I have seen many dead birds at the bases of smoke stacks. Birds will use the heat from the exhaust to rise in elevation. Unfortunately some of these birds get too close and are killed from the exhaust and or heat. So if we are already killing birds from our existing energy production what would it matter if we kill birds from a more green energy production. Secondly birds have excellent eyesight, they can see the wind turbine blades compared to heat from smoke stack from other turbines.
Back when this article was first posted, the need to keep up a sense of urgency about renewable energy was paramount, and even concerns about bird strikes had to be minimized. In fact, all that's missing from this article is the tag line, "brought to you by Vesta and Suzlon."
However, bird strikes have proven to be a bigger issue than anyone thought at the time. The WE Energies Blue Skies project in Wisconsin has had a bird strike record 300% higher than predicted when it was sited. These are not facts they're eager to release.
We're farther along the learning curve now, and this issue is not an "eco-myth." It's an eco-fact. Now the dialogue needs to change, contrasting Big Wind and small local wind, between big horizontal-axis wind farms and small vertical impellers (seen as solid objects by birds).
The need for alternative energy has proven itself for its own sake, and is now only hindered by old-school articles like this. Wind power is here to stay; we now need to choose what form it will take.
This is not a myth. Just do a Google search.
http://www.wind-watch.org/news/2007/05/30/study-shows-hundreds-of-dead-birds-bats-at-wind-turbines/
The old time windmills, with lots of big wide blades, do not kill birds. The birds can SEE the blades. The blades can turn VERY fast and still the birds can see the blades. The problem is NOT that wind power kills birds. The problem is that three bladed wind turbines with their wide spacing between the blades kill birds.
I have read a lot of posts here and I have concluded that any mention of the logic of HOW the blades kill birds, and WHY the birds do not avoid being killed by those blades is almost missing.
The argument about the tips of the blades killing the birds is correct.
The old time windmills created a huge amount of mechanical power which should be used today for electric. The new wind turbines create about 5% of that same mechanical power in the same blade sweep area. It is a known and documented fact that aerofoil lifting three bladed wind turbines are only about 5% to 7% as efficient as the same size old-time windmills. Get your facts straight. Three bladed wind turbines not only do NOT work well, but they also kill birds.
Wind turbines kill birds. It's not a myth. Simple.
As do cars, cell phone towers, wires, planes, buildings, and technology in general.
Articles like this keep liberals/greenwashed minds/conservatives at bay with their thoughts so they can be re-assured that they're thinking the right thoughts; in turn they can elect their master who will govern them as they please.
Nonetheless, it is certainly not "clean energy", nor is anything else that has come out of industrial civilization.
this civilization needs to (and will) collapse soon by the hands of this destructive culture.
Nothing much has changed since we slaughtered the American Indians. They only killed what they needed for food. We are still the planet's parasite, slowly killing our host and justifying killing any and all animals in our quest. I'm certainly for green technology but not at the expense of killing bats, which are already stressed enough. I dislike wind turbines intensely for the noise, the visual space they take up and any deaths caused. You people think because Exon killed more birds, you're justified to kill less. I like hydro, which produces more energy than wind and solar combined, as long as aquatic life can be protected, I think solar is great if it doesn't cover the entire mohave desert. Tidal hydro has much more merit and so does nuclear power. Does anyone value the pristine landscape ? When is the last time you heard no noise other than nature? The audacity of mankind to value themselves over any other creature will be our downfall. How long will our host support this kind of egotistical thinking? The landfills are now filling up with mercury ladden florescent bulbs but it's green so it must be ok to contaminate our soils. Let's slow down and think before we rush into green technology.
John said: "You admit repeatedly that turbines kill birds. So what's the myth? The real myth is that all wind turbines look and act alike."
follow the link to find a design that addresses the concerns listed about traditional wind turbines
http://www.magenn.com/
from the site:
AVIAN MORTALITY:
Birds and bats tend not to fly into objects directly in front of them. Birds can see these objects and bats can sense them. Current terrestrial wind turbines are large fast-moving blades slicing through the air, hitting birds and bats from the side without the animals sensing the presence of blades. In contrast Magenn wind turbines are three-dimensional, softer objects. Birds and bats will more easily be aware of the turbine's presence.
The MARS developers also address Visual Impact, Noise and Height Restriction.
I just saw an article in today's Washington Post
saying how the birds, the flying cranes, would
be caught in the wind turbines and that the wind
turbines are "blowing bats up"....and that they
are working on producing sonar to help the Bats
to avoid the Turbines.
So, In Indiana, we are now the Largest growing
state of active wind turbines. That is right and
growing because of the flat area of farmland and
the farmers are getting paid and jobs are being
created and of course all you have to do is
google Benton County, In. Wind Farms....and see
them...and one farm...supplies 60,00-250,000 homes
with electricity!!! We are excited!
And they are brand new! No blight to the landscape.
And leaves room for the farmers to farm.
Wonderful!
lizzie
Here is that article i mentioned above
from Washington Post
Robert Redford also wrote
a great piece on the use of
wind turbines and other
uses...you can find these
on my blog...or on Huffington
Post today....
lizziegott on blogstream.com
great work! love you!
purps
those didn't link so here:
Robert Redford: Harnessing Nature's Power
Anyone who knows Utah knows the power of wind, water and sun. You can see that power in Utah's sculpted arches of stone, in our majestic mountains capped with snow, and in the cracked earth of our deserts.
Nature's power is so obvious that you have to wonder why we've mostly ignored it as a source of energy to run our homes and businesses, and to propel our cars and trucks.
After all, if we did a little more to harness that power, we could begin to solve some of our most pressing environmental and economic challenges. In fact, creating electricity from the energy nature gives us is critical if we're going to reduce global warming pollution, protect public health with clean air and water, create jobs in Utah and ultimately bring down energy prices.
We know that burning fossil fuels is destabilizing the atmosphere and acidifying the oceans. We know that our dependence on oil shackles us to dangerous foreign regimes and to the escalating prices they'll inevitably charge as demand outstrips supply. But we also know how to break our dependence and free ourselves from this destructive cycle.
Why keep buying foreign crude when we could be making energy right here in Utah from sunlight, wind and geothermal power? Why rip up more pristine wilderness to extract dirty fuels when we could generate clean power from the energy nature delivers to our doorstep?
Dollar for dollar, investing in clean energy creates more jobs than investing in traditional energy sources like oil and gas. That really matters, especially when you consider that more than 30,000 Utah workers lost their jobs last year.
We've got tens of thousands of windy acres here in Utah, sites for geothermal energy abound, and the southern part of the state has tremendous potential for solar power. We will have to carefully pick renewable energy sites that don't endanger critical habitat and wilderness quality land, but the opportunity is vast.
So how can we jump start a home-grown clean energy economy?
Right now Congress is working on a landmark clean energy jobs plan that would boost the amount of wind, solar and other clean energy our country produces. The American Clean Energy and Security Act will also make our vehicles, appliances and buildings more efficient, and update our antiquated electricity grid.
Our investments in clean energy and efficiency today will pay dividends for generations. They will create good, family-sustaining jobs that can't be shipped overseas, and they will lower energy prices in the long run. They will reduce energy dependence and global warming pollution, and make our economy more competitive.
It's true that the economic and environmental challenges we confront are serious. But Americans have never encountered a challenge of any kind that we couldn't overcome by working together and applying our ingenuity.
That is what we need to do right now. The only missing ingredient is a spirit of innovation, cooperation and resolve amongst our political leaders. From the copper-domed Capitol in Salt Lake, to the halls of power in Washington, our leaders need to reconsider their allegiance to the dirty fuels industry, stop their bickering, and act boldly to move America towards a new energy economy.
In the coming weeks, Representative Jim Matheson (D-Utah) can lead the way. As a key member of the Energy and Commerce Committee, he'll play a pivotal role before Memorial Day in determining whether Congress even gets to vote on the clean energy jobs bill. Now is the time to let Rep. Matheson and all of our leaders know that we expect them to do what's right for our people, our economy, our land and our future.
[This piece first ran in the Salt Lake Tribune.]
"but the eco damage from turbines is extensive."
?? what? i understand there is an issue with the bats and they are working on a sonar device...and the line running across the
ecosystem out in AZ...where Migratory Ducks fly might be an issue...but...telephone lines???? They fly around poles, lines. barns...c'mon people...birds are not stupid creatures.....they WILL
learn to adapt to their environment. They now sit on top of electrical and telephone wires. Didn't anyone think back then the birds would
be dropping dead from running into these types of wires and telephone poles???? C'mon. Take down the Cell Phone Towers then if you are that concerned or are you? The Satellite towers?????
I'm sure birds collide with them. Oh no, we mustn't give up OUR things we LOVE like our cell phones and satellite dishes. NO, or our cars in which birds collide, so for nature in the long run..in the short run...this is the better deal or we aren't going to be here on this earth.
If Robert Redford is supporting it and he has been and i realize this article is old but our wind farms our popping up like flowers
and there are not going to be a lot of bird deaths. If you look
on youtube.com on Benton County Wind Farms and let them explain you will understand a bit more and out here where it's flat...hello...you don't put a turbine on a mountaintop and then complain of bats dying. So stupid. You put the wind turbines where they should be. ON flat land where wind can easily blow through and it does here on this land and don't tell me it doesn't as i grew up here and the air flows through because there is nothing to stop it due to the farms.
People can be ignorant. Man. I just don't read the stuff. I just post. Thanks.
Lizzie
Maybe the people that are concerned about this issue DO care when other birds die for different reasons. I rescue birds that run into buildings in downtown Chicago every week. My workplace recently installed a wind turbine, and guess what? It kills as many birds every day as a skyscraper. This is a new wind turbine. Maybe the national wind power association has some kind of interest in, I don't know, selling more wind turbines. Maybe they would downplay thier effect for that reason. Windspire turbines don't create the low pressure zones that rip bats' lungs apart, and they don't have blades to kill birds. They produce less energy, but is the power you get from a bladed turbine worth the lives it takes? The best way to handle our energy needs is to reduce our need for energy.
Personally, i think wind turbines are beautiful!!!! they are so elegant and i love them.x
Devices that create NOISE, LIGHTS and LOTS of other Bird-Warning Attributes can easily be constructed into a Wind Turbine why dont they just do that? We used to call them
SCAREACROWS
There you go even a name 4 the movement !!!
So simple. Everybody's like : "Thats just the price we pay" OR "We'll have to stop to save the birds" Geez come on folks we dont have to be so paradigm ridden. Birds & Bats can be made aware of a dangerous zone. Yes, shocking, more than 2 options!
I think that the fears of bird mortality associated with wind farms stem from an incorrect assumption. That assumption is that birds are stupid. They're not. Their great level of agility clearly demonstrates a sophisticated nervous system. They can also learn. When a bird observes another bird killed, it usually notices the event, especially if it is its mate. Those that die will die, those that don't adapt.
I am truly concerned about bird kills by wind turbines in high migration paths. Particularly the massive new wind projects near Corpus Christi Bay and Kenedy County, Tx. These are among the heaviest traffic migration corridors in North America, and have been studied as such for decades.
Questions: Who is censusing dead birds? What method and protocol is
used? What have been the results? Have they been higher or lower than
the wind companies' pre-construction study estimates? What private or
government entities are conducting these studies?
It would seem that these are the questions that need to be answered.
Wind companies can certainly make any claims they wish as to the
safety of their equipment and the low impact on bird life that it will have,
but at some point, it is all nothing more than educated guesswork, without
some proof. Charts, graphs, and fancy formulaic opinions won't cut it.
At some point, the American people will want to see some hard data. We have studies of road kills, tower kills, and window kills, and that data is available to the public and has been for many years. We now need some
independent study on avian wind turbine kills.
http://peacelegacy.org/articles/wind-farms-do-they-kill-birds