Wind Farms Act Like Apex Predators on Ecosystems, Study Finds (1 Viewer)

Interesting way to frame the study:

https://weather.com/news/news/2018-11-05-predator-birds-wind-turbines-lizards

Sad really...internal combustion means the eventual death of humans, but all the replacement sources of power seem to doom humans and/or large swathes of the animal kingdom anyway.

Sheesh...

Pity the full paper is paywalled, as it would be interesting to see if the report of the abstract accurately reflects the research (this is a frequent problem with reports of scientific and medical research in the popular media - the abstract glosses over some inconveniences in the full paper, the press release polishes that up a bit more, then the reporting polishes some more...).

Murmur said:

Pity the full paper is paywalled, as it would be interesting to see if the report of the abstract accurately reflects the research (this is a frequent problem with reports of scientific and medical research in the popular media - the abstract glosses over some inconveniences in the full paper, the press release polishes that up a bit more, then the reporting polishes some more...).

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Very true.

Though I have read similar things before, that birds of prey suffer harm at the hands of wind turbines. Just never heard of (or considered) what that does to the prey on the ground.

Would be interesting if anyone had thought to do long-term studies at the Altamont Pass Wind Farm, for example. But too little too late, I suspect.

Murmur said:

Pity the full paper is paywalled, as it would be interesting to see if the report of the abstract accurately reflects the research (this is a frequent problem with reports of scientific and medical research in the popular media - the abstract glosses over some inconveniences in the full paper, the press release polishes that up a bit more, then the reporting polishes some more...).

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It would also be pertinent to discover if the results refer only to windfarms in areas where raptors are sedentary, migrant, or if the casualties are relatively uniform across the range of windfarm sites.

Was their control area (or areas) windfarm free or a windfarm area in an area of year-long low raptor density?
MJB

Interesting article. But surely it’s not beyond the wit of man to bird-of-prey-proof such devices?

There is also the issue of prey selection: apex and other predators select the young, the old, the weak and the sick - what is the evidence that wind turbines do the same?

John

Murmur said:

Pity the full paper is paywalled, as it would be interesting to see if the report of the abstract accurately reflects the research (this is a frequent problem with reports of scientific and medical research in the popular media - the abstract glosses over some inconveniences in the full paper, the press release polishes that up a bit more, then the reporting polishes some more...).

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It's for a good cause: https://sci-hub.tw/https://www.nature.com/articles/s41559-018-0707-z

fugl said:

Interesting article. But surely it’s not beyond the wit of man to bird-of-prey-proof such devices?

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Got this mental image of the typical metal-mesh "screen" around the fan like your typical desk fan, which was good for a chuckle. :-O

On a serious note, you're correct that it should be possible, but depending on the solution, the weight, maintenance, construction, efficiency, etc. costs would
likely skyrocket.

But that would/should fall under "well then, that is what wind power really costs." If we got charged more for what any power really costs we might all wise-up. But all power is currently subsidized in this way; we don't pay for the indirect, but very real, costs.

RafaelMatias said:

It's for a good cause: https://sci-hub.tw/https://www.nature.com/articles/s41559-018-0707-z

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Many thanks for posting the full report. :t:

Ed

PS. Mitigation efforts have been underway for a while.

elkcub said:

Many thanks for posting the full report. :t:

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+1 for that; though I will leave it to the more ecological sciences-minded among you to see if the report makes sense or draws reasonable conclusions.

elkcub said:

Mitigation efforts have been underway for a while.

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"Underway" but seemingly an epic fail so far? Vertical axis turbines on the small scale seems the most promising solution from that article.

But the industry seems to be moving towards the slow THWUMP-THWUMP-THWUMP of truly epic-scale horizontal axis, propeller-style turbines (and OMG that is such a creepy, unnerving sound).

And..."just site wind farms where birds don't fly" (paraphrasing). Um...that is probably just about nowhere. Also, the "welp, since we can't reduce the kills, how about give the companies a permit that limits them to X amount of kills."? Wow, that is just...idiotic?

Okay, so interestingly, coal may kill more birds per unit of energy (poke around in the comments section of the story), but I can't personally reconcile whether that's the correct sort of take-way.

Loved the tilting at windmills picture, BTW. That would seem to imply another sort of solution to the problem. ||