Thanks again fugl. So 4930 turbines, mostly small "old fashioned" ones.
Hmmm...I wonder if the same area (in a less environmentally sensitive place) was covered with solar panels if more or less energy would be produced. I can't find anything that contemplates this equation anywhere.
Sadly though, it looks like we are stuck with them so its really worth fighting for all the mortality reduction measures possible.
Here is a google translated Portuguese text (from a webzine article) that I have made into "English" that gives a nice overview of what the EIA company STRIX has achieved at the wind park near Sagres at Barão de São João - thought it may be of interest to Americans interested in proposing measures (the best pdf docs are very long winded and in Portuguese):
Along the village of Barao de Sao Joao, in the western Algarve, a wind farm has pioneered the strategy of balancing energy production and respect for the local avifauna. In European route full of birds with protected status, the operation of the wind farm was only granted because the prosecutor joined the E. ON Strix environmental consultant to develop a pioneering application in the world. The technology, based on two radars and computer application of Strix, allows the turbines are "advised" the presence of birds, with the consequent arrest of the blades.
The park opened last year and thus became the 2010 "proof-of-fire" in the functioning of the technology. The results, presented recently in the annual report that the Strix AmbienteOnline had access, were above the initial expectations of the consultant. Both environmental impacts and in electricity production in the park.
The paper realizes that in the period of monitoring of migratory birds, the wind stopped at 36 days (33 per cent of the total), which translates into 140 hours of total or partial shutdown of the turbines, a value below the 150 hours provided annually by Strix. In terms of total stops, the blades of the park Barao de Sao Joao is immobilized for 80 hours, distributed in 27 days of monitoring.
The Executive Director of Strix, Michael Repas, says even though there was no mortality of migratory birds monitored the wind farm. The achievement represents a victory for the company, which managed to demonstrate that technology can help in resolving conflicts between biodiversity and environmental infrastructure enegia renewable. Still, this victory is not without a taste of the "wasted effort". "Sometimes we see some birds pass through here, after disconnecting the wind towers, eventually crashed into the nearest wind farm," laments responsible.
This is because the wind farm neighbors in this region of the Algarve, between Lagos and Sagres, are not required to implement these measures to minimize the environmental impact of infrastructure, which in turn compromises the efforts of Baron Park St. John himself Institute Nature Conservation and Biodiversity (ICNB) is aware of the importance of a regional program that can encompass all the nearby parking lots under the same radar system. According to Strix, efforts have been promoted from the various promoters of wind farms in the region in order to reach an agreement on such a program.
The blind eye of the radar and the human insight
The radar technology park Barao de Sao Joao, located two kilometers from the park during the three months that there is presence of migratory birds, is complemented by the human eye. Besides the application completely developed by Strix, which allows diagnostic alerts evade radar and "false positives" are nine ornithologists Strix in the observation posts that determine the real risk of a collision of birds with wind turbine blades. This way, you avoid unnecessary stops the park and the resulting cost to the promoter.
In parallel with the system of stopping the blades, the wind farm has also devices BDF (Bird Deflector Device) in high voltage power lines. The helical structures installed to allow the power lines become more visible to birds, with a greater sense of space traversed.
