Bat-Killing Wind Turbines Outfitted with Systems to Stop Carnage

The linked chart doesn’t dispute the damage from wind turbines. However, there is also a relatively low penetration of wind turbines compared to the number of power lines, windows and cats. It would follow that a rapid expansion of wind turbines would result in a dramatic increase in bird deaths. Suggesting that turbines don’t kill as much as windows is a straw man: nobody is claiming that turbines are the leading cause of bird deaths, however, they are still significant and, with an increase of turbines, you will absolutely have an increase in bird mortality. Additionally, endangered birds such as bald eagles are rarely getting eaten by housecats or crashing into windows, however, they are being killed by windmills.

The Audubon Society, a group that most assuredly has more experience with all things birds are certainly more credible than a random google image search in terms of the impact of turbines on birds.

https://www.audubon.org/news/will-wind-turbines-ever-be-safe...

Indeed! Birds in general have infamously sensitive lungs, apparently because their respiratory system is a one-way loop instead of an in-and-out piston. They can exhale one breath at the same time that another is passing through the lungs. It's amazingly efficient, serving the high oxygen and cooling needs of active flight, but it's far more susceptible to airborne pollutants of all kinds.

But, apparently, sensitivity to pollutants is unrelated to sensitivity to pressure.

Biology is fascinating.

If 100% of US power was wind, turbines would still not be the #1 bird killer.

Can you point out the new hydro plants that we can build?

As a California resident, I'm happy that the state isn't spending extra to buy nuclear.

> The push for wind and solar is political more than practical.

It's fascinating how you're accusing others to be emotional instead of rational, while answering a post providing data for one specific question regarding wind power with an unspecific rant.

How many birds, bats and insect that they feed on are killed (or never get to live) by uranium mining: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Ranger_3_open_pit.jpg ?

Nuclear power still requires water as coolant so it's environmental impact is still as bad for the local fish as a coal plant.

Nuclear has problems which humanity hasn't found an answer yet:

1) what to do with the waste that has to be kept safe for thousands of years, war-, theft- and natural-disaster-proof? Recycling or breeding can be done but nowhere near the volume that is required. For early attempts at long term storage we have problems getting the waste out of there.

2) how to operate nuclear power in a capitalist society safely? Operators will always have the incentive to cut corners and bypass regulations for profit, leading to security issues and accidents. Hell even communism has failed there, e.g. in Chernobyl or that lake (?) where they dumped their old submarines.

3) how to make a reactor disaster-proof? This includes geology (earthquakes like in Japan), water, fire, terrorism, operator negligence, ...

Imagine if nuclear killed a similar number of birds and bats. Would you suddenly say that it wasn't green enough? Of course not, that would be stupid. Wind and solar are green enough. The environmental damage caused by either source is trivially small.

Also, any complex project will be subject to politics. That is just reality. If you want to defeat climate change (a political objective) you have to put forward projects that will be approved by government.

Yeah that's why I'm wondering if perhaps there's a knock-on effect where a reduction in a local bat population causes trees to suffer, shifting a local ecosystem out of balance.

I suppose though, all things considered, this might be preferable to razing the mountain for coal.

I second this. I have a bat that lives in my roof (yeah, that will eventually be a problem) and eats its body weight in mosquitoes and moths every day. A neighbors bat tested positive for rabies and that is my only real concern. I keep an eye on mine. The species in my neck of the woods lives about 15 years. That's 15 years of free pest control.

I'd like that to be true, but these people are very much influencing those that want their statements to be true (so they don't need change anything).