Warrick, J. (2015, August 31). The surprising way that birds and wind turbines can coexist. Retrieved November 20, 2015, from https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2015/08/31/the-surprising-way-that-birds-and-wind-turbines-can-coexist/
This article, is about the problem of birds, specifically Golden Eagles in California flying into Wind Turbines that create energy for California. The article says that, “At a single wind farm near Altamont, Calif., more than 75 golden eagles die each year from collisions with the farm’s thousands of spinning blades.” Wind energy in America is becoming increasingly popular. But depending on where the wind farms are built, they can cause thousands of bird species, some of which are endangered, to be killed. The article talks about how by mapping where popular bird nesting locations are, and by mapping where there is the most potential for wind energy, we can then find the “sweet spots” where there are no popular nesting areas, but also have high potential for wind energy.
This article is very important to environmental science, because it is trying to help to both protect birds, and to create more renewable energy. This is important because it can help prevent further harming of endangered species such as the Golden Eagle, in California and other places.
Always interesting to see issues that pit environmentalists against each other. So what do you think? Can wind and birds coexist? Could these turbines be designed differently? What they don’t include in these conversations is how many magnitudes more birds get killed by cars or by running into buildings each year (not necessarily eagles though). Interesting dilemma.
I think that the idea of wind energy is good in concept, but is not effective and is harmful to birds in such a way that other sources of renewable energy should be turned to instead. Even when we find the sweet spot of places with high winds and small bird populations, birds will inevitably die and the space that wind farms take up is ineffective to their output.
Thank you for commenting
I wasn’t aware that wind turbines could actually bring such a significant threat to our state’s endangered species of birds. With this is in mind, I think that it would be beneficial to make alterations to wind turbines so that they don’t impact our needed species, however, that would cost a lot of money. This is definitely a controversial topic.
I agree that it is controversial, but I think that this is a good fix to the current problem
This is tricky because wind energy is such a good resource, but the species it is affecting are so important. Do you know how many/how common “sweet spots” are?