Wind turbines kill hundreds of thousands of birds a year:
"After the sad death of the White-throated Needletail on Harris, Outer Hebrides, on 26 June when it hit the shaft of a wind turbine on the island, some birders were vocal in their disapproval of the prominent energy generators, proclaiming them to be killers of bird in large numbers. While some of these claims were somewhat exaggerated, it turns out that they may inded be more dangerous than thought previously.
A new study just published in the United States has estimated that around 573,000 birds were killed by wind turbines in 2012 (including 83,000 birds of prey), in increase of 30 per cent on a previous estimate by the US fish and Wildlife Service in 2009. Bats are even worse hit, says author K Shawn Smallwood, and probably top 888,000 killed per year."
https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2013/07/21/wind-farm-bird-deaths-more-than-thought/
"For years, a huge wind farm in California's San Joaquin Valley was slaughtering thousands of birds, including golden eagles, red-tailed hawks and burrowing owls.
The raptors would get sliced up by the blades on the 5,400 turbines in Altamont Pass, or electrocuted by the wind farm's power lines. Scientists, wildlife agencies and turbine experts came together in an attempt to solve the problem. The result?
Protective measures put in place in an effort to reduce deaths by 50% failed. Deaths in fact soared for three of four bird species studied, said the Altamont Pass Wind Resource Area Bird Fatality Study.
The slaughter at Altamont Pass is being raised by avian scientists who say the drive among environmentalists to rapidly boost U.S. wind-farm power 20 times could lead to massive bird losses and even extinctions."
http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/nation/environment/2009-09-21-wind-farms_N.htm
:sigh::anguish:
