Peril in the Wind Industry

[MORTARDUDE]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...2003Dec23.html

Peril in the Wind Industry
Turbines That Produce Clean Energy Also Kill Migrating Birds
By Kimberly Edds
Special to The Washington Post
Wednesday, December 24, 2003; Page A02


LOS ANGELES -- The freezers at the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Department in the Sacramento Valley are overflowing with the decapitated and mangled bodies of golden eagles, kestrels and red-tailed hawks, victims of the whirling blades of wind turbines.



Scientists estimate as many as 44,000 birds have been killed over the past two decades by these towering machines in the Altamont Pass, east of San Francisco.

Although the rows of spinning blades at Altamont Pass turn wind into electricity and make Alameda County less dependent on fossil fuel, they are also the end of the line for many predatory birds whose annual migration route includes the pass. The area is also home to the largest resident population of golden eagles in the lower 48 states. Concentrating on their prey on the ground, the birds fly into the blur of the windmill blades.

The bird deaths have led some environmental groups that support wind power to oppose permits for the Altamont site. They argue that enough birds are being killed to affect the resident population of golden eagles -- an average of 50 golden eagles are killed each year -- and that the wind industry is not doing enough to stop the deaths.

Federal law enforcement agents pick up more than 1,000 dead birds a year, recording the species and cause of death before depositing each bird in the freezer. When space is in short supply, the birds are incinerated.

"On the one hand, we feel we need to reduce our dependency on fossil fuels, and we support the idea of wind power. We would like to see the wind industry continue to remain in business. It conflicts with the goal of protecting birds like the golden eagle, red-tailed hawks and other birds," said Jim Nickles, a spokesman with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

In Alameda County, several environmental groups are trying to persuade the county to stop reissuing permits for the windmills without requiring additional environmental studies.

The county zoning board approved permanent permits for 1,400 windmills in November, but Californians for Renewable Energy and the Center for Biological Diversity, a national nonprofit group known for taking wildlife issues to court, say the county approved the permits illegally. The county board of supervisors is scheduled to review the issue next month.

"The level of bird kills is just astronomical. You couldn't have picked a worse place to put a wind farm. It's just been an accepted cost of doing business out there," said Jeff Miller of the Center for Biological Diversity.

Environmental activists accuse the industry of dragging its feet on making improvements, despite knowing what impact the turbines are having on the bird population.

Steve Stengel, a spokesman for Florida Power & Light Co., which owns about half of the 7,000 wind turbines at the Altamont wind farm, said members of the wind industry have been working for 18 months to come up with ways to reduce the number of bird kills in the area. But one of the biggest challenges has been to develop an agreement among the many different turbine owners.

There are wind farms in 29 states, and they provide about 1percent of the nation's energy, but that could increase to 6 percent by 2020, according to the American Wind Energy Association. The plains of North Dakota alone could supply one-third of the nation's demand for energy.

Altamont was constructed in the early 1980s when little was known about the migration patterns of birds in nearby areas. Mistakes made at Altamont have been used to make improvements in new wind farms. No other wind farm in the United States comes close to the bird mortality rates at Altamont because of improved windmill design for newer farms. The industry says similar updates for Altamont would be too costly.

Past attempts to reduce bird kills have included painting the tips of turbine blades to try to make them more visible to birds, installing screens around generators and putting devices to discourage perching on the towers.

But those measures have failed to substantially lower the number of bird deaths. Among the measures now being discussed is letting the grass beneath the turbines grow taller and removing nearby rock to provide more cover for prey and discourage birds from flying in the area.

"There is no universal agreement what the exact right thing to do is," Stengel said, noting that a few years ago the recommendation was to build rock piles near the turbines. Now the recommendation is the opposite.

"They've been saying they've been working on the problem for 10 years, but the mortalities are continuing," Nickles said.

The controversy over bird kills has "delayed and even significantly contributed to blocking the development of some wind plants in the U.S.," according to a 2001 report commissioned by the National Wind Coordinating Committee, an advocacy group funded by the industry. A debate is raging over a proposed 28-acre offshore wind farm off Cape Cod, with Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) opposing the project because of environmental concerns.

Environmentalists blame the federal government in part for failing to enforce numerous laws that protect some birds. Companies can be fined thousands of dollars for every protected bird -- including golden eagles -- that is killed as a result of running into a wind turbine. But a citation has yet to be issued at Altamont.

"Bringing a criminal case under the migratory bird act would be really tough because you have to prove intent, and these cases seem to be unintentional or accidental. Plus, there are so many different companies up there, it's hard logistically to deal with several thousand windmills and who owns what," Nickles said. "We're just monitoring the situation for now."