NEWS
Wind farms’ deadly
Mincing machines: an estimated 40,000 birds die
a year in US wind turbine blades — conservationists
worry that rare raptor populations are at risk.
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NATURE|Vol 447|10 May 2007
reputation hard to shift
What’s 3% of a bird? The last seven centimetres onshore. It has also taken a vociferous stance
G. LEAPER/ECOSCENE/CORBIS
of a swan’s wingspan? The right foot of an against a vast 234-turbine wind farm planned
ostrich? Or the annual death toll attributable for the Isle of Lewis in the Scottish Hebrides.
to an average wind turbine? In the context of In Spain, the world’s number three wind-
last week’s report1 by the US National Acad- power producer after the United States and
emy of Sciences (NAS) on the environmental Germany, published studies also suggest that
impacts of wind-energy projects, it’s the third the number of birds killed is low. But Spanish
definition that counts. It takes 30-odd turbines environmentalists feel the figures aren’t telling
to reach a kill-rate of one bird a year. the full story. Alvaro Camiña, an environmen-
The scientists who wrote the report natu- tal consultant who monitors bird fatalities at
rally attached lots of caveats to this figure, 70 of the country’s 140 wind-power farms,
which they gleaned from 14 studies they felt says that in the case of a widely accepted study
were of good quality. They acknowledged that published in 2004 (ref. 2), the field work was
rates can differ widely from site to site, and completed a decade earlier when turbines were
that although, as Hamlet said, much smaller.
there is a special providence in “I heard that more Camiña, who is paid by
the fall of a sparrow, such a fall than 1,000 birds the regional governments of
might not be quite as special, or a year run into Rioja, Valencia and Anda-
worth avoiding, as the death of a lucia, recently submitted a
bald eagle. the Washington report on his research to the
In the final analysis, though, monument. Should Ministry of Environment
whichever way you slice it, or we tear that down?” in Madrid. It is due to be
them, America’s birds seem to released soon. Of particu-
die in turbine blades at a rate lar importance, he says, are
no higher than 40,000 a year. Deaths due to the number of raptors killed — for example,
domestic cats, on the other hand, are put at 866 griffon vultures (Gyps fulvus) since 2000.
“hundreds of millions”. It is possible, the panel “It’s important to know the mortality of large
noted, that the turbines are rather worse for birds because they have a lower number of
bats; recent studies have turned up more of offspring. Even a small number of deaths can
their carcasses than expected. But the numbers affect a population.”
are still small. Raptors have long been a cause célèbre in the
United States as well. The wind farms in Cali-
The shadow of the waxwing slain fornia’s Altamont pass have been cutting down
It is unlikely, though, that the study will allay golden eagles (Aquila chrysaetos) since they
the worries of bird-lovers who look on wind were opened in the 1980s. But Rick Koebbe,
farms with loathing. For carbon-free power president of PowerWorks, a California firm
sources, wind turbines have an oddly bad rep- that owns turbines in Altamont, argues that
utation among conservationists: bird safety, this should be put into context.
like landscape aesthetics, is a common cause “I heard that over 1,000 birds a year run into
for complaint. the Washington Monument. Should we tear
And the wind farms do not have a completely that down? We’re out here trying to do a job
clean bill of health. As the NAS report pointed to save the Earth. We even save birds, since
out, much of the data available is too narrow they are twice as vulnerable to pollution as
and site specific. “My personal opinion is that humans.”
the evidence base is very poor,” agrees Andrew Unsurprisingly enough, Koebe is against any
Pullin, head of the Birmingham, UK-based further regulation of his industry: “If you give
Centre for Evidence-Based Conservation. the Fish and Wildlife Service control over the
The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds wind-power industry,” he says moodily, “there
(RSPB), a British charity with a large member- will be no more wind power.” ■
ship and quite a lot of muscle, points to the Emma Marris and Daemon Fairless
fact that while its members oppose large off-
shore developments, evidence on British wind 1. Environmental Impacts of Wind-Energy Projects National
Academies of Science (2007).
farms is limited to studies of small installations 2. Barrios, L. & Rodriguez, A. J. Appl. Ecol. 41, 72–81 (2004).