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SACRAMENTO, California, US, September 14, 2005
(Refocus Weekly)
Windfarms in California are killing “thousands of
hawks, eagles and other birds each year,” says a staff report
prepared for the California Energy Commission.
“Bird mortality from strikes with turbine blades continues to be
the primary biological resource issue concerning wind energy,” says
the 2005 ‘Environmental Performance Report of California’s
Electrical Generation System’ prepared for the CEC in support of its
2005 Integrated Energy Policy Report. “Thousands more are killed
through collision or electrocution with electric power lines.”
The severity of avian mortality varies among the five main wind
resource areas in the state, with estimates of 881 to 1,300 raptors
and 1,766 to 4,721 total birds killed each year at the Altamont Pass
Wind Resource Area in Alameda County. That county has instituted a
moratorium on wind energy development at the existing level of 580
MW until the avian collision issue is resolved.
Studies from Solano County indicate that raptor species (red-tailed
hawks and kestrels) are even more prevalent than at Altamont Pass,
“which is resulting in higher levels of mortality for some raptors
and bats.” Developing wind energy resources in Solano County without
addressing bird, raptor, and bat mortality “could create problems
with slow permitting, unacceptably high mortality rates for avian
species, and negative publicity for the wind energy industry at a
second major wind resource area.”
In the Tehachapi Pass, San Gorgonio Pass and Pacheco Pass, avian
collisions with turbines have not been studied as thoroughly as
Altamont and Solano, but studies report lower bird use and fatality
rates in these areas, it notes. “Studies using more current research
protocols could confirm that birds and bats are not as heavily
impacted in these areas, which would allow for more wind development
and lower rates of avain mortality than at Altamont Pass.”
New research from the CEC’s Public Interest Energy Research Program
seeks to determine “what mitigation measures can effectively reduce
bird kills at the Altamont Pass to a level that allows for expansion
and repowering,” and some turbine owners have agreed to implement
measures to reduce the number of bird collisions, and some high-risk
turbines will be removed or shut down during the winter season when
bird collisions are highest. Several agencies and the industry have
prepared guidance documents for best practices, but the guidance “is
not widely used or uniformly adopted” because of fragmented
jurisdiction between local, state and federal agencies, as well as
non-coordinated regulatory programs.
Windfarms and the transmission lines to link them to the grid, “are
projected to expand in coming years in order to help meet
California’s Renewable Portfolio Standard goals,” and the report
assesses the impact of ‘once-through cooling’ to the marine
environment and the environmental profile of power imported into
California, as well as the review of avian mortality from wind
turbine collisions.
The state has 453 power plants and the environmental performance of
the generating system from 1945 to 2000 “improved substantially” due
to switching from oil to natural gas, improvements in combustion
technologies and implementation of pollution controls. “The
environmental footprint of the energy system needed to power the
state’s people and economy is relatively small compared with the
energy impacts in other parts of the nation and the world; however,
there are continuing discrepancies in levels of impact to various
parts of the natural environment.”
“Power generation in California causes ongoing, often poorly
understood impacts to aquatic ecosystems, to hawks and eagles
related to wind turbines, and fresh water supplies used for power
plant cooling,” it explains. Poor air quality is a predominate
environmental and public health concern, but “emissions from power
generation facilities comprise an ever smaller portion of emissions
inventories in most California air basins.”
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