Pine Tree facility in the Tehachapi Mountains faces scrutiny over the deaths of at least six golden eagles, which are protected under federal law. Prosecution would be a major blow to the booming industry.
The Obama administration is evaluating a plan to allow a 200-mile corridor for wind energy development from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico that would allow for killing endangered whooping cranes.
Scores of golden eagles have been killed after striking the thousands of wind turbines in the Bay Area, raising questions about California’s move toward alternative power.
June 06, 2011 | By Louis Sahagun, Los Angeles Times
The death count, averaging 67 a year for three decades, worries field biologists because the turbines, which have been providing thousands of homes with emissions-free electricity since the 1980s, lie within a region of rolling grasslands and riparian canyons containing one of the highest densities of nesting golden eagles in the United States.
“It would take 167 pairs of local nesting golden eagles… Read more
By Paul Schliesmann The Whig-Standard
The short-eared owl, listed as a species of special concern in Canada, has all but disappeared from the west end of Wolfe Island.
A noted Kingston-area birder says the decline has everything to do with the construction and startup of wind turbines on that part of the island two years ago.
“They’re definitely avoiding the area,” said Kurt Hennige, who has been watching and documenting the short-eared populations on Wolfe Island for more than 25 years.
The owls specifically congregated on the northwest corner of the island because of an abundance of their favourite… Read more
By John Upton|December 7, 2010 1:18 p.m.
Notorious raptor-killing wind turbines that cover agricultural land at the Altamont Pass on the eastern edge of the Bay Area will be replaced over four years in an effort to reduce bird deaths by 50 percent, under a lawsuit settlement agreement announced by Attorney General Jerry Brown.
The 5,400 first-generation turbines at the site, which are decades old, will be replaced or switched off by 2015. The California Energy Commission determined that the machines kill 1,766 to 4,271 birds annually.
The agreement settles lawsuits filed by nonprofits Californians for Renewable… Read more
According to reports, bird toll census numbers are being rigged by burying or otherwise concealing mutilated bird carcasses rather than reporting them.
Wind power is the fastest growing component in the state’s green energy portfolio, but wildlife advocates say the marriage has an unintended consequence: dead birds, including protected species of eagles, hawks and owls.
http://www.eastcountymagazine.org/node/3146#comments
By Jim Wiegand, wildlife biologist
April 17, 2010 (San Diego’s East County) — The controversy surrounding wind farms in America has been brewing for over 25 years. The debate centers around the use of the deadly propeller style wind turbines and the large death toll to what are supposedly protected species. One of these species, the federally protected golden eagle, has been at the forefront of this debate from the beginning.
This is for good reason, because at Altamont Pass California, 50-75 golden eagles have been killed each year in the blades of the prop wind… Read more
Written by J. Patrick Eaken
(THE PRESS) – Magee Marsh, Metzger Marsh Wildlife Area, Ottawa National Wildlife Refuge, and Crane Creek Beach Ridge have been steadily building a reputation.
Between mid-April and the end of May, an estimated 50,000 bird watchers arrive from around the world, pumping an estimated $17-24 million into the local economy.
The Black Swamp Bird Observatory is seeking a three-year moratorium on additional wind turbines within three miles of the Lake Erie Shores in Lucas, Ottawa, Sandusky, and Erie counties until research, including radar studies, on how the turbines affect the lives of nocturnal migrants can… Read more
What were they thinking ????
