Death Match: Wind Turbines vs Climate Disruption as Cause of Species Mortality

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

Overstated headline at original post -- wind turbines do get a few birds (and some bats as well, even more disturbingly and much more importantly) but the gist is right -- compared to the broad species decline that rapid climate disruption is already causing, wind turbines aren't even on the same scale.

AMENDATION:

By far, the largest causes of mortality among birds include loss of habitat due to human infringement, environmental despoliation, and collisions with man-made objects. Since wind turbines fall into the last category, it is worthwhile to examine other human causes of avian deaths and compare these to mortality from wind turbines.

Avian Deaths caused by….

Utility transmission and distribution lines, the backbone of our electrical power system, are responsible for 130 to 174 million bird deaths a year in the U.S.1 Many of the affected birds are those with large wingspans, including raptors and waterfowl. While attempting to land on power lines and poles, birds are sometimes electrocuted when their wings span between two hot wires. Many other birds are killed as their flight paths intersect the power lines strung between poles and towers. One report states that: "for some types of birds, power line collisions appear to be a significant source of mortality."2

Collisions with automobiles and trucks result in the deaths of between 60 and 80 million birds annually in the U.S.3 As more vehicles share the roadway, and our automotive society becomes more pervasive, these numbers will only increase. Our dependence on oil has taken its toll on birds too. Even the relatively high incidence of bird kills at Altamont Pass (about 92 per year) pales in comparison to the number of birds killed from the Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska. In fact, according to author Paul Gipe, the Altamont Pass wind farm would have to operate for 500 to 1000 years to "achieve" the same mortality level as the Exxon Valdez event in 1989.

Tall building and residential house windows also claim their share of birds. Some of the five million tall buildings in U.S. cities have been documented as being a chronic mortality problem for migrating birds. There are more than 100 million houses in the U.S. House windows are more of a problem for birds in rural areas than in cities or towns. While there are no required ongoing studies of bird mortality due to buildings or house windows, the best estimates put the toll due collisions with these structures at between 100 million and a staggering 1 billion deaths annually.4

Lighted communication towers turn out to be one of the more serious problems for birds, especially for migratory species that fly at night. One study began its conclusion with, "It is apparent from the analysis of the data that significant numbers of birds are dying in collisions with communications towers, their guy wires, and related structures."5 Another report states, "The main environmental problem we are watching out for with telecommunication towers are the deaths of birds and bats."6

This is not news, as bird collisions with lighted television and radio towers have been documented for over 50 years. Some towers are responsible for very high episodic fatalities. One television transmitter tower in Eau Claire, WI, was responsible for the deaths of over 1,000 birds on each of 24 consecutive nights. A "record 30,000 birds were estimated killed on one night" at this same tower.7 In Kansas, 10,000 birds were killed in one night by a telecommunications tower.8 Numerous large bird kills, while not as dramatic as the examples cited above, continue to occur across the country at telecommunication tower sites.

The number of telecommunication towers in the U.S. currently exceeds 77,000, and this number could easily double by 2010. The rush to construction is being driven mainly by our use of cell phones, and to a lesser extent by the impending switch to digital television and radio. Current mortality estimates due to telecommunication towers are 40 to 50 million birds per year.9 The proliferation of these towers in the near future will only exacerbate this situation.

Agricultural pesticides are "conservatively estimated" to directly kill 67 million birds per year.10 These numbers do not account for avian mortality associated with other pesticide applications, such as on golf courses. Nor do they take into consideration secondary losses due to pesticide use as these toxic chemicals travel up the food chain. This includes poisoning due to birds ingesting sprayed insects, the intended target of the pesticides.

Cats, both feral and housecats, also take their toll on birds. A Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR) report states that, "recent research suggests that rural free-ranging domestic cats in Wisconsin may be killing between 8 and 217 million birds each year. The most reasonable estimates indicate that 39 million birds are killed in the state each year."11

There are other studies on the impacts of jet engines, smoke stacks, bridges, and any number of other human structures and activities that threaten birds on a daily basis. Together, human infrastructure and industrial activities are responsible for one to four million bird deaths per day! . . .

The National Wind Coordinating Committee (NWCC) completed a comparison of wind farm avian mortality with bird mortality caused by other man-made structures in the U.S.

The NWCC did not conduct its own study, but analyzed all of the research done to date on various causes of avian mortality, including commercial wind farm turbines. They report that "data collected outside California indicate an average of 1.83 avian fatalities per turbine (for all species combined), and 0.006 raptor fatalities per turbine per year. Based on current projections of 3,500 operational wind turbines in the US by the end of 2001, excluding California, the total annual mortality was estimated at approximately 6,400 bird fatalities per year for all species combined."13

This report states that its intent is to "put avian mortality associated with windpower development into perspective with other significant sources of avian collision mortality across the United States."14 The NWCC reports that: "Based on current estimates, windplant related avian collision fatalities probably represent from 0.01% to 0.02% (i.e., 1 out of every 5,000 to 10,000) of the annual avian collision fatalities in the United States."15 That is, commercial wind turbines cause the direct deaths of only 0.01% to 0.02% of all of the birds killed by collisions with man-made structures and activities in the U.S.

(Footnotes from original.)

Oregon's filthy secret is Salem's too

Note that the head of Salem's Willamette University, M. Lee Pelton, sits on PGE's board and supports continuing and increasing the use of coal even as his university touts its sustainability initiatives, never mentioning that 40% of the electricity powering the campus is from coal, the methamphetamine of the energy world.

Despite Green Dreams, Oregon Is Fueled by 40 Percent Dirty Coal

WHILE PORTLAND'S high-profile green innovations are helping the city's image become synonymous with sustainability (see: condo developers topping their downtown towers with wind turbines) the city runs on a dirty secret. Forty percent of [SALEM'S] energy comes from a very un-green source: coal. . . .

The Boardman coal plant in Eastern Oregon releases tens of thousands of tons of toxic chemicals into the air annually, including five million tons of carbon dioxide (as much as nearly one million cars). The Sierra Club is part of a coalition that's currently suing the plant in federal court for allegedly violating the Clean Air Act.

With the background noise of bongos and tribal chanting filling Pioneer Courthouse Square on Saturday, PGE representatives hyped the company's clean wind and biomass energy programs. But altogether those earth-friendly energy sources make up only four percent of PGE's power. In a draft of the company's new two-year plan released last month, PGE promotes energy efficiency—but also says it will increase its reliance on coal. . . .

PGE spokesman Steve Corson says if the company switched from coal, it would need to rely more on natural gas. "That would leave us vulnerable to natural gas price hikes," says Corson, explaining that power rates might increase. PGE is currently planning to keep Boardman open until at least 2040 after installing the environmental upgrades. Critics say the threat of a rate increase is off base when PGE's departing CEO Peggy Fowler got a $4.5 million severance package last year.

Don't be in the dark on bike safety (via Recumbent Blog)

This is a person greatly increasing the risk of being killed or crippled by a car -- no lights and no helmet, a deadly duo. Image by ItzaFineDay via Flickr

This quote from WashCycle makes you stop and think…

"While only three percent of bike rides happen at night, over half of all cyclists killed are hit while riding at night without lights. . . .

As energy costs break city and state budgets, public health costs set to soar

Image by Merelymel13 via Flickr

Guess what? An unstable climate means exposure to a whole host of problems we're not used to dealing with, including diseases following vectors into places where they've never been seen before. Couple that with more extreme climate problems and skyrocketing energy costs (making staying comfortable in more extreme weather more difficult) and you start to think that, you know what, maybe we ought not to roll the dice on climate change so much . . .

Alas, nearly every one of the failures to prepare listed below applies to Salem, where officials are busily pretending that we can continue sprawling, flying, and driving like it was 1959 and that there's no need to be concerned about local food resiliency or helping people learn to be more food secure.

Ailing planet seen as bad for human health

Climate change will make Americans more vulnerable to diseases, disasters and heat waves, but governments have done little to plan for the added burden on the health system, according to a new study by a nonprofit group.

The study, released Monday by the Trust for America's Health, an advocacy group focused on disease prevention, examines the public-health implications of climate change. In addition to pushing up sea levels and shrinking Arctic ice, the report says, a warming planet is likely to leave more people sick, short of breath or underfed.

Experts involved with the study said that these threats might be reduced if the federal government adopts a cap on greenhouse-gas emissions. But no legislation could stop them altogether, they said. Emissions already in the atmosphere are expected to increase warming -- and the problems that come with it -- for years to come.

"That [a cap on greenhouse gases] really is not enough," said Phyllis Cuttino of the Pew Environment Group, which funded the study. "We can see all these problems coming, but as a country, we haven't done enough to prepare for them."

The idea that climate change will be bad for people as well as polar bears is not new: It was explained in detail by a United Nations panel that won the Nobel Peace Prize for its work on climate in 2007.

Monday's report summarized some of the biggest worries for Americans in particular. They included:

-- Heat waves, which the report says are expected to increase. The danger is expected to be worst, the report said, in concrete-clad cities, where the lack of greenery creates an "urban heat island." Under climate change, the experts said, summer heat could also sneak up on people in cities where air conditioning hasn't been needed in the past.

-- More "extreme weather events," such as hurricanes, floods and wildfire-breeding droughts. Drought could also create crop failures, the report said, leading to malnutrition.

-- More widespread diseases carried by mosquitoes, ticks and other pests. If warmer temperatures allow these animals to expand their ranges northward, the result could be more cases of West Nile virus, Lyme disease and hantavirus.

-- Increased air pollution, caused because heat contributes to the formation of smog. This, the report said, could increase the incidence of severe asthma or pulmonary disease.

The experts who worked on the study said they could not provide a timetable for when and where these effects will appear. But they said it is already time to get ready for them, but many governments are not doing so.

"Some of the most personal effects of climate change are going to be health-related ones," said Jeff Levi, executive director of the Trust for America's Health. "We should want the government doing as much as possible now to prevent these effects, or minimize them when they occur."

The right way to deal with utility monopolies: The public option

Monticello, Minnesota found out. If you want something done, threaten to do it yourself.

Got leaves? Or a million of 'em?

Leaves make wonderful rich compost for your gardening. Image via Wikipedia

You have an opportunity to put them to good use:

FALL LEAF HAUL
LET'S COMPOST THOSE LEAVES!
December 5, 9:00 am - 3:00 pm

The Fall Leaf Haul is a leaf collection program designed to provide Salem residents a means to compost their leaves and grass clippings. No tree limbs are accepted.

The program is for Salem residents only (no commercial landscapers, please).

Food or cash donations will be taken for the Marion-Polk Food Share and Parks Tradition Fund. The sites are being organized and staffed by neighborhood associations and other volunteers.

The sites are located at the State Fairgrounds (Silverton Road at Lana Avenue NE), Sprague High School (2373 Kuebler Road S) and Wallace Marine Park (200 Glen Creek Road NW).

If you are a senior or disabled citizen who needs help getting bags of leaves to one of the collection sites, call Center 50+ at 503-588-6303 for assistance by November 12.

To volunteer a couple of hours to help at a site, call 503-589‑2195 for information.

Important: For the record

Image via Wikipedia

"Global cooling" is nonsense. Now someone is sure to pipe up and say "Maybe figures don't lie, but liars sure do figure" -- but of course that would first tar the folks who came up with the phony "global cooling" numbers, but that little bit of reality doesn't matter to the committed denialist.

AP IMPACT: Statisticians reject global cooling

WASHINGTON – Have you heard that the world is now cooling instead of warming? You may have seen some news reports on the Internet or heard about it from a provocative new book. Only one problem: It's not true, according to an analysis of the numbers done by several independent statisticians for The Associated Press. . . .

In a blind test, the AP gave temperature data to four independent statisticians and asked them to look for trends, without telling them what the numbers represented. The experts found no true temperature declines over time.

"If you look at the data and sort of cherry-pick a micro-trend within a bigger trend, that technique is particularly suspect," said John Grego, a professor of statistics at the University of South Carolina.

Yet the idea that things are cooling has been repeated in opinion columns, a BBC news story posted on the Drudge Report and in a new book by the authors of the best-seller "Freakonomics." Last week, a poll by the Pew Research Center found that only 57 percent of Americans now believe there is strong scientific evidence for global warming, down from 77 percent in 2006.

Global warming skeptics base their claims on an unusually hot year in 1998. Since then, they say, temperatures have dropped — thus, a cooling trend. But it's not that simple.

Since 1998, temperatures have dipped, soared, fallen again and are now rising once more. Records kept by the British meteorological office and satellite data used by climate skeptics still show 1998 as the hottest year. However, data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and NASA show 2005 has topped 1998. Published peer-reviewed scientific research generally cites temperatures measured by ground sensors, which are from NOAA, NASA and the British, more than the satellite data.

The recent Internet chatter about cooling led NOAA's climate data center to re-examine its temperature data. It found no cooling trend.

"The last 10 years are the warmest 10-year period of the modern record," said NOAA climate monitoring chief Deke Arndt. "Even if you analyze the trend during that 10 years, the trend is actually positive, which means warming."

The AP sent expert statisticians NOAA's year-to-year ground temperature changes over 130 years and the 30 years of satellite-measured temperatures preferred by skeptics and gathered by scientists at the University of Alabama in Huntsville.

Statisticians who analyzed the data found a distinct decades-long upward trend in the numbers, but could not find a significant drop in the past 10 years in either data set. The ups and downs during the last decade repeat random variability in data as far back as 1880. . . .

UPDATE: Mother Jones blogger Kevin Drum's review of the story:

Here's a thought experiment for you. Suppose you had some data and you wanted to know what to make of it. The problem is that the subject of the data happens to be a political hot potato, and you know that everyone you show it to is going to cherry-pick just the pieces that bolster all their favorite preconceived notions.
Well, here's an idea: Show the data to a bunch of different experts but remove all the labels first so they have no idea what they're looking at. Just give them the raw numbers and ask what they think.

That's the delightful idea that AP science writer Seth Borenstein hit on a few days ago. He sent data on global warming to several independent statisticians but didn't tell them what the numbers represented. He just wanted to know if they thought the data showed any kind of flattening or decrease in recent years.

Answer: No. "Statisticians who analyzed the data found a distinct decades-long upward trend in the numbers, but could not find a significant drop in the past 10 years in either data set. The ups and downs during the last decade repeat random variability in data as far back as 1880." In other words, contrary to the chatter from global warming skeptics, the Earth didn't start cooling a decade ago. It only looks that way if you compare current temperatures to 1998, which was an unusually hot year due to a strong El Niño. But if you look at all the data, instead of just cherry-picking one single comparison, the news, unfortunately, remains grim. The current decade is the hottest on record, and the next one will be hotter still.

Another manifestation of peak oil: Salem not alone with decrepit sidewalks

Image by Grant Neufeld via Flickr

The Salem City Council's vote a little while ago to abandon the responsibilities it assumed for maintaining sidewalks back in the 1980s meant that the city simply tossed miles and miles of decayed and sometimes impassible walks back into the laps of property owners, most of whom live in areas with decayed sidewalks because they don't have much money.

That step was a key sign that things are heading in the wrong direction here and that the problems are fundamental and systemic. Even as the city is failing to provide one of the most important basic public safety amenities, it continues to pour money into paving and repaving and into the rathole of planning the fantasy about yet another auto bridge between connecting Salem's Marion and Polk County pieces, a $600+ million dollar delusion.

Knowing that infrastructure is deteriorating rapidly all over the US and that Salem is not alone in putting the needs of a small subset of people (drivers) ahead of prudent foresight and responsible administration, it's no surprise that Salem's sidewalk woes are showing up elsewhere:

Lois Thibault, coordinator of research for the U.S. Access Board, a federal agency that provides guidance to local governments on ADA issues, said Jackson is in the same boat with a lot of cities that for years stalled spending federal dollars on sidewalks to spend money on roads.

"It's deferred maintenance," she said. "We've been so focused on new construction that we've let the maintenance go.

UPDATE: Speaking of sidewalks:

If you're like me, you want vibrant neighborhoods where you can walk to the local grocery, relax in the local park, and have a short commute to work.

Right now, we have the chance to make our dream for livable communities a reality. Oregon is working to develop policy tools that will help Salem-Keizer, Springfield, Eugene and other Oregon cities shape their future.

Join us on Oct. 28 for "Activist 101: Building a Livable Salem-Keizer," co-hosted by Environment Oregon and 1000 Friends of Oregon! This is a great chance to hear from local environmentalists and policy writers, as well as learn how to make a difference yourself.

Click here to sign up!

We all deserve communities where our kids can walk to school or the local playground . . . where we have the option to take the bus or ride a bike to go shopping or to work . . . and where we no longer drive so much that one-third of our global warming pollution comes from transportation.

Right now, nearly half of our city roads lack the basic infrastructure of sidewalks to make streets safe for children; our dependence on cars costs family households more than $10,000 per year; and global warming pollution is threatening to cause more storms, droughts and unpredictable weather patterns.

We can change all of this. Right now, Oregon leaders are developing planning tools that will help Salem-Keizer, Springfield, Eugene and other local communities make the right decisions for improving our communities' livability, while also reducing global warming pollution.

Activist 101: Building a Livable Salem-Keizer
Thursday, Oct. 28, 2009, 6p.m. - 7:30p.m.
Salem Central Library's Anderson Room
585 Liberty St. SE, Salem

Learn how to get involved at "Activist 101: Building a Livable Salem-Keizer," co-hosted by Environment Oregon and 1000 Friends of Oregon on Oct. 28!

Thanks! I look forward to seeing you soon!

Sincerely,

Nicole Forbes
Environment Oregon Field Organizer

A warning from one who would know

Like all oil wells, even this one (the first in the US) still produces some oil -- just not very fast. THAT is what peak oil is -- a mismatch between the flowrates demanded and the flowrates the earth will yield. Image by Stuck in Customs via Flickr

Fact. No. 3: Supply. We are not running out of oil. The issue is not our endowment of oil resources, it is the world’s production capacity. Additions from exploration last replaced annual production in 1987. The easiest oil has been discovered. Costs are increasing for new barrels, where wells can be drilled in water depths of over one mile to targets up to six miles deep, and discoveries can take over a decade to develop.

Oil field declines are running at more than 5 percent per year. That means we have to add at least 4 million barrels per day each year just to keep production flat. Yet non-OPEC production is in the process of, if not peaking, reaching a plateau. The U.K. Energy Research Centre just published a report that there is a significant risk that worldwide production of conventional oil could peak before 2020 and enter terminal decline. If we do not act now, we will have a devastating oil crisis in the next 5-to-10 years.

We will need the courage to act to prevent this crisis and make the commitment to change our behavior – not just in demand; not just in supply; but both.

The United States must take a leadership role. With five percent of the world’s population but 25 percent of its oil consumption, the United States can no longer blame oil producers for rising prices. We need to have the courage to demand 50 miles per gallon as the national standard for all vehicles; gasoline hybrids and diesel could get us there. A gasoline tax of $1 gallon would boost conservation and help pay down the federal deficit by $120 billion per year.

This outstanding summary -- one of the best ever in the mainstream media -- further warns that living without cheap oil is less science-fictional all the time:

It is 30 years since the film Mad Max was made, launching the career of Mel Gibson.

The film made a big splash at the time for its terrifying view of a world without oil, where gangs of grisly looking people roam deserts in a post-apocalyptic world, killing each other to get their hands on the few drops of petrol that some have managed to produce in makeshift refineries. Social order has completely broken down.

Great film if you like that sort of thing but complete fiction, of course. Or is it? Three decades later, and I wonder if the film was, in fact, years ahead of its time.

Just think back to summer last year when oil prices spiked to $150 a barrel – 10 times the level of a decade earlier. In petrol stations in some European countries, people started to drive off without paying and drivers had to be banned from filling cars before they had paid up. In Britain, people stole heating oil out of the tanks that sit outside many houses in the country.

Imagine what would happen if prices rose, say, to $300 a barrel. Or higher. Not only would it become too expensive to drive unless absolutely necessary, but food would become prohibitively expensive to transport, goods from China would be too expensive to ship, and plastics, which come from oil, would be unaffordable. The cold turkey after more than a century of cheap oil would be painful indeed. For developing countries it would be fatal – many could not afford energy at those prices.

Oil has fallen sharply in price since last summer, but this is only because the world tumbled into its worst recession in decades, clobbering industrial output and trade volumes, and therefore oil demand. What is curious, though, is that oil prices, having tumbled below $40 earlier this year, went back above $81 a barrel last week, their highest for a year.

There are plenty of possible reasons, such as the continuing fall in the value of the dollar, in which oil is priced, or the piling in of speculators who think a recovery will push up oil prices. Or you could reach for the old chestnut of supply and demand. Demand has fallen a lot, sure, but maybe supply is not what it used to be. Indeed, take a graph of the oil price over the past couple of decades, chop off last year's spike to $150 and this year's plunge to $35 and you can see that oil prices have been on a steady upwards trend for a decade. The question is why?

An excellent new report, Heads in the Sand, released last week by the non-governmental organisation Global Witness – the group that first brought "blood diamonds" to the world's attention – looked in depth at what is happening to the supply of oil. And it is frightening.

The author, Simon Taylor, has spent two years working on this issue, in particular, analysing the forecasts issued late last year by the Paris-based International Energy Agency (IEA), in which it admitted for the first time that world oil supplies were about to start to dwindle just as demand from countries such as India and China is accelerating rapidly. The IEA had previously asserted that oil production would not peak before 2030 at the earliest. Now it thinks we might be very close to that point.

The IEA figures showed there could be a gap of 7m barrels a day between supply and demand by 2015. That represents about 8% of the expected world demand by then, 91m barrels a day. The gap will grow as demand keeps growing. Taylor warns that world supply levelled off between 2005 and 2008, so quite where the new oil is going to come from is unclear.

Taylor takes issue with the IEA's recommendation that the world spend $450bn (yes, billion) a year looking for new oilfields that may or may not be there and so render its forecasts overoptimistic. He thinks governments should admit they have ignored the problem and don't have a plan B. . . .

Moving story -- a reminder to treasure life

http://nymag.com/arts/popmusic/features/60127/