🚀 go-pugleaf

On Sep 7, 9:19 am, Ron House <rho...@smartchat.net.au> wrote:
> A short while ago I read a shocking and disturbing article about bird
> deaths from wind farms on climaterealists.com. I immediately asked
> myself: "Is that really true?" I wanted to know the right answer to this
> question, whether or not I liked it. If we want to create a peace legacy
> for future generations, to safeguard the planet for both humans and our
> non-human friends, we need to know the truth.
>
> The issue is this: the story above claims that millions of birds are
> killed by wind farms. But a "green" friend I mentioned this to told me
> that this is absurd: she had studied wind farms in depth, she had
> personally visited them, and they were the safest, most
> wildlife-friendly places imaginable; the blades rotate so sedately
> nothing could possibly be killed by them; and there wasn't a dead or
> injured bird to be found anywhere around about. She went so far as to
> wonder if the writers of the above article weren't simply lying through
> their teeth.
>
> The paradox I was struggling with was this: my green friend is without
> doubt one of the most truthful people I know. I did not doubt her
> account for a second. Equally, it seemed impossible that anyone could
> write such a credible-sounding article as the one linked above. Two
> truthful sources in direct contradiction - I needed facts that no one
> could dispute, because if lies are involved (and who won't at least
> wonder about the possibility?), it isn't good enough to merely discover
> the truth; I also needed it in a form that would allow anyone to prove
> it for themselves.So here's what I did. Read more:
>
> http://peacelegacy.org/articles/wind-farms-do-they-kill-birds

A very thoughtful piece, Ron, even though you rate increased animal
suffering much higher than loss of biodiversity, and you are to be
commended for taking the trouble to think the windfarm problem
through.

The answer has always been small is beautiful, and small turbines on
the roof, perhaps with solar panels additionally, has always appealed
to me. But the needed materials to manufacture these may be the crunch
that stops this solution. A new design of windmill with rare-earth
elements used in magnets on the tips of the rotors and fixed coils for
electrical generation and collection will likely founder because of
the shortage of materials. They're not called rare-earth for nothing.
Similar problems can be encountered for the latest super-efficient
designs for battery storage of electricity and likely will exist for
solar panels.

Meanwhile my local Golden Eagles have gone the same way my local
Bonelli's Eagles did eight years ago. It took just two years from the
installation of a mountain ridge string of 12 "aeolien" above our
village in Languedoc-Roussillon before they disappeared. How long I
wonder before I see my last local Short-toed Eagle?

John M. wrote:
> On Sep 7, 9:19 am, Ron House <rho...@smartchat.net.au> wrote:

>> http://peacelegacy.org/articles/wind-farms-do-they-kill-birds
> 
> A very thoughtful piece, Ron, even though you rate increased animal
> suffering much higher than loss of biodiversity, and you are to be
> commended for taking the trouble to think the windfarm problem
> through.

Thanks John. To some extent, biodiversity is yet another human-centred 
thing, but real individual lives lived by sentient beings, that is 
in-the-small concrete reality. Just a week or so ago a bird deliberately 
flew down from its tree and warned me of a deadly snake I was about to 
tread on, thus saving my life. It did that because I feed it in harsh 
winters, I ask after her babies, I involve myself in their community. 
And she remembers. I am 'one of the gang'. My wife has also had her life 
saved similarly and we have had snakes repelled from our house often. 
Photos here:

http://wingedhearts.org/minnie-miner-saves-me-from-snake

Due to what I have learned about the wisdom, intelligence, care, and 
other higher qualities of birds coming from my personal involvement, I 
have to treat individual birds as separate, invaluable lives, not to be 
subsumed into 'bulk' considerations like diversity.

> The answer has always been small is beautiful, and small turbines on
> the roof, perhaps with solar panels additionally, has always appealed
> to me. But the needed materials to manufacture these may be the crunch
> that stops this solution. A new design of windmill with rare-earth
> elements used in magnets on the tips of the rotors and fixed coils for
> electrical generation and collection will likely founder because of
> the shortage of materials. They're not called rare-earth for nothing.
> Similar problems can be encountered for the latest super-efficient
> designs for battery storage of electricity and likely will exist for
> solar panels.

Good point. I don't give up on technology though. The impractical has a 
way of becoming practical.

> Meanwhile my local Golden Eagles have gone the same way my local
> Bonelli's Eagles did eight years ago. It took just two years from the
> installation of a mountain ridge string of 12 "aeolien" above our
> village in Languedoc-Roussillon before they disappeared. How long I
> wonder before I see my last local Short-toed Eagle?

That is shocking. You must feel so frustrated watching this destruction. 
The pointlessness of it is the worst part. Wind is set up to minimise 
fossil fuel usage, and then 40% more fossil fuel is used in nutty 
schemes to bury ('sequester') CO2 (which is plant food, and thus 
indirectly animal and human food, not pollution). I saw a target of 20% 
wind mentioned somewhere a few days ago. Big Coal is laughing all the 
way to the bank. Promote the global warming hoax, sell 40% more coal to 
80% of the previous market, and end up about 15% ahead of the game. And 
of course they know the 20% figure is itself fantasy.

I believe humans need to admit something clearly to themselves: saving 
on fossil fuel is a human-centred activity. No animal 'cares' whether 
coal and oil is left in the ground. We humans care because we want some 
still there for a rainy century sometime. But it doesn't benefit any 
other creature on Earth. They are benefited by the CO2 plant food; they 
are benefited by burning fossil fuel. What are we humans thinking? - 
depriving them of the plant food and killing them with wind farms in the 
bargain. What is in it for wildlife - indeed, for the rest of the planet 
apart from ourselves?

-- 
Ron House
Building Peace: http://peacelegacy.org
Australian Birds: http://wingedhearts.org
Principle of Goodness academic site: http://principleofgoodness.net

I find it hard to believe that those birds which survive or avoid wind 
towers will not.... evolve. End of problem.

There is the economy of scale to consider. The cost/watt for a 15kw unit 
is not much higher than that of a 20 megwatt tower. But the 15kw job can 
be in the neighborhood or village that uses the power, so the cost of 
transmission lines is dramatically reduced.

If the new aluminum/gallium hydrogen generators work out as advertised, 
then the excess windpower can be stored, and the whole system becomes 
local, much more competitive in the free market, and sustainable as well 
as financially rewarding to small investors.

Big business and big government love big installations like windfarms 
where there is less free market competition and they are more able to 
dictate the price.

On Tue, 08 Sep 2009 11:34:26 +1000, Ron House
<rhouse@smartchat.net.au> wrote:

>John M. wrote:
>> On Sep 7, 9:19 am, Ron House <rho...@smartchat.net.au> wrote:
>
>>> http://peacelegacy.org/articles/wind-farms-do-they-kill-birds
>> 
>> A very thoughtful piece, Ron, even though you rate increased animal
>> suffering much higher than loss of biodiversity, and you are to be
>> commended for taking the trouble to think the windfarm problem
>> through.
>
>Thanks John. To some extent, biodiversity is yet another human-centred 
>thing, but real individual lives lived by sentient beings, that is 
>in-the-small concrete reality. Just a week or so ago a bird deliberately 
>flew down from its tree and warned me of a deadly snake I was about to 
>tread on, thus saving my life. It did that because I feed it in harsh 
>winters, I ask after her babies, I involve myself in their community. 
>And she remembers. I am 'one of the gang'. My wife has also had her life 
>saved similarly and we have had snakes repelled from our house often. 
>Photos here:
>
>http://wingedhearts.org/minnie-miner-saves-me-from-snake
>
>Due to what I have learned about the wisdom, intelligence, care, and 
>other higher qualities of birds coming from my personal involvement, I 
>have to treat individual birds as separate, invaluable lives, not to be 
>subsumed into 'bulk' considerations like diversity.
>
>> The answer has always been small is beautiful, and small turbines on
>> the roof, perhaps with solar panels additionally, has always appealed
>> to me. But the needed materials to manufacture these may be the crunch
>> that stops this solution. A new design of windmill with rare-earth
>> elements used in magnets on the tips of the rotors and fixed coils for
>> electrical generation and collection will likely founder because of
>> the shortage of materials. They're not called rare-earth for nothing.
>> Similar problems can be encountered for the latest super-efficient
>> designs for battery storage of electricity and likely will exist for
>> solar panels.
>
>Good point. I don't give up on technology though. The impractical has a 
>way of becoming practical.
>
>> Meanwhile my local Golden Eagles have gone the same way my local
>> Bonelli's Eagles did eight years ago. It took just two years from the
>> installation of a mountain ridge string of 12 "aeolien" above our
>> village in Languedoc-Roussillon before they disappeared. How long I
>> wonder before I see my last local Short-toed Eagle?
>
>That is shocking. You must feel so frustrated watching this destruction. 
>The pointlessness of it is the worst part. Wind is set up to minimise 
>fossil fuel usage, and then 40% more fossil fuel is used in nutty 
>schemes to bury ('sequester') CO2 (which is plant food, and thus 
>indirectly animal and human food, not pollution). I saw a target of 20% 
>wind mentioned somewhere a few days ago. Big Coal is laughing all the 
>way to the bank. Promote the global warming hoax, sell 40% more coal to 
>80% of the previous market, and end up about 15% ahead of the game. And 
>of course they know the 20% figure is itself fantasy.
>
>I believe humans need to admit something clearly to themselves: saving 
>on fossil fuel is a human-centred activity. No animal 'cares' whether 
>coal and oil is left in the ground. We humans care because we want some 
>still there for a rainy century sometime. But it doesn't benefit any 
>other creature on Earth. They are benefited by the CO2 plant food; they 
>are benefited by burning fossil fuel. What are we humans thinking? - 
>depriving them of the plant food and killing them with wind farms in the 
>bargain. What is in it for wildlife - indeed, for the rest of the planet 
>apart from ourselves?


Some time ago Dr Malcolm Ogilvie of Scottish Natural Heritage
suggested ridiculously low figures for bird strikes at wind turbines -
something like one in seven years if I remember correctly.  He
referred to something being on the Internet about it, but declined to
identify the website.  IIRC John supported his stance.

In my view many birds will be killed by wind turbines and the true
number will never be known as predators will remove corpses 

I believe the Climate Realists article.

On Sep 8, 11:35 am, Malcolm <Malc...@indaal.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> In article <h85qd5$tg...@news.eternal-september.org>, terryc
> <newsninespam-s...@woa.com.au> writes
>
> >On Tue, 08 Sep 2009 11:27:44 +0100, amacmil304 wrote:
>
> >> In my view many birds will be killed by wind turbines and the true
> >> number will never be known as predators will remove corpses
>
> >You have a view of a wind turbine or just another arm chair expert?
>
> >It is simple really. Wind turbines are driven by the air passing over the
> >blades. they are being pushed around by the air, just the same as birds
> >are. Birds are experts at reading the wind currents and reacting, so they
> >have little to fear from a very noisy, slowly moving turbine blade.
>
> >Basically, birds easily go around them, except for the predators that
> >perch on the housing or other birds that nest on them.
>
> All the turbines erected in the UK have solid towers so not allowing any
> perches or nesting places.

•• So what!! It is the fan that does the damage
    Migration season will be devastating

Malcolm wrote:
> 
> In article <nsbca5dop86vds41f9aj1p6rulam9cd1dk@4ax.com>, 
> amacmil304@aol.com writes
>>
>> Some time ago Dr Malcolm Ogilvie of Scottish Natural Heritage
>> suggested ridiculously low figures for bird strikes at wind turbines -
>> something like one in seven years if I remember correctly.  He
>> referred to something being on the Internet about it, but declined to
>> identify the website.  IIRC John supported his stance.
>>
> It's there if you care enough to look. There are a small number of very 
> badly sited windfarms at which total bird deaths can run into hundreds 
> per year. There are some other windfarms where much small numbers are 
> killed on an annual basis. Then there are a great many other windfarms, 
> properly sited, where deaths either don't occur at all or are very rare.
> 
>> In my view many birds will be killed by wind turbines and the true
>> number will never be known as predators will remove corpses
>>
> Ah yes, we've already had a discussion about your "predators", haven't we?
> 
>> I believe the Climate Realists article.
> 
> Of course you do, Angus, it supports your claim. However, the person he 
> quotes who claims millions of birds killed annually did so on the basis 
> of spurious figures and specious arguments.
> 

My article sites an official report on the European Environment Agency 
website - same result. Why would an official government agency paid to 
promote reusable energy make up stuff that hurts their own cause?

http://peacelegacy.org/articles/wind-farms-do-they-kill-birds

-- 
Ron House
Building Peace: http://peacelegacy.org
Australian Birds: http://wingedhearts.org
Principle of Goodness academic site: http://principleofgoodness.net

Malcolm wrote:

> Where in that report, which is a sober, scientific study of the subject, 
> does it say that "millions of birds are killed by wind farms" as you 
> stated in your original post?

I quoted their estimates of kills per turbine, I calculated an estimated 
number of turbines by multiplying the stated total capacity by the 
capacity of a typical turbine as located on the GE turbine 
manufacturer's website. I stated that this was just an estimate. If it 
is out by even 10%, it is up to you to tell us why a simple 
multiplication gives such a wrong number. Then I multiplied that turbine 
estimate by the kills per turbine.

> You used highly selective figures from the report, concentrating on the 
> quoted examples of the very few windfarms that are so badly sited that 
> they do indeed kill birds. You then use a figure of 20 bird+bat 
> deaths/turbine/year (which you appear to have plucked out of the air) 
> and then do some calculations based on that and extrapolate to the total 
> 52,000 turbines that you calculate exist in the EU.
> 
> This is as spurious as the calculations by Duchamp that you quote later on.
> 
> You have quoted the sentence about the few, appallingly sited, windfarms 
> in Germany that have killed up to 50 birds/turbine/year, and ignored the 
> preceding sentence which reads: "A compilation of existing evidence for 
> the German Federal Ministry of Environment (H�tker et al., 2004) showed 
> that at almost half of the wind farms studied, the number of fatalities 
> was less than one bird per turbine per year."
> 
> So why did you use 20?

Read what I said. They estimate 50, so I divided it by 5 to be 
conservative. They said more bats than birds are killed, so I assumed 
that bat kills equalled bird kills (again, to be conservative). You are 
welcome to disagree with my reasoning, but don't go off making out that 
I have written anything without explaining where I got the figures from.

> Also, you should note this comment in the report: "The majority of 
> studies of collisions caused by wind turbines have recorded relatively 
> low levels of mortality, perhaps reflecting the fact that many of the 
> studied wind farms are located away from large concentrations of birds."

They also say that the figures they have are very likely underestimates.

> So why did you use 20?

Stop being boring. We've all seen this trick before and it fools no one.

> Even the very high number of deaths at Altamont in California, which is 
> mentioned in the report, of 35-100,000 deaths, is spread over 20 years 
> and caused by a maximum of 7,300 turbines. The number of turbines has 
> fluctuated but has rarely been less than 4,000 except in the initial 
> construction phase. So, taking the worst case figures of 100,000 deaths 
> over 20 years by 4000 turbines gives a death rate of 1.25 
> birds/turbine/year.
> 
> So why did you use 20?

P 75: "Using correction factors for search efficiency and scavenger 
removal, Brinkmann & Schauer-Weisshahn (2006) estimated a mean of 16.4 
bat fatalities per turbine per year at 16 study sites in south-west 
Germany." That is 60% more than my figure of 10 bats per turbine, and it 
is an average, not a high figure, and they also state: "The number of 
fatalities is probably underestimated as dead bats are even harder to 
find than birds."

So bats alone ON AVERAGE (the mean - the Report's words) account for 
almost all of my 20 per turbine estimate. I think I am way, way 
conservative. I gave the original references precisely because that's 
how you do things honestly, so others may go and check.

Your boring repetition of the same question three times, however, is an 
old trick for influencing minds subliminally. We know all about it, so 
give it a rest and argue openly an honestly in future.

-- 
Ron House
Building Peace: http://peacelegacy.org
Australian Birds: http://wingedhearts.org
Principle of Goodness academic site: http://principleofgoodness.net

Malcolm wrote:
> 
> In article <4AB2DB72.9070702@smartchat.net.au>, Ron House 
> <rhouse@smartchat.net.au> writes
>> Malcolm wrote:
>>
>>> Where in that report, which is a sober, scientific study of the 
>>> subject,  does it say that "millions of birds are killed by wind 
>>> farms" as you  stated in your original post?
>>
>> I quoted their estimates of kills per turbine, I calculated an 
>> estimated number of turbines by multiplying the stated total capacity 
>> by the capacity of a typical turbine as located on the GE turbine 
>> manufacturer's website. I stated that this was just an estimate. If it 
>> is out by even 10%, it is up to you to tell us why a simple 
>> multiplication gives such a wrong number. Then I multiplied that 
>> turbine estimate by the kills per turbine.
>>
> Kill and capacity are not related.

Capacity of the entire EU divided by capacity of a typical turbine gives 
an estimate of total number of turbines. Not exact, because we don't 
know exactly how many of which types of turbine are installed, but it is 
certainly a good estimate. Multiply that number by the estimated kills 
per turbine and you have an estimate of total kills. And by using 
figures from a recognised authority with a stake in underestimating the 
total, we can be reasonably sure we have not overestimated by much; more 
likely we are greatly under. It's not rocket science. My original 
article here:

http://peacelegacy.org/articles/wind-farms-do-they-kill-birds

The question is, why cannot you and those like you understand such a 
simple argument? What motivates such a bizarre statement as "Kill and 
capacity are not related"? Two different things are related when a valid 
argument relates them, and my argument clearly does so. I have discussed 
the kind of psychological malfunction displayed by global warming 
believers here:

http://peacelegacy.org/articles/climate-change-understanding-evil-religion

-- 
Ron House
Building Peace: http://peacelegacy.org
Australian Birds: http://wingedhearts.org
Principle of Goodness academic site: http://principleofgoodness.net