Murphy’s Law in Action – Which to choose? Save the bats or save the planet? This presents an environmental quandary. – Anthony
Wind Turbines Give Bats the “Bends,” Study Finds
August 25, 2008
Wind turbines can kill bats without touching them by causing a bends-like condition due to rapidly dropping air pressure, new research suggests. Scientists aren’t sure why, but bats are attracted to the turbines, which often stand 300 feet (90 meters) high and sport 200-foot (60-meter) blades.
The mammals’ curiosity can result in lethal blows by the rotors, which spin at a rate of about 160 miles (260 kilometers) per hour.
But scientist Erin Baerwald and colleagues report that only about half of the bat corpses they found near Alberta, Canada, turbine bases showed any physical evidence of being hit by a blade.
A surprising 90 percent showed signs of internal hemorrhaging—evidence of a drop in air pressure near the blades that causes fatal damage to the bats’ lungs.
In humans, the condition is called the bends and can affect divers and airplane passengers during ascents and descents.
(Related story: “Military Sonar May Give Whales the Bends, Study Says” [October 1, 2003])
The “Bends”
“As a turbine blade goes around, it creates lift—like an airplane’s wings—and there is a small zone of [dropping] pressure, maybe a meter or so in diameter, on the tips of the blades,” explained Baerwald, a doctoral candidate at the University of Calgary, in Alberta.
“Bats fly through this area, and their lungs expand, and the fine capillaries around the edges of the lungs burst.”
The bats’ lungs subsequently fill with fluid, and the animals essentially drown.
“We compare it to divers—they are pretty much dying of the bends,” Baerwald said.
Bats have no natural defense against the unnaturally dramatic pressure changes.
“Bats can actually detect pressure changes, but we’re talking large-scale, relatively slow changes, like the coming of a storm front,” said Baerwald. “This is something entirely different.”
Most bats that fall victim to turbines are migrating species, such as hoary bats, eastern red bats, and silver-haired bats.
There are not enough data to determine how wind turbine fatalities might be affecting populations of these slow-reproducing mammals.
Birds are also killed by blows from wind turbine rotors (see a related story), but their rigid, tubelike lungs can better withstand air pressure changes.
The study appears this week in the journal Current Biology.
Curiosity Killed the Bat
“They are the first to have done a large scale look at this [damage to the bat lungs],” Bat Conservation International (BCI) biologist Ed Arnett said of the researchers.
“It’s fascinating information,” said Arnett, who is not involved with the study.
“But ultimately it might not matter so much how [the bats] die but what is attracting them to the turbines in the first place.”
Preventing the bat deaths has challenged experts for years.
“We’ve partnered with industry and federal agencies to raise and spend about two million dollars looking for a solution,” said BCI founder and president Merlin Tuttle.
Laurie Jodziewicz, of the American Wind Energy Association in Washington, D.C., said where the turbines are placed may be the key.
“Bats are not being [killed] at all the wind projects all over the country—it is happening in some places and not others,” she said.
“We’re trying to determine before construction what areas might be risky.”
Turbines create drops in pressure drop during normal operations, so the problem could possibly be addressed by changing when the turbines run, according to BCI’s Tuttle.
“A large portion of the kills occur at the lowest wind speeds,” he said, “and at those low speeds [the turbines] are not generating appreciable electricity anyway.”
Bats also are at particular risk during migration periods in late summer and early fall, when many turbine related fatalities occur.
Arnett, Baerwald, and others are currently conducting tests to see if raising the “cut-in” wind speed at which rotors begin to turn will save bats—particularly during peak migration periods.
“It won’t eliminate the problem, but it’s a good step in the right direction,” Tuttle said.
TBP plan is selfish and undoable. Don’t worry about its chances for implementation.
Firstly, T Boone owns the water rights below the ground, which he hope to construct windmills on. His investment in water was first and he wants to run a pipeline down from west Tx to DFW. With that, he now hopes to run the transmission from his windfarm he’s proposing.
He’s come up with this plan to get his gas fields in high demand, so he can then use the void in those reservoirs as carbon storage sites.
The problem is, his wind power will only generate 33% of the nameplate capacity on those turbines and during period of time which demand is not the greatest. Gas generation is then required to make that 33% output, 100% reliable. W/o his intermittent resource being reliably backed up, his power contracts will not only fetch less money, they will be more short-term, two factors which impede the market penetration of exactly what his plan intends to accomplish.
Renewables are good w/o question, but they are going to cost a bundle. Not only does one have new capital costs in land and equipment, the cost for new transmission, plus the cost for the condemnation and purchase of new right-of-ways has to be considered, plus the arrangement of existing or new backup generation, typically gas but could be older coal. All this means the cost for wind and other renewables alike, will cost 3-4x the price of existing electricity from traditional resources.
T Boone is just trying to shed light on his end goal, new utility right-of-way, the single greatest hurdle utilities face today. With his ad campaign he is trying to get Americans and Texans alike, to grow in the understanding of the transmission requirement, necessary to get the energy sector more green.
Taken as a whole, his plan just like Al Gore’s 100% clean energy by 2018, is simply undoable.
Bats will evolve to survive new hazards in their environment.
Let’s see if I have this right. The government mandates and subsidizes a 10% profit margin for wind power producers, but gets their knickers all in a twist over the oil companies “windfall” profits which average out about 9% and demands an extra cut on top of the near 40% tax rate their already paying. I guess that makes perfect sense, if you’re a politician. I see Squeaker Pelosi has recently made a six figure investment in T. Boone’s doggle, but, move along, nothing to see here. I guess the rules are different for politicians, but I seem to recall Martha Stewart doing a stretch up the river for a deal that smelled like a garden full of American Beauties compared to this one.
johnnyb: The point is that wind turbines are an absolutely worthless “technology”, and the key stone of the global warming scammers.
I beg to differ. But it comes with qualifications. The fact is, based upon what I’ve read, much of what you say about wind is accurate — but only IF wind power is not coupled with a widely distributed transmission grid. Absent that, you’re largely right — wind is just a toy. But including that, it isn’t. For example, there’s this. Note that this DoE analysis is very dependent upon the assumption that widely distributed wind farms are interconnected. If that happens, much of the variability associated with individual farms disappears. Europe is thinking along the same lines.
The fact is, if you’re excited about the potential of any sort of renewable energy you have to think in terms of a regional or national overhaul of the transmission network. Is that a problem? Personally, I don’t think so. The existing system is so rickety and so “leaky” that unless you’re contemplating highly localized sources something has to be done regardless of what sources you prefer, be they some combination of wind, solar, nuclear, or whatever.
The existing network is very close to being overtaxed. It will not sustain the projected 30% increase in power requirements in the next couple of decades. It’s not like doing nothing is a viable option. Considering that, and assuming you’re amenable to replacing the existing scotch tape and baling wire grid with a national, “everything in” national power superhighway, consider this. Obviously this is just one estimate. But as far as I know, it is the first comprehensive estimate performed so far. The price tag: $60 billion.
That sounds like a lot, and perhaps it is. But what are the alternatives? I mean really — what are the alternatives?? Currently different regions have to rely on themselves to come up with a plan. johnnyb mentioned Texas, but only the Amarillo-to-Dallas corridor. My understanding is Texas is planning to wire the whole state, not just Amarillo-to-Dallas. Likewise, the northeast (New England and New York) is working on the same sort of idea. Western Europe as well.
This is not a scam. It does, however, require a different way of thinking. And finding a way to address NIMBY concerns will be a significant and difficult part of that. Then again, if you want to populate the country with nuclear plants instead of (or in addition to) wind and solar utilities — or just about anything else, for that matter, the same issues apply.
Andy,
Maybe the surviving bats will learn, maybe they won’t.
REPLY: An animal with a larger brain than a bat, deer, have not evolved in 100 years to learn to avoid cars. So how long will it take the bat to learn to avoid windmills? Natural selection may be a bit faster in bats, since they have a faster breed cycle/shorter life span. But still it will take many years. – Anthony
REPLY 2: It’s actually more complicated than just the length of the breeding cycle.
Currently the bats appear to exhibit behavior which causes them to fly too close to the windmills.
What percentage of the bat population exhibits this behavior? If it is a small percentage, then natural selection will probably occur quickly. If it is a large percentage natural selection will proceed slower or not at all based on some of the factors listed below (this list is by no means comprehensive):
Is this an innate behavior or is it learned?
If it is an innate behavior, is this behavior linked to improved survival in other circumstances or could this behavior genetically linked to other behaviors or physical attributes which improve survival. What disadvantage may be created by undoing this behavior?
If it is learned behavior, under what circumstances was it learned not involving windmills and is a large enough percentage of the bat population’s learning capabilities able to distinguish between the circumstances? Again, what disadvantage may be created by undoing this behavior?
I am not a mammalian biologist by any means, but determining circumstances for natural selection is not a simple task.
None of this absolves Anthony from being a killjoy and throwing a wet blanket on my most excellent post above the replies. ~ charles the moderator aka jeez
Correction of “There Will Be Oil”, should be “There Will Be Blood”
jeez that was a hilarious link. bat brains aside.
JackSimmons: We now know the Shell in situ process for extracting oil from the oil shale of the Green River basin has a yield of 72% of the hydrocarbons in the ground. This process avoids all the drawbacks (economic and environmental) of mining and cooking the shale.
I wouldn’t be so sure of that. The article you linked to estimated the EROI (energy return on energy investment) as somewhere between 3:1 and 7:1, quoting industry (and specifically Shell) employee estimates. That’s not so great, but okay in the current oil price environment (and assuming you don’t much care how much GHGs are spewed into the atmosphere, which I assume is a gimme on this site). However, this article, which reports on a more recent and peer-reviewed analysis, pegs the EROI at between 1.2:1 and 1.6:1. That’s a big difference. And if their numbers are accurate, Shell is going to have significant problems making oil shale profitable, even independent of the GHG issue. Also, FWIW, CO Sen. Ken Salazar (D) recently ran a cautionary op-ed on the subject. Salazar is generally considered to be well-informed on such matters.
Have you ever heard of windlets?
I’m stuck deciding between the Pickens plan and the Paris plan.
http://www.funnyordie.com/videos/64ad536a6d.
T Bone is cute, but once Peta gets wind of the bat genocide, then the Paris
plan will probably prevail.
REPLY: Or they’ll join forces and we’ll have the Peta-Paris-Pickens Plan – Anthony
By the way, if you’re interested in following various energy alternatives through their “life cycles” (i.e., in terms of EROI — energy return on investment, aka “ratio of energy produced to energy expended) I highly recommend the six-part series on the Oil Drum blog by Nate Hagens. The link I just provided is to Part 6, but it contains links to the previous 5. I can’t suggest you believe every word he says (for one thing, some of his data are dated), but it’s a very good starting point. He’s very thorough, so he gives a very good feel for the details you have to pay attention to if you want to get a handle on EROI issues.
Ricorun (12:36:12) :
Do the lower EROI estimates include sequestration of the carbon?
Not clear from the article you cited.
You are correct about the GHG assumptions for CO2.
I do not believe CO2 has more than a very small impact on our climate.
After spending 30 years working under, atop, and around windmills I can say (of the old ones anyway) they have little more than ornamental value. The cows must have water, rancher’s use diesel.
Becalmed is a very old word used to describe a ship sitting idle in a windless sea.
Do the lower EROI estimates include sequestration of the carbon?
No. That would be a little hard to do, considering there are yet no viable CCS technologies available. At least not for use in that context.
Hey T. Boone,
what ya gonna do?
What ya gonna do
when the bats sue you?
OK. So windpower is 3 times as expensive and 1/3 as reliable as nuclear power. If TBP (and strange bed-fellow Speaker NP) want to free up natural gas as a motor fuel, put in a bunch of new nuclear stations. That way you also won’t need to keep 2/3 of the gas freed up as stand-by for when there is no wind (plus keep all those gas-fired plants in stand-by operation, which also costs money).
But maybe both TBP and NP are betting on making a buck or two from the wind farm proposal.
On the other hand, the “bat” problem really leaves me cold. To keep a curious 2-year old from sticking his fingers into a home fan, the designers simply put a shield around it. If we can send a man to the moon, we can surely figure out how to put a shield around the wind fans, as well.
But this doesn’t change the fact that wind farms are a batty idea.
Max
Birds and bats aside, having recently returned from Alberta I would have to say the wind farms there are the most hideous man made blot on the planet I have ever seen.
Just at a first estimate wouldn’t a windshield fine enough to disuade bats cost a fortune and cut power production per dollar invested about in half.
Bats in a blender
Slim Pickens for dough
Sierra clubbed mytosis
Doth windmills seem to sow
Michael Haubner sez:
What sane person could possibly have a ‘quandary’ weighing up the welfare of bats vers humans? And what do we mean save the planet? Is it epxected to go somewhere? Or is global warming expected to vapourise x squillion tonnes of rock?
I hate cliches.
***************
Me: Umm, bats eat upwards of 100 gazillion insects every night. Birds eat another 100 gazillion insects every day. I assume that you don’t want to die of Malaria, West Nile, or any of the handful of really squikky illnesses that are insect-borne.
The die-off of these species *IS* an issue, whether you like it or not.
FWIW, I happen to think that wind farms are beautiful (as the extensive one around Sweetwater, TX). That being said, the die-off is a *very* bad thing.
julie, and I want to make it clear that I am not being facetious, your use of the words, squillion, gazillion, squikky, made for a charming and most excellent post.
Your point about the value of bats to the ecosystem is also dead on.
Yes everyone, I’m having a most excellent day.
Solar and wind power generation have been around for years. Mother Earth magazine ran articles on the use of solar and wind for the generation of electricity in the ’60s as well as building a still for producing your own ethanol for vehicle fuel.
The local production of ethanol may be economical for the individual. In a government program, ethanol has undesirable side effects mainly due to use of food commodities as the basis for its production and also that it cannot compete economically without government subsidies.
Compared to other electrical power generating plants, solar and wind are land area intensive. Five thousand of the turbines at Altamont require 50 acres of land. Cleantech America, a San Francisco based developer, has launched a project to build the world’s largest solar farm. When completed in 2011, the 80-megawatt spread of solar panels will cover roughly 640 acres and be 17 times the size of the largest US solar farm in existence. The project, will generate enough power for nearly 21,000 homes.
Solar and wind are intermittent power sources and make sense to some local home owners who can also afford a bank of batteries to supply power when the solar and wind are not providing the necessary energy.
If solar and wind require frequent back-up, why not use the back-up all the time?
I presume, T. Boone will tie his turbines into the grid, where they will provide their intermittent power and replace the methane powered plants. But wait, we need back-up for the turbines, so what do we use to provide the back-up?
We need an extensive and intensive multi-year study on the bat problem, funded by T. Boone.
Will someone please inform T. Boone that we are not transferring 700 billion dollars to the “oilies.” It is an exchange of value, a purchase. When I buy gasoline, I do not transfer dollars to the station owner, I exchange the value of my money for the value of his gasoline.
“FWIW, I happen to think that wind farms are beautiful (as the extensive one around Sweetwater, TX).” Julie
Maybe when we have enough nukes, we can run them backwards as fans.
Ray Reynolds: Beautiful.
Birds and bats aside, having recently returned from Alberta I would have to say the wind farms there are the most hideous man made blot on the planet I have ever seen.
I don’t suppose you visited the tar sand mines, eh?
julie,
I second jeez’s opinion of your post. Your are sweet. Forgive my joke at your expense. OK?
Your -> You