Reader Richard Lyman submits this story from AP and the “What we all knew but Washington would never admit because it stinks to high heaven department“.
It is about how certain green interests get a pass on Endangered Species Act laws everyone else would get prosecuted on, but these greens get a pass based solely on their ideology. No, we aren’t talking about the recent IRS scandal where conservative groups are targeted, though it bears a striking resemblance to that story.
CONVERSE COUNTY, Wyo. (AP) — It happens about once a month here, on the barren foothills of one of America’s green-energy boomtowns: A soaring golden eagle slams into a wind farm’s spinning turbine and falls, mangled and lifeless, to the ground.
Killing these iconic birds is not just an irreplaceable loss for a vulnerable species. It’s also a federal crime, a charge that the Obama administration has used to prosecute oil companies when birds drown in their waste pits, and power companies when birds are electrocuted by their power lines.
But the administration has never fined or prosecuted a wind-energy company, even those that flout the law repeatedly. Instead, the government is shielding the industry from liability and helping keep the scope of the deaths secret.
Source: http://entertainment.verizon.com/news/read.php?id=19636464&ps=1018&srce=news_class&action=1&lang=en&_LT=UNLC_NKNWU00L1_UNEWS
Richard opines:
It is fascinating how the fossil fuel based industries are held financially accountable for bird deaths (even from electrocutions!) but wind farms get a free pass. It would appear that if standards were applied evenly across the board, the fines to wind powered electricity generating facilities for bird slaughter would exceed the subsidies they receive for construction and operation.
It could really be a win/win for the government: a mechanism for perpetual funding. As a small town elected official, I am amazed that none of our Washington bureaucrats have seized upon this golden opportunity. Of course, the Audubon Society may take a different view.
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Chad,
“The turbine would only need to slow enough to ensure with ~95% certainty that the bird would pass through unmolested. This would require”
The technology does not exist to predict the flight path of a living bird (or bat) with sufficient accuracy to achieve your stated confidence short of stopping the blades all together.
“1) radar determination of where the bird is (and whether it is a bird we care about, or a pigeon)”
Given the size of the targets and your desire to differentiate species, active sonar would probably be a better choice and may have the added advantage of repelling bats away from the turbines.
“3) Knowledge of the minimum turbine speed that would cause sufficient turbulence to generate a shock wave capable of causing internal injury to the bird.”
It’s not just the shock wave ahead of the leading edge of the blade that can cause internal injuries. The low pressure zone behind the trailing edge can cause decompression injuries. This latter is the primary cause of bat kills by modern wind turbines.
As for the timing of these AP and ABC stories, look no further than Holder going after the AP leakers. This is retaliation, digging up old dirt, and it could get interesting. Might even PBS turn against Obama? (I doubt it.) –AGF
Who in the world could be in favor of these policies? I mean besides crooks ,elected and otherwise, and windmill salesmen – but I’m being redundant.
@ur momisugly Matt S says: The technology does not exist to predict the flight path of a living bird (or bat) with sufficient accuracy to achieve your stated confidence short of stopping the blades all together.
So you are saying the tech does exist. It involves a wrench. You toss it in the gears. Problem solved. As a bonus it cures the intermittent power spike problem also.
I think we need to document a condor killed by the wind farmers. A body with it’s special monitor tags or video of a condor being chopped out of the sky. It’s a given that the wind mill operators will block access to the scene of their crimes. Perhaps unmanned drones could hover over the area, to get around that.
And let’s say the murdering son’s of beaches complain about being spied on to their henchmen in office and focus attention on the clever use of spy drones. Pass special laws against their use and such.
All the better.