Guest essay by Eric Worrall
“If we let these developments go ahead, the biodiversity will be gone long before climate change starts affecting it”
Climate change: Green energy plant threat to wilderness areas
By Matt McGrathEnvironment correspondent
Wind, solar and hydro power installations pose a growing threat to key conservation areas, say researchers.
Researchers found that over 2,200 green energy plants have been built within the boundaries of the Earth’s remaining wilderness.
They say that around 17% of renewable facilities globally are located in protected regions.
A further 900 plants are now being developed in key areas of biodiversity.
The amount of renewable energy facilities in use around the world has essentially tripled over the last 20 years.
Green energy facilities are often much larger than fossil fuel power plants, with wind and solar needing areas of land up to 10 times greater than coal or gas to produce the same amount of energy.
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The authors of the report say that greater care must be taken when planning and permitting renewable facilities.
“If we let these developments go ahead, the biodiversity will be gone long before climate change starts affecting it,” said Dr Allan.
“We acknowledge that there is a risk that we will arm some sceptics, but anyone who reads the work will understand that we are not saying that renewables are bad, we just need to put them in the right places.”
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Read more: https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-52023881
The abstract of the report;
Renewable energy development threatens many globally important biodiversity areas
Jose A. Rehbein, James E. M. Watson, Joe L. Lane, Laura J. Sonter, Oscar Venter, Scott C. Atkinson, James R. Allan
First published: 04 March 2020
Transitioning from fossil fuels to renewable energy is fundamental for halting anthropogenic climate change. However, renewable energy facilities can be land‐use intensive and impact conservation areas, and little attention has been given to whether the aggregated effect of energy transitions poses a substantial threat to global biodiversity. Here, we assess the extent of current and likely future renewable energy infrastructure associated with onshore wind, hydropower and solar photovoltaic generation, within three important conservation areas: protected areas (PAs), Key Biodiversity Areas (KBAs) and Earth’s remaining wilderness. We identified 2,206 fully operational renewable energy facilities within the boundaries of these conservation areas, with another 922 facilities under development. Combined, these facilities span and are degrading 886 PAs, 749 KBAs and 40 distinct wilderness areas. Two trends are particularly concerning. First, while the majority of historical overlap occurs in Western Europe, the renewable electricity facilities under development increasingly overlap with conservation areas in Southeast Asia, a globally important region for biodiversity. Second, this next wave of renewable energy infrastructure represents a ~30% increase in the number of PAs and KBAs impacted and could increase the number of compromised wilderness areas by ~60%. If the world continues to rapidly transition towards renewable energy these areas will face increasing pressure to allow infrastructure expansion. Coordinated planning of renewable energy expansion and biodiversity conservation is essential to avoid conflicts that compromise their respective objectives.
Read more (paywalled): https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/gcb.15067
It has always seemed a little odd that people who claim to love natural spaces doggedly defend the right of greedy green industrialists to clear fell thousands of acres of their beloved wilderness, to build yet another pointless wind turbine farm or solar installation.
Good to see nature lovers are finally getting fed up with wholesale destruction of important wilderness areas in the name of green progress.
Every country should pass a law that all wind turbines and solar plants should be built in urban and suburban locations, perhaps with homeless shelters at the base of each one. That’s where the highest electricity use is so that’s where the generation units should be in order to lessen transmission costs. It would also serve the public good by housing the homeless.
I assure you it wouldn’t take long before there would be no more wind mills or solar plants built.
I quite agree with you .Indeed I have said that to many before and a long time ago – no new Transmission Pylons in the Highlands of Scotland where there was quite a rumpus about “damage to the Scenery” or to the soil when cables were buried ( in the ‘rock’ ) Nobody batted an eye when during the course of one of these Cable RAISING stints ( Across the Trunk Road, one night) a Red Deer Stag got his Antlers entangled in the Cables as it was being winched up. You can just imagine the consternation etc and the Delay to traffic for a considerable while as the engineers in the Dark tried to fathom out just what was happening to the cable. …..
As for providing shelter homes for the Homeless – a great and Noble idea …. – would they appreciate the “low-level” noise ?
My guess is that most of them already have “low level” noise in their heads. They wouldn’t notice a little more!
https://www.flickr.com/photos/187678696@N08/shares/EiyF49
Pflash,
Sadly, that probably isn’t enough wind turbines to provide the load for even one of the skyscrapers!
And worse, once you have enough wind turbines, the grid stability collapses. I think when you get close to enough, the system becomes unstable and self destructs. I am oversimplifying, but hey, I am working from home… and wanted to chime in to these great posts!
I haven’t seen mention of , for instance- today’s generation, that Wind has not been large, Demand not that high either in the Morning, yet COAL – that BLACK STUFF was being burnt to supply around 4 or 5% of requirements. ( See Gridwatch variants ) Solar and wind appear o have fallen this pas few days
Saighdear, “…yet COAL – that BLACK STUFF was being burnt…”
The black stuff, if that is what they burn, is much better than the brown coal.
Could you tell us what your point was, other than the color of a source of energy in all caps?
My point was clear that wind turbines cause grid instability, which gets worse as more of the grid is energized by wind. There are many reasons for why that is true.
Indeed the Black stuff is better than the Brown stuff – you mean Brown Coal or Peat ? – or OTHER brown stuffs ( Straw etc ) As for Grid instability … Yes I do know a fair bit about those things. WE call it Hysteresis in a different field – at least as far as explaining to the Lay-man. It is a lot more serious in Generation circles ( not true hysteresis )
My Point was ? Observe the performance of the Generators on Gridwatch and other similar sites. For all the Trumpet Blowing of the green brigade and Politco MSM monkeys you would be seeing that over the past few days,Wind & Solar hasn’t produced very much and that COAL – the BLACK STUFF ( = Carbon!) had to be burnt. From Memory . Nuclear also got in on the act. Good job they are all still functional and pity we didn’t have more.
I have to burn Tons of coal because Wood will not dry sufficiently in this part of the country. Steel on my machinery housed indoors is soaked with condensation and we cannot get sufficient Electric power supplied On-Grid since we are at the end of the Line AND yet have Industrial 3-Phase power available on 3 sides of our property but costs £thousands to get in. So it’s Coal and diesel to do what we need. Got it ? 🙂
Saighdear: You are charming and extremely colorful in your use of words. That was an enjoyable post to read. Ah.. the brown coal is lignite, low quality vs black coal, which produces less pollution. I got it!
Mario
Wow Mario! as we say up here, ‘Flattery gets you ‘k’nowhere’ Indeed Brown coal is ( still) what’s open cast mined in Germany. I know all that – and other things too. but FYI, I also referred to fuels such as wood, straw, grasses, and any other ‘Bio’ – was the word I couldn’t find last night.
Although once upon a time, our Teachers kinda spoon-fed us ( rightly or no – based on current thinking / methods etc ) we were still encouraged to look and think for ourselves. We live in a topsy turvy world where Black is white, Up is down and yes means know, No means we are unsure and don’t want you to object etc. and of course there is a solution to the square root of -1 . As for a solution to Idiocy, meantime I fear the only one is Pb with rather drastic effects. I wish they wold come up with a better one than throwing Paper £$ at it. Coins are not much better than Pb. Capito? & Stay safe
Here’s what I read just this morning about Scotland, “Now statistics, released by Forestry and Land Scotland, show that 13.9 million trees have been axed to make way for 21 wind farm projects since 2000.”
And then this,” A Scottish conservation charity, which has planted almost two million trees across the Highlands, believes that both wind farms and trees are key to reducing carbon levels. Steve Micklewright, CEO of Trees for Life, said: “It seems deeply ironic that trees are being felled to make way for windfarms when both healthy growing forests and renewable energy are important in resolving the global climate emergency.””
Hmmm.
Here’s the link to the article:
https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2020/02/29/14m-trees-have-been-cut-down-in-scotland-to-make-way-for-wind-farms/
That picture was from the build up for D-day Normandy. Seen it many times in WW II references.