Resource Library Category: Wildlife (156 items)
Documents presented here are not the product of nor are they necessarily endorsed by National Wind Watch. This resource library is provided to assist anyone wishing to research the issue of industrial wind power and the impacts of its development. The information should be evaluated by each reader to come to their own conclusions about the many areas of debate.
FWS letter against Garden Peninsula wind energy development
Source: Hicks, Scott
… Based on the data currently available, we must once again recommend that you not construct a commercial wind energy development on the Garden Peninsula, because of the high potential for avian mortalities and violations of Federal wildlife laws. Since 2007, our office has expressed significant concerns with this project. Our concerns are based on several factors, including the proximity of the project to a Great Lakes shoreline and Big Bay de Noc, the proximity of the project to adjacent wetland habitats, and the fact that this peninsula will tend to funnel avian migrants and serve as a point of departure or arrival for birds crossing Lake Michigan. These factors are all likely to lead to a high level of avian use on the Garden Peninsula that could result in high levels of avian mortality by wind turbines at the proposed project site.
Because of our concerns, in our early project correspondence with Dr. Paul Kerlinger on December 18, 2007, we recommended that no turbines be constructed within three miles of a Great Lakes shoreline. On June 25, 2009, in a letter to Mr. Rick Wilson, we again recommended that no turbines be sited within three miles of the shoreline and further recognized that it would be very difficult to achieve this three-mile distance at any place within the Garden Peninsula. In 2011, Heritage presented our office with data collected specifically for this project site and this data … has validated our wildlife related concerns for this proposed project.
We were in the process of finalizing additional information that you had requested concerning our bald eagle risk assessment, when we received your October 18, 2011, letter transmitting a “Comprehensive Avian Risk Assessment for the Garden Peninsula Wind Energy Project, Delta County, Michigan” (September 2011, Curry & Kerlinger, LLC-9-27-11). Your letter indicated that you accepted the conclusions of the Curry & Kerlinger Risk Assessment and intended to move forward with construction of the wind energy development, regardless of our previous recommendations and wildlife concerns.
First, we strongly disagree with the conclusions presented in the Curry & Kerlinger Risk Assessment. The data available suggests that construction of a commercial wind energy development on Garden Peninsula is likely to pose a very high risk for avian mortalities, including a high risk for bald eagle mortalities. The Service will provide you with a more detailed response related to our concerns about the Curry & Kerlinger Risk Assessment in the near future.
Second, although we have appreciated your periodic efforts to coordinate with our office as your project planning has progressed, you have failed to sufficiently collect and analyze comprehensive information concerning avian use of the project area prior to construction. The Service recommends that this information is collected and analyzed well in advance of project construction so that it is available to inform project siting. Additionally, you do not appear to be adequately considering the limited data you have collected. The proposed turbine locations are in areas where you have documented high avian use and thus are not adequately set back from the Great lakes shoreline or other important wildlife habitats. Therefore, we continue to recommend that the project be substantially reevaluated or abandoned. …
Scott Hicks
Field Supervisor
Fish and Wildlife Service
East Lansing Field Office (ES)
2651 Coolidge Road, Suite 101
East Lansing, Michigan 48823-6316
[November 4, 2011, to Ms. Xio Cordoba, Heritage Sustainable Energy, 121 East Front Street, Traverse City, MI 49684-2570]
Destruction of Lowell Mountain, Sat. Nov. 19, 2011
Source: Mountain Talk
More photos at http://picasaweb.google.com/114098560210816181304/. Via Mountain Talk.
Construction in the Mojave Desert and Grassland
Source: Basin and Range Watch
November 14, 2011 – Photos of construction on large wind projects in the Mojave Desert and Tehachapi Mountains area, Kern County, California. Photos were taken over the period of 2010 to 2011. Photos are by Basin and Range Watch (where more photos are available) unless otherwise labeled.
Mojave Fragmentation
Friends of Mojave took these photos of industrialization of west Mojave ecosystems around the town of Mojave. This area has seen a boom in wind projects on the flat desert and slopes of the Tehachapi Range.
Large swaths of Joshua tree (Yucca brevifolia) woodland and creosote desert are destroyed on a wind project. (Photo: Friends of Mojave)
A pile of bulldozed and uprooted Joshua trees ten feet high to make way for wind turbines. (Photo: Friends of Mojave)
Fragmentation of a Mojave Desert ecosystem at the transition to the Tehachapi Range. (Photo: Friends of Mojave)
Deep hole and pad for cement foundation for a single turbine. (Photo: Friends of Mojave)
Dust clouds from construction. (Photo: Friends of Mojave)
Towers and crane. (Photo: Friends of Mojave)
Even when new, oil leaks out of a nacelle. (Photo: Friends of Mojave)
Mojave Desert scrub meets grassland of the Tehachapi Range, now divided up by roads everywhere. (Photo: Friends of Mojave)
Forest of industrial Wind Turbine Generators. (Photo: Friends of Mojave)
Friends of Mojave go to Bakersfield to protest the wind projects surrounding their town, asking supervisors to stop the industrialization. (Photo: Friends of Mojave)
Wind protest, October 2011. (Photo: Friends of Mojave)
(Photo: Friends of Mojave)
Joshua Tree Destruction
Wind project under construction: new roads and pads graded into the Mojave Desert on a an overcast winter day west of the town of Mojave.
New road and pad for a single wind turbine, in the middle of a Joshua tree woodland.
Powerlines feed off wind projects.
New roads in the desert must be wide to accommodate over-sized trucks.
Road grading on a wind project.
Single wind turbine pad 100 feet across.
Tehachapi Mountains Along the Pacific Crest Trail
Summer 2010, the Pacific Crest Trail through the Oak Creek area of Tehachapi Mountains. The trail stretches from Mexico to Canada, and dips into lower grassland, oak woodland, and Joshua tree desert in this part of southern California. In the distant upper right hills can be seen a new road and construction machinery for a wind turbine pad.
Trail sign at a trailhead.
View from the trail: Joshua trees, Gray pines (Pinus sabiniana), and a stream woodland with wind projects on the grasslands.
Wind projects encroach into wild grasslands full of wildflowers and rare plants.
Towers and crane in grassland.
The Tehachapi Mountains have abundant native bunchgrasses such as this Nodding needlegrass (Stipa cernua).
Enormous towers on pads cut into hill slopes.
Over-sized truck with tower piece must access the hills.
Roads and pads along ridge. The Pacific Crest Trail was diverted from this spot to go around the wind project.
Wind project construction on once wild ridge.
New pad and access road.
Native wildflowers bloom in summer here: Sapphire flower (Eriastrum eremicum).
Roads and wind turbine pads scar the mountain and disturb habitat. Pronghorn antelope (Antilocapra americana) have been seen in these grasslands.
Wind project from central yard. Trucks parked carry single turbine blades.
Construction.
Wide entrance road from the paved highway, into the wind project site.
New wide road over a creek, with pipe for the water, and willows torn out.
New turbines.
Tower sections in yard.
Yard and ongoing construction.
New road bulldozed into a desert grassland with junipers and Joshua trees.
Buried line in the hills.
Entrance to wind project access road.
Transport
The wind turbine parts are huge. Over-size trucks need to transport them on wide roads.
Part of a turbine tower, not the complete tower.
Lowell Mountain road and site building
Source: Vt. Department of Environmental Conservation
Vermont Department of Environmental Conservation photos from Nov. 10, 2011, by courtesy of Mountain Talk (more photos at source; click photos below to enlarge).
