October 18, 2010
Arkansas
Arkansas
Bats scuttle plans for NW Arkansas wind farms
Associated Press, www.katv.com 18 October 2010
Associated Press, www.katv.com 18 October 2010
An endangered species of bat living in northwest Arkansas has scuttled plans to build wind farms in the region.
Invenergy, a Chicago-based company, has told Washington County residents the presence of the Ozark big-eared bat means it has to halt development of the wind farms.
Washington County planning director Juliet Richey tells the Northwest Arkansas Times that Invenergy already had approached several landowners about the planned project and had set up two meteorological towers in the area to collect data.
David Kampwerth, a karst biologist for the Arkansas field office of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, says bats can be killed when their organs and lungs implode due the changes in air compression from the turning of wind turbine blades.
He says about there are only about 1,700 living Ozark big-eared bats.
Information from: Northwest Arkansas Times, http://www.nwanews.com/times/
URL to article: https://www.wind-watch.org/news/2010/10/18/bats-scuttle-plans-for-nw-arkansas-wind-farms/