Planned wind farm told it will need to shut down for five months a year to protect parrots

cross-posted from: https://exploding-heads.com/post/68636

Amid global plans to ramp up wind power capacity in the years ahead, the interaction of wind turbines with the natural world — including marine and bird life — is likely to become a key area of debate.

The U.K.-based Royal Society for the Protection of Birds warns that wind farms "can harm birds through disturbance, displacement, acting as barriers, habitat loss and collision," adding that "impacts can arise from a single development and cumulatively multiple projects."

The U.S. Energy Information Administration has said that some wind projects and turbines can result in bat and bird casualties.

"These deaths may contribute to declines in the population of species also affected by other human-related impacts," it notes. "The wind energy industry and the U.S. government are researching ways to reduce the effect of wind turbines on birds and bats."