Wind Energy Development and Wildlife Conservation: Challenges and Opportunities

Abstract

Wind energy development represents significant challenges and opportunities in contemporary wildlife management. Such challenges include the large size and extensive placement of turbines that may represent potential hazards to birds and bats. However, the associated infrastructure required to support an array of turbines—such as roads and transmission lines—represents an even larger potential threat to wildlife than the turbines themselves because such infrastructure can result in extensive habitat fragmentation and can provide avenues for invasion by exotic species. There are numerous conceptual research opportunities that pertain to issues such as identifying the best and worst placement of sites for turbines that will minimize impacts on birds and bats. Unfortunately, to date very little research of this type has appeared in the peer‐reviewed scientific literature; much of it exists in the form of unpublished reports and other forms of gray literature. In this paper, we summarize what is known about the potential impacts of wind farms on wildlife and identify a 3‐part hierarchical approach to use the scientific method to assess these impacts. The Lower Gulf Coast (LGC) of Texas, USA, is a region currently identified as having a potentially negative impact on migratory birds and bats, with respect to wind farm development. This area is also a region of vast importance to wildlife from the standpoint of native diversity, nature tourism, and opportunities for recreational hunting. We thus use some of the emergent issues related to wind farm development in the LGC—such as siting turbines on cropland sites as opposed to on native rangelands—to illustrate the kinds of challenges and opportunities that wildlife managers must face as we balance our demand for sustainable energy with the need to conserve and sustain bird migration routes and corridors, native vertebrates, and the habitats that support them.

A Habitat-based Wind-Wildlife Collision Model with Application to the Upper Great Plains Region

“…Despite the large potential for wind energy production in the US (AWEA 2009) and the minimal carbon emissions that occur from producing this power, the proliferation of wind energy has some drawbacks, including land disturbance caused by the installation of a wind facility, potential decline in aesthetics of a landscape, difficulty in attaining public acceptance, and threats to aerial and terrestrial wildlife (Kunz et al 2007a;Kuvlesky et al 2007). Wind project facilities pose two possible hazards to wildlife: the potential for mortality (i.e., collisions with wind turbines and associated power lines) and the potential for habitat effects (Kuvlesky et al 2007). While both collisions and habitat effects can impact wildlife, this study examined collision hazards only; other studies currently being funded by the US Department of Energy (DOE) are examining habitat displacement effects.…”

“…Despite the large potential for wind energy production in the US (AWEA 2009) and the industry's minimal carbon emissions, the proliferation of wind energy has some drawbacks, including land disturbance needed to install a wind facility, potential decline in aesthetics of a landscape, public acceptance, and threats to aerial and terrestrial wildlife (Kunz et al 2007a;Kuvlesky et al 2007). …”

“…Wind energy facilities pose two possible hazards to wildlife: the potential for mortality (i.e., collisions with wind turbines and associated lines) and the potential for habitat effects (Kuvlesky et al 2007). These possible hazards are influenced by and can be understood from speciesspecific habitat preferences and behavioral characteristics.…”

High passage rates and different seasonal migration strategies of birds along the lower Texas coast

“…It also allows managers to determine whether management strategies are effective for bird-habitat conservation (Faaborg et al, 2010). The need to better understand bird migration is particularly relevant given the recent upsurge of development interests along the lower Texas coast, particularly large-scale wind farms (Kuvlesky et al, 2007). Wind energy development has the potential to greatly impact migratory birds through large-scale habitat alteration, as well as creating obstructions within the airspace that can become problematic when these manmade structures correspond to height of migratory movement (Kuvlesky et al, 2007).…”

Responses of male Greater Prairie-Chickens to wind energy development

“…In 2008, the U.S. Department of Energy set a benchmark that 20% of U.S. energy demand should be met by domestic wind energy by 2030 (U.S. Department of Energy 2008, Obermeyer et al 2011. However, renewable energy development presents potential conflicts with conservation of sensitive species of wildlife (Drewitt and Langston 2006, Kuvlesky et al 2007, Smallwood and Thelander 2008, Obermeyer et al 2011, Pearce-Higgins et al 2012. Migratory birds and bats are at risk of population-level impacts associated with broad-scale wind energy development (Kunz et al 2007).…”