Wolfe Island Wind Farm Still one of most Dangerous for Birds, Bats

Tree Swallow via Marshall Segal on Flickr

TransAlta has just released its fourth Report on bird and bat monitoring from its Wolfe Island wind plant located on the west side of Wolfe Island, near Kingston Ontario.

The report affirms that TransAlta's Wolfe Island Wind Energy plant is one of the most destructive for birds and bats in North America.

Easily visible from the Kingston waterfront, the 86 turbines continue to kill large numbers of birds and bats. Most of the casualties described in the report are the same species reported in the three previous TransAlta studies of bird and bat deaths at their Wolfe Island plant, with Tree Swallow and Purple Martin at the top of the list, and including Bobolink and Barn Swallow, both listed as Threatened by the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada (COSEWIC).

All of the Ontario swallow species listed in the report are suffering long-term population declines, which makes the unforeseen impacts of the wind energy plant on wildlife all the more troubling. Only two raptors casualties were reported, which may be more a reflection of reduced search efforts in this period, although winter raptor surveys on the island revealed higher numbers of several species compared with the previous year, in particular, Rough-legged Hawk and Short-eared Owl. However, raptors do not appear to be using the habitat on which the wind plant in the north-west corner of the island is situated, and where the turbine density is highest. Three migratory species of bats, including Hoary, Eastern Red, and Silver-haired, comprised the balance of the bat casualties. Unlike birds, which are struck by the fast spinning tips of the turbine blades, bats are killed due to "barotrauma," a condition caused by the sudden change of pressure around the blades that result in damage to their lungs.

The report presents the findings of monitoring programs that began in June 2009, which will produce reports approximately every 6 months over the first three years of the wind plant's operations. The current report represents the third six-month period of monitoring. (The first Report was for a two-month period). Several aspects of the plant's impact on birds and bats are monitored, including casualty rates of birds and bats, displacement of waterfowl and distribution and behaviour of raptors.

The results of the report reinforce the significance for birds and bats of the open scrubland habitat on the offshore islands at the eastern end of Lake Ontario, and onshore alvar habitats such as those found on Ostrander Point in Prince Edward County or Amherst Island. Wind energy plants, transmission towers, and other types of developments that put birds and bats at high risk should be excluded from these significant areas. All of Wolfe Island and a portion of its surrounding waters were recognized as a globally significant Important Bird Area (IBA) by BirdLife International's Canadian partners, Nature Canada and Bird Studies Canada.

Taken together, the reports show that TransAlta's Wolfe Island Wind Energy plant has one of the highest annual rates of casualties, reporting 16.5 birds per turbine and 43.7 bats per turbine, based on the 6 month study period from July 1 to December 31, 2010. Over a year, this would amount to approximately 1,500 birds and about 3,800 bats. Only one wind plant of the 45 reported on in a landmark 2010 study cited in the TransAlta Report by the US National Wind Coordinating Committee killed more birds per turbine. That plant, the Buffalo Mountain Wind Farm in Tennessee, which is consisted of only three .66 MW turbines at the time of the study, and so makes for a poor comparison. Most wind energy projects have much lower casualty rates for birds and bats.

It is also becoming clear that the July to September period (when the Swallows congregate and the bats migrate) is the most devastating for birds and bats. In my view, it is time that TransAlta implement serious mitigation, and turn off the turbines during this high risk period. This would save the lives of hundreds, if not thousands of birds and bats.

Wolfe Island Wind Plant Still Harming Birds in Important Bird Area

Last May, I blogged about a report that described how birds and bats have been affected by the TransAlta wind plant on Wolfe Island, a globally significant Important Bird Area in southern Ontario known for its waterfowl, raptors and swallows. I called the numbers of birds and bats being killed by TransAlta’s turbines “shockingly high,” indeed the highest recorded in Canada and one of the highest in North America.

However, since the report only studied a six month period, TransAlta’s spokespeople argued that it was premature to reach conclusions so soon, especially when comparing the Wolfe Island deaths to yearly casualty rates for other wind plants. Besides, TransAlta reasoned, the results appeared to be within the thresholds of acceptable limits set by provincial and federal government regulators.

Then last month, Stantec Consulting, the firm that produced the original report, released its report on the second half of the year: January 1, 2010 to July 1, 2010. And the results for birds are troubling. (I’ll write about bats in a future post.) Though casualty numbers for birds did not skyrocket in the second sixth month period, a time that included the spring migration, they still were high enough to make the Wolfe Island wind plant the most deadly for birds in Canada.

The 13.4 birds per turbine casualty rate is about 7 times the industry average in Canada according to Canadian Wind Energy Association (CANWEA) but below the so-called “adaptive management” threshold for TransAlta facility, as set by various government agencies. That level is 11.7 birds per MW which translates to 21 birds per turbine, which just happens to be the highest level ever recorded at any wind facility in North America (Buffalo Mountain, Tennessee). Using the highest level recorded as the threshold before which any mitigation is even considered seems a bit dubious to say the least.

Estimated and actual numbers of birds killed, proportioned by the species actually found, over the entire 12 month period, paints a disturbing picture:
Tree Swallow 218 (calculation based on 31 corpses)
Purple Martin 49 (calculation based on 7 corpses)
Bobolink 73 (calculation based on 9 corpses)
Wilson’s Snipe 50 (calculation based on 7 corpses)
Red-tailed Hawk 10 (actual count)

It is important to note that the calculated numbers are arrived at using Stantec’s formula to calculate total casualty rates. A sample of turbines are visited either weekly or twice a week and a search for bird corpses on the ground beneath the blades is conducted. As the method is not intended as a comprehensive search, determining the casualty rate requires taking in factors like the ability of the search team to find carcasses, the percentage of the area searched and the rate of predation between searches. The 31 Tree Swallow corpses, in other words, represent about 15% of the calculated number of tree swallows killed, based on Stantec’s calculations and field testing.

While the report and the research behind it appear to be quite solid, the authors contend that the casualty rates are quite sustainable and will not have any effect on the species populations. They do this by contrasting the kill numbers from the turbines with the estimated Ontario population of the most affected species – Tree Swallow, numbering about 400,000 and Bobolink, about 800,000. (They do not do this for Red-tailed Hawk, which in fact may not meet their sustainability criteria). They also contrasted the numbers with estimates of birds killed by other human activities or artifices such as tall buildings, vehicles, cell towers, and pets.

While this argument has gained considerable traction among some in the wind industry and even the scientific community, it fails to consider that the turbines at Wolfe Island are killing different species than the tall buildings, cats and cars. Tree Swallow, Purple Martin, Red-tailed Hawk, Turkey Vulture and Bobolink rarely if ever show up on lists of casualties from tall buildings, and are unlikely victims of cats, with the possible exception of the Bobolink. And vehicle collisions, well – while this is a legitimate concern, Turkey Vultures have arguably had a net benefit from the carnage caused by vehicles.

But it is some of these very species – the ones most likely to be harmed by Wolfe Island’s turbines – that are already experiencing declines.

Take swallows, for example. Most species of swallow have declined significantly in Canada over the past 20 years. Adding additional threats to already stressed populations is not prudent. According to trend data on this species from Breeding Bird Survey routes in Ontario, the Tree Swallow has declined by about 6% annually over the past 20 years, a cumulative decline of almost 80%! In other words, the current estimated population of 400,000, was 2 million only 20 years ago. Bobolink, recently added to COSEWIC’s list of threatened species, declined 4.1% over the same period. We should not trivialize the impact of removing dozens, or hundreds of individuals from a population of species that are clearly in trouble.

In the meantime, good documentation of the impacts is essential. While TransAlta had to deliver these studies – they were a condition of the wind project’s approval – the company and Stantec should be recognized for doing good work. Once one takes the spin out of the document, the data and the methodologies are solid. The quality of the monitoring appears to be high, and some weaknesses, such as a potential bias to undercount the number of raptor fatalities, are recognized in the report.

With regard to birds of prey, even if they were not undercounted, the number of casualties is excessively high at .27 per turbine. This was the highest recorded rate for raptor kills outside of California. The victims included:

10 Red-tailed Hawks,
1 Northern Harrier,
1 Osprey,
2 American Kestrel,
1 Merlin
8 Turkey Vulture

This number crossed the “notification threshold” for the project, meaning that the CWS and MNR were notified about the high rates. The report states that TransAlta and MNR have initiated discussions regarding “adaptive management” in response to the raptor deaths. We look forward to hearing what the response might be.

With the plant already in operation, the only option now is to mitigate the risk to wildlife perhaps by slowing down the blades of the turbines at hazardous moments of the year, or turning them off. However, unless the numbers of casualties increase even further in the next two years, it is unclear how far the threshold must be exceeded and how often, before mitigation is implemented. It is reported in the document that four notifications were made by the company to the government for raptors alone, yet none appears to have led to mitigation.

As I write this, several wind farms are being proposed around the eastern end of Lake Ontario, the most worrying being Gilead’s Ostrander Point wind farm. Ostrander Point is an area that is arguably even more significant for birds than Wolfe Island, because of its specific geography. Ironically, the land on which the Gilead project is being proposed is owned by the Province of Ontario – a Crown forest block. Opposition to turbines in agricultural areas appears to have persuaded government officials to meet their renewable energy agenda by prioritizing "crown lands" as locations for wind energy plants. While this might be appropriate and acceptable for some properties, when a wind plant is located in an area of great significance to wildlife, as is the case with Ostrander Point, so-called green energy ceases to be green at all. The Ontario government needs to think more carefully about where they allow wind turbines. It is not too late for the Province to design a policy that promotes green energy and also protects key biodiversity sites including Important Bird Areas. Otherwise, as more of these facilities are built in bad places, wind energy will become a significant contributor to the declines of several species that are already in trouble, and the Green Energy Act will be recognized and remembered for all of the wrong reasons.

Wind Farm on Wolf Island is killing large numbers of birds and bats

Stantec Consulting Inc. has just released a very important study on post construction impact of a wind farm with 86 2.3 megawatt wind turbines on Wolf Island near Kingston, Ontario on birds and bats. The data on which the assessment was made was collected between July 1 and December 31, 2009, or the "reporting period."

In short, the result of the monitoring reveals shockingly high numbers of fatalities of both birds and bats. Here are the facts stated in the report: over 600 birds were killed, equivalent to 6.99 birds per turbine for the "reporting period", and 1278 bats, or 14.7 per turbine. The reporting period was six months and did not include the massive pulse of birds in the spring migration or wintering raptors. The casualties included 8 Bobolinks, 28 Tree Swallows, 7 Purple Martins, 3 Red-tailed Hawks, 6 Turkey Vultures, 2 American Kestrels and a Merlin, among other species. Bat fatalities included 54 Hoary Bats, 44 Eastern Red Bats and 36 Silver-haired Bats. It is interesting and very troubling to note the selective impact these turbines are inflicting on certain groups of animals, such as the aerial insectivorous birds like swallows and martins which are in serious population declines, raptors, and migratory bats.

The Stantec report converted the fatality rate into birds or bats per megawatt per reporting period, rather than the more standard birds or bats than per turbine per year as is traditionally used. This reporting technique, that I would call spin, diminishes the shockingly high impact of these structures. As turbines get bigger and more efficient at generating energy, our tolerance for their impact increases, according to this flawed logic.

Many proponents of wind power, including CANWEA, quote studies that cite two birds per turbine per year as the impact of turbines. Indeed it was birds and bats per turbine per year that was the standard metric used for reporting impact. If we see through the spin of the report in using birds/bats per megawatt per "reporting period", there is no denying the impact of this project is too high and beyond tolerance.

In the meantime, Prince Edward County, including the globally significant Prince Edward County South Shore Important Bird Area, Amherst Island, Wolf Island (both Important Bird Areas), offshore locations near the Duck Islands, and many areas along Lake Erie and elsewhere in the Country have either existing or proposed wind farms. We hope that this report, and the stir it will cause, will wake up those agencies charged with protecting our wildlife to put brakes on the chaotic expansion of wind farms into places that they clearly should avoid. Wind energy is a good idea. Let's "keep good ideas in good places." In the wrong places - Important Bird Areas and migration corridors for example - wind energy is a bad idea and our wildlife, which does not have a voice, continues to pay the price for our lack of foresight and greed. I fear that the Stantec report will be the first of many that will chronicle this sad legacy that we are creating.

Photo credit:
Merlin by Marty Burke