“This whole episode illustrates that the wind industry is a major killer of birds — including bald eagles and golden eagles and bats — but the government lets it happen as long as they’ve filled out the paperwork and gotten the permit to do so,” said Myron Ebell, director of the Center for Energy and the Environment at the Competitive Enterprise Institute in Washington.
ESI pleaded guilty to three counts of violating the MBTA, each based on the documented deaths of golden eagles due to blunt force trauma from being struck by a wind turbine blade at a particular facility in Wyoming or New Mexico, where ESI had not applied for the necessary permits.
“ESI acknowledged that at least 150 bald and golden eagles have died in total since 2012, across 50 of its 154 wind energy facilities,” the Department of Justice said in a statement. “And 136 of those deaths have been affirmatively determined to be attributable to the eagle being struck by a wind turbine blade.”
Another story: The Obama administration is issuing 30-year permits for “taking” (killing) bald and golden eagles. The great birds will be legally slaughtered “unintentionally” by lethal wind turbines installed in their breeding territories, and in “dispersion areas” where their young congregate (e.g. Altamont Pass). By chance (if you believe in coincidences), a timely government study claims wind farms will kill “only” 1.4 million birds yearly by 2030. This new report is just one of many, financed with taxpayers’ money, aimed at convincing the public that additional mortality caused by wind plants is sustainable. – It is not.
