Wildlife

Obama’s Climate Plan: Kill Birds and Bats by the Hundreds of Millions

A newly published peer-reviewed study reports U.S. wind turbines kill 1.4 million birds and bats every year, even while producing just 3 percent of U.S. electricity. The numbers in the study from Wildlife Society Bulletin reveal President Obama’s global warming plan will kill hundreds of millions of birds and bats while doing little if anything to reduce global temperatures.

Even if no new wind turbines are ever built, turbine blades will slice 14 million birds and bats to death in mid-flight during the next decade. However, global warming alarmists say we must reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 50 or even 80 percent. President Obama’s recently announced assault on climate change appears likely to seek such numbers. Given that most global warming alarmists also vigorously oppose hydropower, natural gas power, and nuclear power, reducing emissions by 50 to 80 percent would require increasing the number of wind turbines roughly 25-fold. That means killing 350 million birds and bats in the United States every decade.

Actually, the number of bird and bat deaths would likely be much higher than that. Wind turbines produce power on an intermittent and unpredictable basis, meaning conventional power plants must remain cycling constantly, to fill minute-by-minute fluctuations in wind power. That means electricity produced by wind turbines is far from carbon-neutral.