The Price of Solar

Do you have any links reporting the numbers of fish/birds/aquatic mammals that either go through the water turbines, or are caught and die in diverters/screens, in a hydroelectric facility?

Wind farms are not avian friendly either.

The up-side to the wind farm south of our Minn. place:

Buffalo Ridge Wind Farm - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia is that the turbines are all built in corn fields, which means that the dead birds fertilize the corn crops.

It's a win-win for everybody, but the birds.

I decided to not mention wind turbines... another hot button for the detractors. Few people seem to think about the fishes...

This isn't really the price of solar, as the thread title says. This (animal casualties) is the price of modern society, industrialization, convenience. The search continues for a no-fault, no-trouble, no-expense, no-casualty, non-polluting energy source.

WHY won't the damn gubbamint open up that vault of alien technologies and let us have this energy source? All we get this year is Ping-Pong balls being pushed around in a fish tank.

Timely post. I just read:

http://www.newswithviews.com/guest_opinion/guest250.htm

You have just been put on the solar energy lobbyist hit list of troublemakers.

If these "save the world" power generation schemes didn't produce profit for big business, lobbyists and the politicians they bribe, we'd still be burning whale oil.

Should I go into a protective custody program?

Yes! Plastic surgery and a name change are in order, too.

The CIA already knows what you had for breakfast this morning.

Chances are they've already briefed the lawyers for the lobbyists.

No we would not be burning whale oil! We would be burning our own turds by now because the whales would have been long gone. With ping pong balls on the forefront, what is next, treadmills for earthworms? You know, just pour in a small amount of water at the bottom, add the worms, and off they scoot!

I suspect the only place where birds are in danger from concentrated solar is in large facilities. Small scale use of solar does not involve large open areas where light is concentrated above 1 Sol.

Between the power lines, the windmills, the deathray solar thingys, and jet planes flying all over the place,,,,it's just not safe to fly anymore.....anybody have any sneakers in a size 1/3rd??

This always seemed like a stupid, inefficient way to generate electricity to me.

We've got plenty of room to generate solar power on top of our existing buildings and above our parking lots, but it should be used to produce hydrogen, which can be used to power anything...including cars.

I had read about this and thought it was just bad luck that the birds flew into these areas, but apparently the mirrors look like water, making them magnets for thirsty birds, which have a serious impact.

Evidence is mounting that the resulting concentrated solar flux poses a serious risk to wildlife, as would the 2,500 or so acres of mirrors resembling surface water.

http://www.kcet.org/news/rewire/solar/concentrating-solar/solar-power-tower-company-our-competitors-kill-birds-too.html

Solar fried chicken anyone?

Koala populations have to compete with traditional energy sources like coal and gas.
Life, energy and mother nature is something of a balance ... and we make choices.

Tit for tat. The oil companies have been fined 100s of millions for a relative few dead birds.

Not a peep about these dead birds, because "green" is good. More hypocrisy.

There's a LOT more to an oil spill than the dead animals, don't you agree?

Pumping 200 million gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico seems to me to be worthy of a huge fine.

The oil companies have been fined for a lot more than "a relative few dead birds".

Go stand in the corner!

Yep, 10,000 gallons a day, every day, just off the coast of southern Ca, but it's okay when mother nature murders birds.

http://www.masterresource.org/2013/06/oil-drilling-reduces-seepage-california/

Does it matter if a bird gets fried in the sky or drenched in oil? Lets have the jackbooted government thugs put the same fines on the solar/wind companies as they do the oil companies, and I'll shut up and go to the corner.

Some idiot politician or bureaucrat shouldn't be able to pick and choose who gets fined for dead birds depending on their donor list or which technology they "like" better.

"Some idiot politician or bureaucrat shouldn't be able to pick and choose who gets fined for dead birds depending on their donor list or which technology they "like" better."

Okay, but these idiot bureaucrats should be able to levy fines against an operator who grounds an oil tanker while negligently operating thus:
Exxon Shipping Company failed to supervise the master and provide a rested and sufficient crew for Exxon Valdez.
The third mate [of the Exxon Valdez] failed to properly maneuver the vessel, possibly due to fatigue or excessive workload.
Exxon Shipping Company failed to properly maintain the Raytheon Collision Avoidance System (RAYCAS) radar...

Negligence... cause harm... avoidable...

Absolutely! There was no excuse for the Valdez spill.

The BP spill on the other hand...

If our bureaucrats would have granted permits for shallow water drilling, there's no way the oil companies would have been out that deep. They hated being pushed out there, knowing there was easy, and way safer, near shore oil they could have been pumping.

My point is:

Solar/wind = Dead birds = a necessary cost of clean energy.
Oil = Dead birds = Lets get those greedy bastards. Lets use taxpayer money to show pictures of oil slicked birds to the public. Lets fine them out of business!

"Lets fine them out of business"

The get plenty in tax breaks and subsidies to pay for hundreds of lawyers and any piddling fines they might have to pay.

I'm a free market type. Nobody should get subsidies, nor should the government be picking winners and losers...I don't care if it's Haliburton or Solyndra. Politicians are pigs.

Quit it. We're agreeing way too much.

Hell, I don't even have to bother ranting anymore. You've got it covered.

Let's sue the Earth!

I don't believe you'll ever, "shut up and go to the corner".

I sort of remember hearing a few peeps about something called the Exxon Valdez.

According to Wiki, "Immediate effects included the deaths of 100,000 to as many as 250,000 seabirds, at least 2,800 sea otters, approximately 12 river otters, 300 harbor seals, 247 Bald Eagles, and 22 orcas, and an unknown number of salmon and herring."

Apparently the Myth Busters could not even manage a "death ray" suitable to match that of Archimedes' ship burner.

On a more serious note, there are at least two other ways to generate solar energy using convection, no focusing, similar areas of collection, but no one can afford the chimneys. One scheme would stabilize a human-made tornado (vortex) to generate power from waste heat in a power plant, enough to increase the output of the plant by 15-20% (conservative estimate), depending on pre-installation heat rate.

I really like that idea, and haven't heard a word about it in a long time.

There's something shameful about it being the year 2014 and seeing that we are concentrating sunlight to boil water. I was frying little brown ants with my magnifying glass by the time I was 6.

A few years back, I had a look possible deterrents for birds on runways at airports. This is a problem that still persists to date. This is a similar problem to birds entering fields of wind generators. One may want to link up with biologists and bird experts who might be able to input into such a problem solving exercise. E.g., there could well be a natural feature in birds that could for a part of the solution. Alternatively there could be regions or patches that birds simply avoid for some reason. One might even want to consult birding enthusiasts - These guys might be able to assist as they spend endless weekends bird-watching. Hence, one solution might be a natural deterrent. Another might be an artificial deterrent for birds.

Just off-hand, I thought of something based on sight, smell or magnetism.