WIND ENERGY & WILDLIFE

Audubon holds successful conference on wind power and birds at Debs Park in January, 2006.

Audubon California and the American Wind Energy Association held a very well-attended and successful conference on how to reduce the impacts of wind power on birds and bats in California. The conference was held at the Debs Park Audubon Center in Los Angeles on January 10 and 11, and included participants from the California Energy Commission, Cal. Department of Fish & Game, US Fish & Wildlife Service, National Renewable Energy Labs, Washington State Department of Fish & Wildlife, bird and bat experts, wind company representatives, Audubon California and Audubon Washington, Golden Gate and Los Angeles Audubon chapters, Defenders of Wildlife, Sierra Club, Center for Biological Diversity and others. The conference participants provided important information about the impacts of wind power on birds and bats, the state of knowledge about ways to reduce those impacts, research and data gaps, and general agreement about the need to develop statewide guidelines for the siting, operation and mitigation of wind power to reduce its impacts on birds and bats. You can download a summary of the conference proceedings, many of the individual presentations, hand-outs and other materials below.

Audubon / AWEA Conference
AWEA Audubon Proceedings (355K PDF)
AWEA/California Audubon Workshop (202K PDF)
Mark Sinclair, Clean Energy Group
Economic Challenges of Adaptive Management (230K PDF)
Mike Azeka, AES SeaWest
Types of Mitigation Measures (179K PDF)
Shawn Smallwood
Incorporating Data from the California Wildlife Habitat Relationships (CWHR) System into an Impact Assessment Tool for Birds Near Wind Farms (2M PDF)
Shawn Smallwood et al.
Elements of an Informed Decision: Adaptive Resource Management (800K PDF)
Bill Kendall, Patuxent Wildlife Research Center
Typical Wind Development Process (1.8M PDF)
Kenny Stein
Forecasting and Minimizing Avian Mortality in Siting Wind Turbines (5.2M PDF)
Lee Neher et al., Risk and Response Management Program - Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
Pre-construction Surveys (3.2M PDF)
Mike Green, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
Avian Fatalities Caused by Wind Turbines, Cumulative Impacts, and Trade-offs for Birds and Bats (1.7M PDF)
Albert M. Manville II, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
Standard Metrics and Methods for Conducting Avian/Wind Energy Interaction Studies (204K PDF)
Dick Anderson, West, Inc.
Impacts of Wind Energy on Birds in California (349K PDF)
Dick Anderson, West, Inc.
Assessing the Impacts of Wind Turbines on Bats (3.7M PDF)
Edward B. Arnett, Bat Conservation International
Status of USFWS Interim Voluntary Wind Turbine Guidance (334K PDF)
Benjamin N. Tuggle, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
Why are Birds so Important to Californians? (1M PDF)
Bloom
Why Conduct Pre-construction Avian Wind Farm Surveys? (247K PDF)
Bloom
Adaptive Management, Mitigation, and Future Siting: On-going Research and Post Construction Monitoring Protocols (51K PDF)
Richard C. Curry, Curry & Kerlinger, LLC
Pre-Construction Avian Studies for Wind Projects: Objective, Methods, Metrics (3.4M PDF)
Wallace Erickson, Western EcoSystems Technology, Inc.
Windpower in Washington State (1.6M PDF)
Greg Hueckel, Washington Dept. of Fish & Wildlife
Windpower & Wildlife: A Latecomer's Perspective (4.4M PDF)
Jim Walker, enXco
Review and Evaluation of Pre-Construction Surveys (224K PDF)
Sue Orloff, Ibis Environmental, Inc

Audubon California

Julia Levin, State Policy Director
4225 Hollis Street
Emeryville, CA 94608