Wind Farms Kill Thousands Of Rare Birds, Never Face Prosecution

By Evan Bleier, Tue, May 14, 2013

An Associated Press investigation has discovered that hundreds of thousands of protected birds are killed each year by wind farms, but that the deaths have been kept secret and are never prosecuted.

An estimate by the Wildlife Society Bulletin supposes that 573,000 birds are killed by wind farms each year, including 83,000 hunting birds such as hawks, falcons and eagles. Each one of those deaths is a federal crime.

The Obama administration has never prosecuted a wind energy company for killing a bird, Fox News reported. The administration has prosecuted oil companies when birds drown in their waste pits and power companies when birds are killed by their power lines.

The deaths of the rare birds show there are certainly some downsides to using renewable energy. The amount of available wind power has doubled during President Obama’s first term.

"It is the rationale that we have to get off of carbon, we have to get off of fossil fuels, that allows them to justify this," said long-time environmentalist Tom Dougherty. "But at what cost? In this case, the cost is too high."

Continued