And what about this??? https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-49567197 Biggest polluters of all.
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Apple Invests in Three Wind Farms in China as Part of Renewable Energy Efforts
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It's great that we're moving towards renewables. But wind is crap. We have wind farms in my area and our energy costs kept INCREASING. The reason? Wind power "isn't productive enough" and they don't see it paying for itself anytime soon. We've had them for 8 years. And we live in a pretty windy area. So it's not like there's a shortage of "fuel" on average. They have been so unproductive and cost unfriendly that they are considering taking them down. We have installed solar panels throughout town over the last few years and they are ALREADY showing a profit.
I would much rather see more solar over wind. We're getting a win-win for solar. No one wanted the panels on open areas because they environmentalists didn't like the idea of tearing up ground for it. All plans in our area involved tearing up grass, replacing it with gravel, and then fencing around the panels. Those plans didn't go over well. So we put them on rooftops and in parking lots. Generate energy and be able to park in the shade! Works great!
I would much rather see more solar over wind. We're getting a win-win for solar. No one wanted the panels on open areas because they environmentalists didn't like the idea of tearing up ground for it. All plans in our area involved tearing up grass, replacing it with gravel, and then fencing around the panels. Those plans didn't go over well. So we put them on rooftops and in parking lots. Generate energy and be able to park in the shade! Works great!
If only every company got mentioned in the news when they install solar panels or wind power.
It seems everything kills birds. The question is which energy production has the fewest bird deaths per megawatt generated? Factoring in deaths from gathering resources, transport, refining and manufacturing. It would make for a nifty Kurzgesagt video.
It seems everything kills birds. The question is which energy production has the fewest bird deaths per megawatt generated? Factoring in deaths from gathering resources, transport, refining and manufacturing. It would make for a nifty Kurzgesagt video.
Obligatory statement that it is not a matter of it happening but rather a rational approach as to why …
Blind insistence/posturing by both sides is why nothing is getting done.
Within sight of the toxic mess driven in large part by Apple leading the industry to focus on disposable LION powered devices ?? Incredible profits driven by leveraging negative externalities. Eg:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/business/batteries/graphite-mining-pollution-in-china/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/business/batteries/graphite-mining-pollution-in-china/
Yes - But those other things also generate infinitely more energy, in a far more efficient manner then wind turbines do. A better metric would be how many Birds die per watt of energy produced by each source - in this regard you would find the appeal of wind turbines to decrease drastically. This doesn't even take into account the carbon footprint of constructing a windmill- An excess of concrete, transportation, deforestation etc.
For anybody serious about climate change (and taking into consideration our current technological capabilities), you would know that Nuclear is the only viable option. If you think otherwise, you have been brainwashed.
Essentially everything you’ve said here is conjecture and isn’t backed up by any scientific study. There is also no official regulation for “counting”, bird deaths, so your 1 foot comment is just totally made up. None of these bird death estimates actually COUNT dead birds, they are just simply estimates and possibly extrapolations using various methodologies using very limited data sets.
Fossil fuel bird death study: Here
Cars also kill orders and orders of magnitude more birds.
Pesticide poisoning kills 1,500x more birds than wind turbines
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Electric vehicles CAN use clean sources of electricity, internal combustion engines cannot. That’s the point. You have to think long term, something most people don’t seem capable of doing.
I posted a BBC article citing a 2009 study giving you those per kWH bird death figures you’re asking for. You also have it totally backward. Wind turbines are extremely efficient in extracting energy, far more efficient than any fossil fuel source.
yaxo wrote:
"Not wind farms, they are slaughtering birds to an unprecedented level."
It's not just birds.
The wind turbine blades have a very limited lifespan, and cannot be recycled or otherwise disposed of easily, because of their size and composition.
Windfarms:
One of the WORST sources of energy on the planet!
"Not wind farms, they are slaughtering birds to an unprecedented level."
It's not just birds.
The wind turbine blades have a very limited lifespan, and cannot be recycled or otherwise disposed of easily, because of their size and composition.
Windfarms:
One of the WORST sources of energy on the planet!
Last time I checked.... China is run by the Communist Party of China (CPC) and the Peoples Liberation Army (PLA). As shareholders, why do we not know exactly what concessions or deals were made to invest in China? I suggest you read the bestseller "The Hundred-Year Marathon" by Michael Pillsbury.
There's absolutely no reason why Apple isn't investing in every single retail store by moving to renewables.
There's absolutely no reason why Apple isn't investing in every single retail store by moving to renewables.
Exactly why my area is leaning towards dismantling the ones we have. They are nowhere near paying for themselves yet and we've had them for YEARS. We installed solar panels just a few years ago and we're already seeing a profit on those. Wind power has actually been a detriment for us. It's cost us more and it's not generating enough. Our costs rose sharply when those turbines came around. Which was actually why the solar panels were installed...only after the panels, did we see our costs go down.
One thing we have to consider is that this is in China. They have serious air quality problems in their cities. You can go for a swim in their air. Turbines might be the most responsible solution for their energy needs. (Though is there some reason they can’t go with solar energy? Why won’t Apple explore that option instead?)
Nuclear is a low polluting high output solution until there’s a disaster. Do we really need more irradiated dead zones in the world? Chernobyl alone was bad enough. And I never thought the highly efficient, meticulous Japanese would have something like Fukushima, but they did. With the weather getting more extreme and Mother Earth shaking up as much as she’s done, it’s getting more tricky to find a safe zone to locate a nuclear plant.
China may have some good locations but their history of lax regulatory oversight of business and resultant gigantic urban explosions doesn’t hold out much promise for safe nuclear power oversight.
Nuclear is a low polluting high output solution until there’s a disaster. Do we really need more irradiated dead zones in the world? Chernobyl alone was bad enough. And I never thought the highly efficient, meticulous Japanese would have something like Fukushima, but they did. With the weather getting more extreme and Mother Earth shaking up as much as she’s done, it’s getting more tricky to find a safe zone to locate a nuclear plant.
China may have some good locations but their history of lax regulatory oversight of business and resultant gigantic urban explosions doesn’t hold out much promise for safe nuclear power oversight.
This is actually true,
They currently last 15-25 years. We aren’t really sure yet.
It’s true they are hard to recycle right now. So, we should probably just give up and not attempt any more innovation.
Everything about this, including your linked studies, are at the point of theoretical conjectures due to the lack of standardization and how new the problem is. However, I still need to see someone claiming that it's not a
big problem.
It's possible that it's incorrect, I remember reading it somewhere.
Based on two preliminaries studies by one author. This does not change the fact that turbines are sold as clean energy while they aren't.
No one claims that cars, or pesticides are clean.
You not a vegan, are you? Vegans usually know the facts. For example in the US every year around 9 billion chickens are killed for consumption, and 305 million are held hostage at any time for their eggs, and about 4-6 billion male chicks are ground alive because there's no use for them.
Furthermore, due to livestock production non-Vegans have wiped out 60% of all animal populations in the US since 1970. The thousands of birds that are killed by wind farms... do not even make the statistics. En plus, I guess it's much worse in China.
Thanks for sharing this. Not just a wind turbine problem but an overlooked problem for all electrical distribution and production.
Same reasons as to why Starbucks tries to make itself look good by being so environmentally-conscious, you know like the straw situation (only where the policies force them to and/or it benefits them). Business as usual. Like in San Diego they don't provide straws or put straws in your drink, but I was just in Chicago, straws everywhere.
Not at all. I like my BBQ.
I'd argue that there is a difference between death by food consumption and death by a wind turbine.
They've committed $350B to the US and already run 100% of their US operations on renewables. They have huge solar farms in at least 2 areas of the country (AZ, NC). China is one of the largest users of coal for energy. Apple along with it's suppliers in China, investing in renewables is good for all of us. Apple working to get its supply chain to 100% based on Apple projects is wise. In the not too distant future, Apple will be touting that 100% of their products are produced with 100% renewable energy.
There is no absolutely clean energy source (at a minimum the infrastructure to capture the energy is not “clean”). It is just a comparison of what has the least negative consequences for us and the planet. Solar isn’t totally clean either. The difference is that the energy source in and of itself is infinite. All energy sources takes infrastructure to harness and distribute - that part will never be completely “clean”. I never understand the argument that goes along the lines of “it takes energy and it pollutes to make an electric car/solar panel/wind turbine so it’s not clean and not the answer!” You have to look at the whole life of the product/source and all the externalities involved.
I agree. My parents live in Palm Desert and I drive south down I10 and there are a whole bunch of them after passing HWY 111. Most of them are not moving or laying down being repaired. What seemed like a good idea over a decade ago is merely a waste of money and land. Sort of like California currently building a solar farm that will take up 26 square miles while only powering 100k homes. A Nuclear plant in the same area would take up less than half of the land and power 1.3 mil homes.
