Investing in Offshore Wind Energy While Protecting Migratory Birds
In March 2021, the Biden administration announced its commitment to producing 30,000 megawatts of offshore wind energy by 2030. The consequences of such accelerated offshore development for wildlife, migratory birds in particular, are not yet clear. To mitigate risks while still meeting our nation’s urgent need for renewable energy sources, state and federal policymakers must:
- promote strategic placement of future offshore wind farms.
- fully enforce the Migratory Bird Treaty Act.
- support research into how offshore wind projects impact migratory birds, including by enacting the 2023 Reinvesting in Shoreline Economies and Ecosystems (RISEE) Act.
CURRENT STATE OF OFFSHORE WIND ENERGY IN THE UNITED STATES
Over 72,000 wind turbines are currently operating in the United States, according to the U.S. Wind Turbine Database. Yet just seven turbines have been built offshore to this date, at wind farms off the coasts of Rhode Island and Virginia. The Bureau of Ocean Management has been working closely with coastal sites to identify, lease, and approve new offshore wind farms (Figure 1); seventeen wind energy sites are now under development along the Atlantic Coast. These sites will eventually form a coastal wind energy network stretching from Massachusetts to North Carolina. Plans are also underway to expand farther southward to the Gulf of Mexico and westward to the Pacific Coast through the Federal-State Offshore Wind Implementation Partnership.
IMPACTS OF WIND ENERGY ON MIGRATORY BIRDS
Extensive research conducted around land-based wind farms has established that wind turbines can harm bird populations in two ways: through direct mortality (i.e., collisions with a turbine’s fast-moving blades) or through indirect impacts (e.g., loss of habitat through displacement as birds avoid the area around a wind farm or otherwise shift their natural behavior). Experts are especially concerned about migratory birds, as billions of birds fly over the United States each year during seasonal migration, with many species following the shoreline as they travel. Large, densely placed turbines can create a physical barrier resulting in birds adjusting their flight path to avoid the site entirely. The extra distance travelled and energy expended means that migratory birds are in a poorer condition to breed upon reaching their destination.
Indirect impacts pose a much greater threat to the survival of bird species than collisions. An estimated 234,000 birds are killed annually in collisions with turbine blades. This is far less than the millions of birds killed each year by household cats and in collisions with powerlines, automobiles, and buildings. Further, far fewer bird fatalities are linked to renewable energy sources than to nonrenewable sources like oil, coal, and gas. As many as one million birds are killed each year during the process of extracting and producing oil and gas; nearly eight million fatalities annually are tied to the coal industry.
KEY POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS
MINIMIZE RISKS THROUGH STRATEGIC PLACEMENT OF TURBINES
The consensus among researchers and wildlife advocates is that increasing our wind energy capacity is a worthwhile endeavor regardless of collision and displacement impacts. Organizations like the National Audubon Society and National Wildlife Federation are strongly in favor of wind energy development, arguing that climate change driven by fossil fuel emissions poses the greater existential threat to bird populations. Since annual migration is crucial to birds’ survival and reproduction, however, offshore development must be accompanied by efforts to mitigate harm.
The gold standard for harm mitigation is strategic placement of wind farms. This includes placing wind energy sites outside of flight routes followed by migratory birds. Placement near known stopover sites where large numbers of migrating birds return to land in order to rest must also be avoided. At stopover sites, migrating birds that normally fly far above the height of a typical turbine are newly at risk as they descend into the dangerous rotor-swept zone created by the rotating blades.
LEVERAGE THE MIGRATORY BIRD TREATY ACT
Vigorous enforcement of the 1918 Migratory Bird Treaty Act (MBTA) is one of the best tools at our disposal in ensuring that offshore developers employ harm mitigation strategies. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) in 2021 published a rule reifying its authority under the MBTA to hold companies accountable for indirect or “incidental” killings of migratory birds. Such incidental fatalities would include those due to collisions or displacement by wind turbines. The FWS is now taking steps towards creating a permitting system to regulate incidental killing, along with preparing a set of recommendations for wind energy companies seeking to mitigate harm and avoid regulatory consequences. Guidelines from the FWS have long been available for companies building wind farms on land, but have not yet been created for offshore developers.
INVEST IN WIND ENERGY RESEARCH
Effective enforcement of the MBTA will depend on the FWS being equipped with better data. Linking bird fatalities with any particular offshore wind project is a difficult challenge given our current level of understanding. Some insights can be garnered from research on offshore wind farms in Europe. The applicability of these studies is limited, however, as the wind farms currently being built along the Atlantic Coast stretch across greater distances of ocean and will consist of turbines that are much taller than those of European wind farms.
Given the difficulty of securing additional funding for research in this current political landscape, one extremely promising approach is the use of already available radar data. A 2022 FWS-funded study demonstrated the feasibility of using data collected by weather radar networks over the course of years to identify stopover sites and other areas of high risk to migratory birds. Such innovative and cost-effective research endeavors must continue to receive robust funding, as they enable the creation of increasingly precise guidelines for strategic placement of turbines. Congress should also pass the RISEE Act of 2023 (H.R.913; S.373), which would direct funds generated by offshore wind energy to coastal communities and empower states to direct this revenue stream towards research, coastal restoration, and conservation.
