Radar could save bats from wind turbines

Bats use sonar to navigate and hunt. Many have been killed by wind turbines, however, which their sonar doesn’t seem to recognize as a danger. Surprisingly, radar signals could help keep bats away from wind turbines, scientists have now discovered.

Although wind power promises to be a clean source of energy, some researchers have raised concerns that wind turbines inadvertently kill bats and other flying creatures. For instance, in 2004, over the course of six weeks, roughly 1,764 and 2,900 bats were killed at two wind farms in Pennsylvania and West Virginia, respectively. The bats might not be killed by the wind turbine blades directly, but instead by the sudden drop in air pressure the swinging rotors induce, which in turn cause their lungs to over-expand and burst surrounding blood vessels.

Scientists have tried keeping birds from colliding into wind turbines by making their rotors easier to see. And to discourage bats away from wind farms, researchers have tried white noise generators as deterrents. However, these “acoustic scarecrows” have not worked well, Racey said, probably because these sound systems are not strong enough to influence bats within the entire space that rotors sweep through.

A student at the University of Aberdeen first noticed that bats shied away from radar installations while driving past them. He was holding a bat detector out the window to scope out bat activity on the drive back home from out in the field. (Bat detectors are gadgets that scan for ultrasonic bat calls.)

LiveScience