Wow! Wind Farms Kill Whales?

[Crick]

A recent study has found that the most common cause of death in whales killed by exposure to high powered sonars and seismic charge explosions is nitrogen embolism (the bends) due to fright. A slow heart beat is one of the primary adaptations that allow whales and other marine mammals to dive to great depths and return to the surface without getting the bends. When frightened, their heart rate accelerates and they lose this protection.

Storms are not going to drive whales into turbine pylons and there is no structure that would trap them. Wind turbines at sea are not killing whales.

 

[Olde Europe]

Is anyone confused by "Hundreds Of Unexplained Whale Deaths"?

The author is fiercely honest, and equally fiercely opposed to wind farms. He doesn't even have a theory how, in which way, those wind farms might contribute to whale deaths, or how they might even influence these whales. Thankfully, he doesn't even attempt to feign one. Also, he cannot point to a single "autopsy", that is, an attempt to determine the cause of a whale's death anywhere near a wind farm. Without that, musing about "wind farms may have killed it" doesn't even amount to speculation. It's a rank invention.

As Crick has already pointed out, ships and sonar are vastly more powerful noise generators. There is no comparison.

Moreover, with the whale population no longer hunted down all over the oceans and meanwhile rising in numbers, is "up to 100" deaths even a surprise, that is, out of the natural?

 

[elektra]

Is anyone confused by "Hundreds Of Unexplained Whale Deaths"?

The author is fiercely honest, and equally fiercely opposed to wind farms. He doesn't even have a theory how, in which way, those wind farms might contribute to whale deaths, or how they might even influence these whales. Thankfully, he doesn't even attempt to feign one. Also, he cannot point to a single "autopsy", that is, an attempt to determine the cause of a whale's death anywhere near a wind farm. Without that, musing about "wind farms may have killed it" doesn't even amount to speculation. It's a rank invention.

As Crick has already pointed out, ships and sonar are vastly more powerful noise generators. There is no comparison.

Moreover, with the whale population no longer hunted down all over the oceans and meanwhile rising in numbers, is "up to 100" deaths even a surprise, that is, out of the natural?

You are right, nobody has said that sound has killed these whales.

But, the question still remains, why is there dead whales at the foot of these thousands of wind turbines.

The other thing not mentioned, is that the noise from constructing these is chasing away marine life. That is fact. How much marine is being chased away and is it of the kind that will affect a whale's diet.

We do know the sound chases away fish. How does it affect a whale that must migrate.

 

[Crick]

You keep rattling off imaginative speculation as if they were facts.

A whale would very likely not enjoy the noise of a construction site. That would be why they would leave the area while construction was ongoing.

Balenoptera dine on krill and other macroscopic zooplankton. Those are not affected by noise and do not have the ability to move large distances in any case.

Odontoceti dine on fish and squid. Fish or squid would move away from a construction area due to loss of habitat but would return and typically in greater numbers, once construction was complete, to occupy the new habitat created by the construction. This is essentially how people create artificial reefs.

Aside from a small amount of low frequency noise, a wind turbine would produce no harmful emissions, waste products, hydrocarbons or the like. The noise would be trivial compared to the sound of breaking waves at most coastlines.

Environmental impact studies would very likely prevent the construction of wind farms in sensitive or vulnerable marine environments. No one is going to put a wind farm on top of, say, Molasses Reef in Pennekamp Park.

 

[Pilot1]

We should go back to using whale oil for lighting.

 

[Crick]

We should go back to using whale oil for lighting.

It's renewable ...

No, it isn't.

And you are trolling

 

[fncceo]

We should go back to using whale oil for lighting.

It's renewable ...

No, it isn't.

Of course it is... whales have sex.

 

[Crick]

Whales are going extinct without anyone hunting them. That you think that fodder for poor humor tells me what sort of person you are.

Another fucking TROLL

 

[fncceo]

Whales are going extinct without anyone hunting them. That you think that fodder for poor humor tells me what sort of person you are.

One who loves whales... for dinner.

 

[Crick]

Polemic commentary is a sure sign of an...

INTERNET TROLL: In Internet slang, a troll is a person who starts quarrels or upsets people on the Internet to distract and sow discord by posting inflammatory and digressive, extraneous, or off-topic messages in an online community (such as a newsgroup, forum, chat room, or blog) with the intent of provoking readers into displaying emotional responses and normalizing tangential discussion, whether for the troll's amusement or a specific gain.

Internet troll - Wikipedia

 

[Blues Man]

If cow farts are killing the planet I wonder what whale farts are doing to climate

 

[fncceo]

Polemic commentary is a sure sign of a...

INTERNET TROLL: In Internet slang, a troll is a person who starts quarrels or upsets people on the Internet to distract and sow discord by posting inflammatory and digressive, extraneous, or off-topic messages in an online community (such as a newsgroup, forum, chat room, or blog) with the intent of provoking readers into displaying emotional responses and normalizing tangential discussion, whether for the troll's amusement or a specific gain.

Internet troll - Wikipedia

If you're going to get emotional over big aquatic mammals, that's not my problem.

Whales are just big sea cows. There's no reason they couldn't be harvested as a resource.

 

[Crick]

Cow farts are primarily methane, a potent GHG. Whale farts would be primarily hydrogen sulfide and sulfur dioxide, not GHGs.

 

[Blues Man]

Polemic commentary is a sure sign of a...

INTERNET TROLL: In Internet slang, a troll is a person who starts quarrels or upsets people on the Internet to distract and sow discord by posting inflammatory and digressive, extraneous, or off-topic messages in an online community (such as a newsgroup, forum, chat room, or blog) with the intent of provoking readers into displaying emotional responses and normalizing tangential discussion, whether for the troll's amusement or a specific gain.

Internet troll - Wikipedia

If you're going to get emotional over big aquatic mammals, that's not my problem.

Whales are just big sea cows. There's no reason they couldn't be harvested as a resource.

If the population was managed it could work

 

[Blues Man]

Cow farts are primarily methane, a potent GHG. Whale farts would be primarily hydrogen sulfide and sulfur dioxide, not GHGs.

Do Whales Fart?

The gases that are expelled from a fart are mostly composed of hydrogen, carbon dioxide, and methane.

 

[Crick]

Polemic commentary is a sure sign of a...

INTERNET TROLL: In Internet slang, a troll is a person who starts quarrels or upsets people on the Internet to distract and sow discord by posting inflammatory and digressive, extraneous, or off-topic messages in an online community (such as a newsgroup, forum, chat room, or blog) with the intent of provoking readers into displaying emotional responses and normalizing tangential discussion, whether for the troll's amusement or a specific gain.

Internet troll - Wikipedia

If you're going to get emotional over big aquatic mammals, that's not my problem.

Whales are just big sea cows. There's no reason they couldn't be harvested as a resource.

On this thread on this topic, you are clearly trolling. Trolling is a violation of the USMB rules. That's YOUR problem

 

[Pilot1]

Whales are still harvested. Mainly by Japan.

 

[Crick]

And the Inuit, the Islensku and the Norske of all people.

 

[flacaltenn]

Here's a good place to start @electra ... Whale audible range is several times lower than human. Because high frequencies are useless underwater..

Let's see where most of the sound pressure is in terms of frequency..

So -- as a marker point, audiologists only TEST to about 200 Hz. Not lower.. Doesn't mean you can't have physical EFFECTS from frequencies below that. You certainly can... THe sound pressures are enough to burst the hearts of bats in flight. And it's those low frequencies "periodic explosions" that do that...

1) The sound interference for whales would 6 to 10 higher for whales than humans.

2) The sound field power from a wind farm is HIGHLY directional and the towers are constantly turning to seek the wind direction. So the internet morons that tell you that "wind farms are extremely quiet" don't a CLUE about science and engineering. Because you would never sample a position in a wind field when all the rotors are facing 90Deg from where you are. It's a 20Deg spread approximately for the MAX power..

3) The idea that sound power can't propagate the concrete piers is not correct at these lower frequencies. You are in "strain gauge" territory in terms of low freq vibrations. You could put strain gauges on a bridge piling and tell what kind of traffic was on the bridge.. Albeit -- it would ONLY be frequencies in the range or 1 to 100 hz or so..

4) There's a larger concern that needs to be professionally dismissed. And that is the "phased array" effect of having 10 or 16 of these 10 or 20 story towers all placed in the same location, pointing in the same general direction.. This phased array effect CAN AND WILL mimic the focusing techniques for radar/sonar arrays and provide power gains of spectacular results at SOME CONCENTRATED POINTS in the "far field" of the array of turbines..

SO -- as an environmentalist, I'm concerned that this will be simply dismissed because "Big Wind" money is talking here. You need an INDEPENDENT SOURCE to go scan the "far field" of this potential source with sonar techniques.

Where's Jaques Cousteau and GreenPeace when you need them??? Are they not interested because it's wind turbines???

 

[Crick]

So, the source of your graphic is https://www.researchgate.net/public...ltic_Sea_in_Denmark_Part_II_Harbour_porpoises

Narrowband spectra (2 Hz resolution) of noise radiated from offshore wind turbines. All measurements were made at 100 m distance. Values in brackets are approximate operating powers of the turbine during the measurement, with respect to its maximum power (ISD et al. 2007).