The issue of killing migratory birds is one which might be solved by using signals (noises, pheromones, etc) that may cause the birds to avoid the area. I’m not sure why the birds are not able to avoid the turbine blades, but I imagine they’re much harder to dodge than trees. In fact, office buildings with lots of glass/glazing is a large killer of birds as well (~100 million/ yr Link )

I’ve witnessed at least a few in my childhood when birds had flown into my classroom windows at school.

Nevertheless, it’s a design challenge that has yet to be solved. And yes, Joe, the root of the problem is the consumption in general, but we’d all be hard pressed to unplug our lives. So, the solutions are to both re-evaluate our use, reduce consumption, and find greener energy sources.

see awea’s report.

B) how they die? they run into the propellers and get diced.

C) in reference to my no “solution to pollution”: we try to come up with man made ways to fix our man made messes; i believe that the REAL solution lies in controlling the way and what what we consume. it was not my intention to connote a sense of abysmal pessimism.

Plenty of bridges fell and experiments were tried before we got anything right in our history as a society.

The solution is not give up, but to understand the problems in design (like Jeff’s doing), come up with smart solutions (like starspirit), and keep trying.

funny, cause we were just talking about giving elephants prosthetic tusks so that they can still use their tusks for social purposes, but so that poachers don’t kill them. seems like many elephants in preserves already have their tusks removed, but prostheses would be nice. problem is, they’d have to be very obviously not real tusks, so that poachers don’t kill them, so we were thinking glittery or glow in the dark tusks… anyways i guess it was a weird conversation.