Entries in Wind farm birds (29)

3/15/12 Bird and bat killers called out: Environmental groups put the heat on wind developers and the US Fish and Wildlife service

NINETY ENVIRONMENTAL GROUPS SEEKING TOUGHER RULES ON WIND PROJECTS

By Robert Bryce,

Source www.huffingtonpost.com 

March 15, 2012 

In 2009, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service estimated that the domestic wind turbines are killing about 440,000 birds per year. Since then, the wind industry has been riding a rapid growth spurt.

But that growth has slowed dramatically due to a tsunami of cheap natural gas and hefty taxpayer subsidies. Even worse: that cheap gas looks like it will last for many years, and Congress has, so far, been unwilling to extend the 2.2 cents per kilowatt-hour subsidy for wind operators that expires at the end of this year.

And now, the wind industry is facing yet another big challenge: increasing resistance from environmental groups who are concerned about the effect that unrestrained construction of wind turbines is having on birds and bats. Ninety environmental groups, led by the American Bird Conservancy, have signed onto the “bird-smart wind petition” which has been submitted to the Fish and Wildlife Service.

It’s about time. Over the past two decades, the federal government has prosecuted hundreds of cases against oil and gas producers and electricity producers for violating some of America’s oldest wildlife-protection laws: the Migratory Bird Treaty Act and Eagle Protection Act. But the Obama administration — like the Bush administration before it — has never prosecuted the wind industry despite myriad examples of widespread, unpermitted bird kills by turbines. A violation of either law can result in a fine of $250,000 and/or imprisonment for two years.

But amidst all the hoopla about “clean energy” the wind industry is being allowed to continue its illegal slaughter of some of America’s most precious wildlife. Even more perverse: taxpayers are subsidizing that slaughter.

Last June, Louis Sahagun, a reporter with the Los Angeles Times, reported that about 70 golden eagles per year are being killed by the wind turbines at Altamont Pass, located about 20 miles east of Oakland. A 2008 study funded by the Alameda County Community Development Agency estimated that about 2,400 raptors, including burrowing owls, American kestrels, and red-tailed hawks — as well as about 7,500 other birds, nearly all of which are protected under the Migratory Bird Treat Act — are being killed every year by the turbines at Altamont.

A pernicious double standard is at work here and it riles Eric Glitzenstein, a Washington, D.C.-based lawyer who wrote the petition to the Fish and Wildlife Service for the American Bird Conservancy. He told me, “It’s absolutely clear that there’s been a mandate from the top” echelons of the federal government not to prosecute the wind industry for violating wildlife laws.

Glitzenstein comes to this issue from the left. Before forming his own law firm, he worked for Public Citizen, an organization created by Ralph Nader. But when it comes to wind energy, “Many environmental groups have been claiming that too few people are paying attention to the science of climate change, but some of those same groups are ignoring the science that shows wind energy’s negative impacts on bird and bat populations.”

That willful ignorance may be ending. The Center for Biological Diversity, Sierra Club, and Defenders of Wildlife recently filed a lawsuit against officials in Kern County, California, in an effort to block the construction of two proposed wind projects — North Sky River and Jawbone — due to concerns about their impact on local bird populations. The groups oppose the projects because of their proximity to the deadly Pine Tree facility, which the Fish and Wildlife Service believes is killing 1,595 birds, or about 12 birds per megawatt of installed capacity, per year.

The only time a public entity has pressured the wind industry for killing birds occurred in 2010, when California brokered a $2.5 million settlement with NextEra Energy Resources for bird kills at Altamont. The lawyer on that case: former attorney general and current Gov. Jerry Brown, who’s now pushing the Golden State to get 33 percent of its electricity from renewables by 2020.

Despite the toll that wind turbines are taking on wildlife, the wind industry wants to keep its get-out-of-jail-free card. Last May, the Fish and Wildlife Service proposed new guidelines for wind turbine installations. But the American Wind Energy Association quickly panned the proposed rules as “unworkable.”

Billions of dollars are at stake. And the wind industry is eager to downplay the problem of bird and bat kills. But the issue, which clearly has the Obama administration in a tight spot, is not going away. The Sierra Club now favors mandatory rules for wind turbine siting.

And while wildlife protection is essential, the broader issue of equitable treatment under the law may be more important. For years, says Glitzenstein, the Interior Department has been telling the wind industry: “‘No matter what you do, you need not worry about being prosecuted.’ To me, that’s appalling public policy.”

Disclosure: Robert Bryce is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, which over the past ten years, has obtained about 2.5 percent of its budget from the hydrocarbon sector.

1/22/12 Wind company wants permission to kill golden and bald eagles, says the only reason endangered eagles are in the area is because of baiting by rural residents. USFWS disagrees.

Video of eagles in footprint of proposed wind project, Goodhue County, Minnesota

DNR, U.S. FISH & WILDLIFE CRITICIZE GOODHUE COUNTY WIND PROJECT

By Brett Boese

via The Post-Bulletin, Rochester MN, postbulletin.com

Jan 20, 2012,

ST. PAUL — The Minnesota Public Utilities Commission has set the public hearing Feb. 2 for the Avian and Bat Protection Plan associated with the AWA Goodhue wind project.

The news was released Friday, one day after the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service filed separate paperwork challenging or disputing portions of the 127-page ABPP.

Approval of the plan is the final permitting hurdle National Wind, the project developer, must clear before it can begin constructing the 78-megawatt project; it has targeted June to break ground. The process, which includes a legal appeal proceeding concurrently, has taken almost three years.

The bird-and-bat plan, which was finalized in December and is among the first of its kind, has become the latest target of criticism.

Concerns registered

A 12-page report by the USFWS and the five-page document from DNR that were posted to the PUC docket Thursday echo concerns that have been voiced for months by citizens, since Westwood Professional Services, the environmental agency hired by National Wind, identified no bald eagle activity within the project footprint in its initial report filed to the PUC in 2010.

“It’s almost like there might be a showdown between the DNR and (U.S.) Fish and Wildlife and Westwood,” said Rochester’s Mary Hartman, a project critic who has been the catalyst in identifying and verifying six to seven active bald eagle nests within the project footprint. “We were really well represented by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife and the DNR. (It shows) our information was fair and accurate.”

Though officials from the DNR and USFWS did not return calls on Friday, both agencies appear to have issues with many of the plans and claims developed in National Wind’s document. For example, the plan specifically states that the USFWS has no recommendations for avoiding and minimizing impacts from wind turbines on bald eagle nests. In response, the service cited a 2003 guide that calls for a minimum two-mile setback from bald eagle nests and another document from 2007 that contains “explicit spatial buffer recommendations” around bald eagle nests and important eagle use areas.

Issues with eagles

Both agencies also took issue with how the ABPP used eagle baiting allegations to explain increased avian activity in the project footprint. National Wind claims its point count surveys have been “seriously compromised by an active baiting program being conducted by project opponents.” However, no landowner has been cited for baiting and the Minnesota Board of Animal Health has not drawn any correlation between carcass disposal and increased bald eagle activity.

“The service recommends AWA Wind analyzes the data they have collected, rather than attempt to extrapolate potential data,” wrote Tony Sullins, USFWS field supervisor.

Turbine shut downs were also recommended as a potential mitigation plan, while calls for clarification and more data were common — though bald eagle issues were most prevalent.

Across the United States, five bald eagle deaths have been reported in wind projects. The USFWS says information on those incidents cannot be shared because most are tied up in litigation.

It’s unclear if public comment will be allowed at the Feb. 2 PUC hearing. A PUC spokesman did not return calls on Friday.

Minnesota Public Utilities Commission meeting:  121 E. Seventh Place, Suite 350, St. Paul, 9:30 a.m. Feb. 2.

1/20/12 Getting away with murder: All that's standing between wind developers and their obscene profits is that stupid law that protects endangered bald and golden eagles. 

From Minnesota

WIND FARM WILL SEEK PERMIT TO LEGALLY KILL EAGLES: TURBINES PLANNED NEAR RED WING WOULD ENDANGER PROTECTED SPECIES

 by Josephine Marcotty

Via Star Tribune, www.startribune.com

January 20 2012 

A controversial wind farm proposed near Red Wing plans to ask for federal permission to legally kill eagles, making it one of the first in the nation to participate in a new federal strategy aimed at managing the often-lethal conflict between birds and turbine blades.

U.S. Fish and Wildlife officials say they urged the developers of AWA Goodhue Wind to seek the new permit because the deaths of an unknown number of eagles and endangered golden eagles will be inevitable once the 50-turbine project is up and running.

The process for such “incidental take” permits was devised in 2009 as a compromise between the demand for clean energy from the growing number of wind farms and the rising concern over the estimated hundreds of thousands of birds and bats that they kill every year.

The 18.75-square-mile site in Goodhue County is home to a number of nesting eagles, and many more migrate through the area every year. There also have been sightings of two rare and endangered golden eagles, which come down from Canada to winter along the Mississippi River bluffs in southeastern Minnesota.

To get a permit, the company must provide a detailed plan designed to minimize the impact on protected species, project how many are likely to be killed each year, and keep track of the outcome.

The plan would have to be approved by the federal wildlife agency, giving it some future influence over the design and operation of the project, which is now under the jurisdiction of the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission (PUC).

“There are a lot of issues,” said Mags Rheude, a wildlife biologist with the Minnesota office of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. “We’d have to come to an agreement.”

The developer, AWA Goodhue Wind, stated its intent to file for the federal permit in filings with the PUC, but did not respond to requests for comment.

Without the permit, the company could be subject to federal prosecution if the project results in the destruction of the birds or their nests.

In recent years, there have been four documented deaths and one injury to bald eagles from North American wind farms, and many more among golden eagles at one wind farm built along their migration path in California, according to the Fish and Wildlife Service.

So far, only one wind project, the West Butte Power Project in Oregon, has submitted a request for such a permit, but more are expected.

“There are a fair amount of wind farms lined up – hesitantly,” Rheude said. “I think there are a lot of people watching to see how the process will go.”

Regulators have doubts

In the meantime, however, federal and state wildlife officials say they have significant concerns about AWA Goodhue Wind’s wildlife protection plan, which will go before the PUC on Feb. 2. The commission’s decision is key in determining when and if construction starts on the locally contentious project, which has been in the works for more than two years.

For example, in its filings with the PUC, the company says it has been unable to accurately count eagles or predict how many might be harmed, because local opponents are engaged in an artificial feeding campaign to attract birds to the area.

But, in their sharpest critique, both the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources and the Fish and Wildlife Service said in their filings that no such campaign has been verified by state investigators. The project, they noted, is located in an agricultural area, where livestock and wild animal carcasses are common.

“Due to the large number of eagles already present in the area, it is likely eagles will discover carcasses quickly,” federal officials said. “Eagles feeding on carcasses will likely be a long-term issue for AWA Wind.”

Both the state and federal agencies also expressed concern about the company’s plan to remove woods and other habitat to keep birds and other wildlife away from the turbines. That would only serve to harm other species, they said.

They also raised questions about the company’s plans to measure the project’s impact on bats, which are becoming as great a concern among conservationists as birds. New research is finding that some species of bats are particularly susceptible to wind turbines, because even if they manage to avoid the turbines, the pressure changes that occur as the blades move through air can cause fatal internal bleeding.

“In the next few years there may be more endangered species on the site,” Rheude said.

12/26/11 More evidence of negative health effects wind developers claim do not exist AND Getting away with murder: how green is a bird and bat killing machine? 

STUDY: FALMOUTH TURBINES HURT ABUTTER'S HEALTH

By SEAN TEEHAN,

Via Cape Cod Times, www.capecodonline.com

December 26, 2011 

FALMOUTH — A study released last week concludes wind turbines in Falmouth negatively affect abutters’ health.

The analysis was partially funded by a grant from Bruce McPherson, who opposes the Falmouth wind project and other turbine projects on Cape Cod. Its results assert that wind turbines cause “visceral” physical reactions and that sound waves from turbines are felt more intensely indoors than outside.

“We did not expect it,” said Stephen E. Ambrose, a Maine environmental sound consultant who co-authored The Bruce McPherson Infrasound and Low Frequency Noise Study.

Ambrose declined to release the amount he was paid but said he and a partner each spent about 800 hours on the study.

Ambrose and Robert W. Rand, who also specializes in sound studies, conducted their research over three days in April, Ambrose said.

The two former employees of Stone & Webster Inc., a Stoughton engineering firm that designs and builds power plants, have conducted peer reviews on acoustics from turbines for several towns in Massachusetts, Maine and Wyoming.

For this study, Ambrose and Rand lived in a house near Blacksmith Shop Road for three days while measuring pressure originating from infrasound. They documented the intensity of sound frequencies from a privately owned turbine in the Falmouth Technology Park and how their bodies responded to it. The turbine studied is roughly the size of Falmouth’s two municipal turbines.

When the two arrived at the house — located 1,700 feet from the turbine — on April 17, they began feeling effects within 20 minutes, according to the study. Both felt nausea, dizziness and anxiety, among other side effects.

They also reported having difficulty performing “normal activities” associated with the investigation, which included setting up instruments and observing measurements, the report states.

According to a chart included in the study, the discomfort and sick feelings intensified as wind speeds increased and the blades spun faster.

Previous sound studies that showed no negative health effects were done outdoors, Ambrose said. The recent study, which used low-frequency microphones to measure sound waves, showed sounds are more intense indoors than out. Data from this study showed a 10 dbG (a measurement for infrasound) increase outdoors and a 20 dbG increase indoors. The effect is similar to "living in a drum," he said.

An independent review of the acoustics data indicates it is scientifically valid, Nancy S. Timmerman, chairwoman of the Acoustical Society of America's Technical Committee on Noise, said in an email. She added that she can speak only to data on acoustics, not physiological effects reported in the study.

Jim Cummings, executive director of Acoustic Ecology Institute, another expert who looked at the study, said in an email the results could be a red flag on the correlation between infrasound and negative health effects, but more data are needed to establish proof.

"This is an indication, for sure, but a short sampling to base large claims on," Cummings wrote. "This and one other recent paper from the Association for Noise Control Engineers conference, Noise-Con, are both good indications that infrasound could be more problematic than generally assumed."

Falmouth Selectman Mary Pat Flynn, chairman of the board, said the study is one of many the board has received about wind turbines. Others show little or no harm caused by turbines, she said.

"We've had a number of studies sent to us, and they all have different points of view, and they all have different outcomes," Flynn said.

Ambrose and Rand's study comes as the state Department of Environmental Protection prepares itself for a sound study of the Falmouth-owned Wind 1 turbine. Environmental regulators agreed in September to conduct the study after Falmouth selectmen reached out to the department in September.

"It's still in the works, still under review," said Ed Coletta, a DEP spokesman. "We're hoping to get it done soon."

Last month selectmen announced the town would shut down the 1.64-megawatt Wind 1 — except during the tests — until April's town meeting. The town also plans to start up the Wind 2 turbine for 60 days, during which time officials plan to log complaints from residents.

The announcement came as a compromise after Wind 1 abutters filed a nonbinding town meeting article that asked selectmen to keep both turbines off until "mitigation options are fully explored and the existence of injurious conditions upon nearby residents can be qualified."

Wind 2, which has sat idle for about a year, could begin spinning for its trial period before mid-January, said Gerald Potamis, Falmouth's wastewater superintendent, who oversees the two municipal turbines.

Next month, Falmouth selectmen will choose a consultant to help advise the town on minimizing the impact of wind turbines on neighbors, Flynn said. Four firms were presented to selectmen during a meeting Dec. 19. The board will accept suggestions from residents until Jan. 4 and plans to choose one Jan. 9, Flynn said.

[Click here for Ambrose and Rand's study.]

Next Feature:

GROUP TARGETS WIND FARMS: ADVOCATES WANT STRICTER RULES TO PREVENT BIRD DEATHS

by Cody Winchester,

VIA www.argusleader.com 

December 26, 2011 

“Developers typically build at the site they’ve chosen, regardless of wildlife concerns,” she said. “We’ve written letters stating the proposed location is likely to have high wildlife impacts … but the projects were constructed (anyway).”

As the Obama administration moves on a plan to speed permitting of wind projects in the Great Plains, a major bird conservation group is asking the government to enact stricter standards for wind energy development.

The American Bird Conservancy has formally petitioned the Department of the Interior to develop mandatory siting rules for wind projects, claiming that existing guidelines, which are voluntary, constitute a “counterproductive and almost certainly unlawful approach” to enforcing the Migratory Bird Treaty Act.

“Most wind energy projects that are already in operation are in ongoing violation” of the act, since most birds killed at wind farms are protected, the petition says. The conservancy group alleges a “systemic failure” by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to enforce the law.

The conflict highlights an ongoing tension between conservationists and a rapidly expanding industry seen as the linchpin of a clean energy future – although the petitioners also note that climate change driven by the combustion of fossil fuels “indisputably poses an unprecedented threat to species and ecosystems.”

Fueling the conflict is territory overlap: Windy corridors that are prime candidates for energy projects also tend to be migratory flyways. With the growth of the industry in wind-rich states such as South Dakota, conservationists are worried not only about collisions with turbines and power lines but further fragmentation of a habitat already under pressure from urban and agricultural expansion.

“There are impacts beyond the towers sticking up out there,” said K.C. Jensen, an associate professor of wildlife management at South Dakota State University.

Federal officials have worked for years to develop siting standards for wind projects and earlier this year released a set of draft guidelines. As the guidelines evolved, the American Wind Energy Association, a trade group, accused Fish and Wildlife of trying to “impose new guidelines that are not based on sound science.” But the American Bird Conservancy says the guidelines were in fact crippled by pressure from a federal advisory board dominated by industry.

“At first we were optimistic,” said Kelly Fuller, the conservancy’s wind campaign coordinator. “But over the last year, our view has changed. We have seen drafts of the guidelines repeatedly weakened under industry pressure. We’ve seen Fish and Wildlife Service abandon much of what its own scientific experts wrote, and so we felt that we now have to respond to this worsening situation.”

The group wants the rules strengthened and made mandatory, so wind developers would have to obtain a permit that specifically considers the project’s effects on migratory birds before beginning construction.

Such a permitting scheme would give the industry greater certainty, since wind developers are technically in violation of federal law every time a migratory bird is killed at a wind installation, said Shruti Sharesh, an environmental lawyer who filed the petition on behalf of the conservancy.

“On the one hand, we have the federal government promoting wind industry,” Sharesh said. “And on the other hand, we have a situation where both the government and the industry is well aware … (of) widespread violation of federal wildlife law.”

But Ron Rebenitsch, executive director of the South Dakota Wind Energy Association, argued that the opposite is true. He said new regulations would create greater uncertainty and make it more difficult to plan wind projects, which already require significant up-front financing and can take years to approve.

“This is not a good thing for wind,” he said. “I would be very cautious about how the rules are developed.”

The industry takes pains to minimize harm to wildlife, Rebenitsch said, adding that concerns about bird strikes are overblown.

“There has never been a recorded instance of a whooping crane impacting a turbine,” he said. “A whooping crane could fly into a building. … Do you shut down the industry (for the sake of birds)? That’s a very real concern.”

Rebenitsch said the number of birds killed at wind farms is inconsequential compared with the number killed by cats, windows and other causes related to human activity.

Fish and Wildlife already has a mechanism for permitting “take” of threatened and endangered species under the Endangered Species Act and other federal laws, but not for migratory birds.

The conservancy group says this “legal anomaly,” coupled with the lack of enforcement by Fish and Wildlife, is unfair: Oil companies are prosecuted under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act when birds fly into oil sump pits and die, the group argues. Why should wind energy be exempt?

Developers ‘build where they want’

On its website, the South Dakota Wind Energy Association urges developers to “consult the environmental and cultural offices in the state as early as possible” and provides contact information for each office.

But this doesn’t always happen, said Natalie Gates, a biologist in the migratory bird program at the U.S. Fish and Wildlife ecological services field office in Pierre.

Sometimes, developers contact Gates about a new wind project as a courtesy. Most of the time, however, she hears about proposals from other federal agencies that need input on how the project would affect endangered species.

“Some developers are more conscientious than others,” she said. “Some work with us a little and some ignore us entirely. All tend to build where they want.”

Once her office knows where the company intends to build the project, Gates sends a comment letter outlining the agency’s concerns about habitat and wildlife populations, and typically she requests that the company undertake a baseline study of birds and bats in the area.

“Sometimes when I write a letter like that, I never hear back from the company,” she said.

Some companies hire consultants to collect pre- and postconstruction figures on bird and bat mortality, and this data can be helpful to wildlife agencies, Gates said. But a suggestion to avoid sensitive habitat “seems to get no traction with developers,” she said.

“Developers typically build at the site they’ve chosen, regardless of wildlife concerns,” she said. “We’ve written letters stating the proposed location is likely to have high wildlife impacts … but the projects were constructed (anyway).”

South Dakota Game, Fish and Parks also has guidelines for wind projects, and the agency’s wildlife biologists have provided expert testimony at hearings before the South Dakota Public Utilities Commission, which issues siting permits for wind projects.

The commission carefully considers the input of wildlife experts when issuing rulings and crafting permit conditions, PUC Chairman Gary Hanson said.

Hanson, who has served on the governing board of the National Wind Coordinating Collaborative, is concerned about whooping crane numbers and would not necessarily oppose stricter federal guidelines for siting.

Fed’s plan would fast-track projects

The Interior Department, meanwhile, is developing a plan to fast-track wind projects in the Great Plains by allowing developers to go through the federal permitting process en masse.

The 200-mile-wide development corridor would follow the central flyway of the endangered whooping crane, which has a wild population in the low hundreds, from Canada to the Texas coast.

A consortium of wind energy companies, including Iberdrola Renewables and NextEra Energy Resources, which operate wind farms in South Dakota, would be granted incidental take permits in exchange for offsetting the losses with conservation efforts elsewhere. Fish and Wildlife still is hammering out the details.

Determining bird kill numbers a tough task

Estimates of birds killed at wind installations vary, and federal field agents face numerous obstacles in gathering accurate numbers.
“The (U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service) has no way of obtaining on a regular basis crucial information about birds and bats being killed at these projects,” said Shruti Sharesh, a lawyer at Meyer, Glitzenstein and Crystal, an environmental law firm .
The conservancy group partly blames this problem on confidentiality agreements between wind developers and private wildlife consultants, which can can make data sharing problematic.
In September, the Argus Leader submitted a Freedom of Information Act request to U.S. Fish and Wildlife asking for records of migratory birds killed by power lines or wind energy projects in South Dakota.
The agency returned a packet of investigative reports detailing 15 bird kills in North and South Dakota since 2008, all of them power line strikes.
This doesn’t mean there were no bird strikes or electrocutions prior to 2008, just that they weren’t necessarily entered into the agency’s computer system, said Rich Grosz, the resident agent in charge of the Office of Law Enforcement for the Dakotas.
Until recently, South Dakota had only one or two field agents, and Grosz said the agency is “completely dependent on the public” to notify it of bird electrocutions. In any case, further investigation may show that the bird died from other means, in which case the agency would not pursue an investigation.

12/8/11 Turbine loses brake control: When free-wheeling means start running AND Eagle man didn't need eagle eye to see why turbines don't belong in nesting area

From the U.K.

Coldingham wind gusts see houses evacuated

Wind turbine - Image by Billy Muir
A nearby road was closed and homes evacuated after the turbine toppled

Homes had to be evacuated and a road was closed after a turbine fell over in gusts of wind in the Borders.

The incident happened near Coldingham in Berwickshire on Wednesday.

The turbine had been erected but was not turned on and appears to have been unable to cope with gusts of up to 50mph.

The A1107 was shut from the north side of Coldingham, at the Croftlaws Caravan Park, down to Lumsden Farm and a 200m cordon was in place.

Lothian and Borders Police said the turbine had suffered a break system failure and had been "freewheeling".

Local resident Billy Muir saw the results of the incident.

"The tip of one blade made it to within five metres of the road," he said.

"We live 500m away but there are a few houses about 200m away.

"No-one was injured - it was dealt with by Lothian and Borders police."

NEXT STORY:

From Minnesota:

 National Eagle Expert Raises Cry over Wind Project

 

By Brett Boese,
SOURCE: The Post-Bulletin, Rochester MN, postbulletin.com
December 7, 2011 

 

ZUMBROTA — The oldest eagle preservation organization in the United States has joined calls from local citizens demanding that additional avian studies tbe done before constructing a 48-turbine wind project in Goodhue County.

Terrence Ingram, executive director of the Eagle Nature Foundation in Illinois, made that determination Friday after touring the 32,000-acre AWA Goodhue project for about four hours. He documented seven bald-eagle nests, six red-tailed hawk nests, and he saw 20 bald eagles — including two that flew over him less than five minutes into the tour.

Ingram’s visit was prompted by calls from Mary Hartman and Kristi Rosenquist, critics of the wind project, asking for his assistance. However, Ingram refused to take a stance based simply on information they’d sent him. That resulted in him spending almost 10 hours on the road last week in order to get a first-hand look at the area.

Reached Monday after his tour, he was highly critical of the pre-construction avian study submitted to the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission by Westwood Professional Services, the consulting company hired by National Wind. Many of the nests viewed Friday were identified by Hartman and Rosenquist after Westwood’s initial examination.

In Wednesday’s print edition, learn about Ingram’s three-pronged proposal concerning the AWA Goodhue project.

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