As the prospect of Congress extending wind energy's primary incentive, the federal Production Tax Credit (PTC), has grown in recent weeks, so have both support and criticism.
On the positive side, the Des Moines Register, Denver Post, and Chicago Sun-Times have all editorialized in favor, joining a number of other major newspapers already on record in support (for example, the Daily Oklahoman, the Houston Chronicle, and The New York Times). The Wall Street Journal, meanwhile, on Friday continued its steady drumbeat of broadsides against renewable energy in general and the wind tax credit in particular.
Here is what the Journal and other critics of the PTC miss:
Historically, all energy sources have been encouraged by government, and for good reason. Ensuring a steady supply of domestic energy is vital to the productivity of our national economy.
Traditional energy sources have had a huge head start in government support. A recent study from the Congressional Research Service (CRS) points out that traditional energy sources enjoy an enormous advantage with regard to tax relief and other incentives: "For more than half a century, federal energy tax policy focused almost exclusively on increasing domestic oil and gas reserves and production ... These provisions remain in the tax code in limited form today."
That advantage is permanent, allowing for a stable business environment that wind energy is deprived of because of on-again, off-again federal policies
Renewable energy sources are not receiving excessive support. Another recent report, "What Would Jefferson Do?" from DBL Investors, found that "current renewable energy subsidies do not constitute an over-subsidized outlier when compared to the historical norm for emerging sources of energy. For example: ... the federal commitment to [oil and gas] was five times greater than the federal commitment to renewables during the first 15 years of each [incentive's] life, and it was more than 10 times greater for nuclear."
Wind energy's incentive is tax relief. Wind's incentive is in the form of a federal tax credit. To call tax relief a subsidy is to assume that all money belongs to the government. Rather, a tax credit simply leaves more money in private hands. In this case, anyone who makes renewable energy qualifies. The result has been the creation of over $15 billion a year in private investment and 75,000 privately financed jobs in wind power.
Wind's incentive, the Production Tax Credit, has strong bipartisan support. As Gov. Sam Brownback (R-Kan.) and Senator Jerry Moran (R-Kan.) put it in an op-ed earlier this year in the Wichita Eagle, "If we expect the wind-energy industry to provide for our country's future energy needs and make long-term investments in their businesses, Congress must reauthorize the wind-production tax credit that expires this year. By extending the wind PTC, Congress will allow the wind industry to complete its transformation from being a high-tech startup to becoming cost-competitive in the energy marketplace."
GOP strategist Karl Rove added in June that the Production Tax Credit for wind "is a market mechanism...not picking winners and losers. We're simply saying for some period of time we will provide this incentive as we scale up and get improvements in technology." He called it something Republicans and Democrats can agree on, and I believe it is.
"Basically you can overlay the strongest, best areas for wind turbine development with the whooping crane migration corridor," said Tom Stehn, whooping crane coordinator for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
The service estimates as many as 40,000 turbines will be erected in the U.S. section of the whooping cranes' 200-mile wide migration corridor."
40,000 wind turbines in the whooping crane migration corridor will create over 16 billion cubic feet of airspace with turbine blades spinning at 200 mph.
I have been told that Mr. Barnard works for IBM in Toronto, Canada. IBM is a company which makes billions yearly on products and services related to wind energy production. I was also told that he lives in a downtown city condo and has no expertise with wildlife. I advise all readers to keep in mind that my comments are based upon a lifetime of experience with wildlife in the field. This background information should help readers to understand that his internet comments read much like all the wind industry environmental impact reports, which have been bogus for 28 years.
People had better believe the critical state of the whooping cranes being caused by wind energy installations because approximately 100 of them disappeared this past year.
For the first time since their recuperation program, the small Whooping Crane population has been shrinking. This coincides with the installation of thousands of wind turbines, and associated high-tension power lines, across their migration corridor.
Another coincidence: their population is now being counted differently, by extrapolation, instead of by direct count. Yet it is not hard to count 200-300 large white birds which can be found in well-known established winter territories year after year.
“We’re eagerly anticipating approximately 300 birds this year,” Dan Alonso said.”
“Alonso said recent rainfall of about 2 inches has replenished drinking water sources for the whoopers, and about 20 ponds created by windmill pumps are available for the birds to drink.”
http://www.scrippsnews.biz/content/record-whooping-crane-flock-expected-2nd-year-texas?page=6
Development of wind projects is likely to cause:
a. Bird mortality caused by collisions with operating turbines and/or elements
of auxiliary infrastructure, in particular overhead power lines;
b. Decrease in population due to loss and fragmentation of habitats caused
by deterring effect of the wind turbines and/or development of
communication and energy infrastructure related to operations of the wind
turbines,
c. Disturbance to populations, in particular to short- and long - range bird
migrations (the barrier effect).
This is exactly what is happening to the Wood Buffalo-Aransas Whooping Cranes population.
Greater impacts of wind farms on bird populations during construction than subsequent operation: results of a multi-site and multi-species analysis
James W. Pearce-Higgins1,2,*, Leigh Stephen1, Andy Douse3, Rowena H. W. Langston4
Article first published online: 13 MAR 2012
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1365-2664.2012.02110.x/full
This is the largest study on bird impacts across multiple sites, separating construction from operational impacts.
It found that for the vast majority of species, short-term construction impacts were reversed during operation, that some species actually had better populations after wind farms became operational and that only a few populations suffered any mild, long-term impacts.
This is a far cry from Mr. Wiegand's uncited quotation of an opinion that wind farms "are likely to cause" some challenges.
Oddly, Mr. Wiegand refuses to accept the great news that the vast majority of birds in the vast majority of wind farm locations are not impacted in any way.
And he continues to lie through his teeth about whooping cranes in the complete absence of any knowledge, or apparently any idea of geographical scale.
Real wildlife biologists aren't so cavalier, but Mr. Wiegand isn't a real wildlife biologist. He's an antiques dealer and anti-wind lobbyist who studied undergraduate biology 40 years ago.
For more information on the whooping cranes visit the Whooping Crane Conservation Association web site and look up flock status. When you get there you can also read what Tom Stehn had to say about the newly adopted (Bogus) USFWS method of counting whooping cranes.
As you well know, last year (2009) the Whooping Crane flock, lost 57 members. In Texas 23 were reported lost on their wintering grounds. Officially some of this decline is attributed to the South Texas drought that affected the birds’ food and water sources. I think there is much more to this story that needs to be told. At one time there were tens of thousands of these Whooping cranes that wintered in Texas. I know time has changed their habitat but a little flock of 270 should be able to find plenty food in Texas.
What is not disclosed in the article is the extreme danger propeller style wind turbines pose to the Whooping Cranes. Thousands of these wind turbines exist all along the whooping cranes 2500 mile migration route...........
Now read the truth from the Dec 2011 the Whooping Crane trial transcript .. Page 168
If you just look at the data of the number of birds(whooping Cranes) that die in migration, you'll see that some years there are
very few, and some years there are many. And the Recovery Team was very concerned about losses of birds during migration,
particularly since so many wind farms are going up along the migration route.
Mr. Wiegand is not a credible source. He is an antiques dealer who hates wind turbines.
One day you and I will agree about the wind industry not killing the whooping cranes. It will come after the wind industry has killed off the last of the whooping cranes or after the industry kills off the propeller style wind turbine.
The US produces almost NO electricity from oil. There is NO relationship. Electricity comes from coal, oil, hydro, nuclear and natural gas. Why did wind turbine supplier GE pay zero tax in 2010?? This is helpful to society?
I'm sure it can be improved, but fundamentally Mr. Wiegand is a non-expert in a sea of experts, none of whom agree with him. His claims of hundreds of deaths of whooping cranes are supported by exactly no empirical evidence.
No whooping crane has been killed by a wind farm or its attendant power lines and other infrastructure. There is no evidence for this at all.
If as many whooping cranes had been killed as Mr. Wiegand asserts, there would be no whooping cranes at all right now, not in five years as he keeps stating.
This is reality....... The industry has their own special USFWS “voluntary regulations”, they use bogus mortality searches around turbines with search areas 8-10 times too small, gag orders are written into contracts with leaseholders and employees, the high security at all wind farms, and the wind industry personnel picking up bodies and hiding them. All these conditions enable the industry to conceal their impacts. The whooping Crane flock lost approximately 100 members last year.
Mr. Wiegand is not a credible source. He is an antiques dealer who hates wind farms.
I have a lot more I could say about his testimony but I will wait for the right time. Now that Tom Stehn is retired he may come clean on all this. He knows I speak the truth and if he truly is dedicated to preserving the whooping crane he will admit that the drought did not kill these birds.
And, of course, he's the Vice-President of the anti-wind lobbyist group, Save the Eagles International, which appears to consist of him and the President. If Mr. Wiegand can call himself a wildlife biologist, then all of those Psych minors working in call centers can call themselves Psychiatrists, and all of those guys who took Commerce who are flipping burgers can call themselves CEOs.
That he has no credibility as a messenger is merely something I am pointing out.
The world's leading expert on whooping cranes, Tom Stehn, attributes the recent losses to drought. He testifies to this in court. He worked his entire life to restore whooping crane populations and knew each bird.
http://whoopingcrane.com/2012/07/
As we look at drought, the leading cause of it these days is climate change. Climate change is something that wind farms are directly assisting with. Saying that wind turbines are slaughtering whooping cranes is directly and exactly against reality.
The only person saying that wind farms are killing whooping cranes is Wiegand, and he doesn't work with whooping cranes, live anywhere near their habitat or corridor, study them or count them.
Wiegand is obsessed with bird deaths by wind turbines, to the point where he makes up impacts where none exist. It is impossible to have a rational conversation with him as he refuses to provide references --- likely as there are none -- and repeats things that no one else believes.