WASHINGTON - An unusual coalition of conservationists and coal advocates told Congress on Tuesday that before the nation continues its rapid expansion of wind power, an assessment is needed of how many bats and birds are maimed and killed by wind turbines' blades. That study should be followed up with regulations to protect those species, witnesses told a House Natural Resources subcommittee.

Using a radio transmitter the size of a shelled pea, John Chenger is studying an endangered bat population that hibernates in an abandoned rail tunnel near the Allegheny Tunnel on the state Turnpike. On April 17, he and his associates at Bat Conservation and Management of Carlisle joined with Sanders Environmental Inc. Centre Hall to tag 15 Indiana bats as the came out of hibernation. "We're trying to figure out where they go," Chenger explained. "Do they go five miles? Do they go 300 miles? It just isn't very well understood at this point."

Schemes to monitor the bat population will be carried out all over Ireland this summer amid concerns the population of the endangered species has dropped dramatically. Despite being protected by law, the nocturnal flying mammals are being affected by hedgerow removals, the renovation of old buildings, bridge work and pesticides.

The State Corporation Commission on Friday sent a proposal for Virginia's first utility-grade wind farm back to a hearing examiner for development of a plan to mitigate harm to rare birds and bats on Highland County ridges. In recommending approval last month for construction of 19 turbines, SCC hearing examiner Alexander Skirpan found that the Highland New Wind Development proposal posed a risk to birds and bats. Skirpan recommended a monitoring program, developed by the company and the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries, to reduce the environmental hazard.

RADAR might help to reduce the number of bats being killed by wind turbines, according to new research. Bats are repelled by electro-magnetic radiation emitted from radar installations, scientists at Aberdeen University have found. They believe fitting radar systems to wind turbines might prevent the bats from flying too close to their rotors. The team studied the behaviour of bats at various distances from ten radar installations across Scotland last summer. They found that bats did not forage in areas where high levels of radiation were present.

ROANOKE -- A state hearing examiner has recommended construction of the first utility-grade wind farm in Virginia, provided it meets conditions to minimize harm to the environment. The recommendation announced Thursday goes to the State Corporation Commission, which will decide whether to approve construction of the 19-turbine development on Highland County ridges. SCC hearing examiner Alexander Skirpan found that the project by Highland New Wind Development poses a risk to bats and birds, but said a monitoring program by the company and a state agency following construction would help reduce the hazard.

Two bird specialists familiar with the Pennsylvania Game Commission efforts to protect wildlife from wind turbines offered cautious support, although each found things they didn’t like. A bat specialist was more critical. Keith Bildstein, director of conservation science at the Hawk Mountain Sanctuary in Berks County, likes the draft agreement that would establish rules wind-energy developers would voluntarily follow. But he would prefer that the Game Commission impose an immediate moratorium on wind farms being built on high-risk sites, meaning places where wind turbines would be most dangerous to birds and bats. “We need to begin development of wind power at low-risk areas,” Bildstein said. “Do pre-construction and post-construction monitoring. Find the problems.”

The Pennsylvania Game Commission is on track with plans to create what it believes is the nation's first voluntary cooperative agreement with wind-energy developers to protect birds and bats. Wind-energy developers and outside wildlife advocates have prepared a draft agreement that would impose rules on the fast-growing industry before irreparable damage is done to bird and bat populations, said William A. Capouillez, director of the Bureau of Wildlife Habitat Management, the Game Commission. "We have broad powers under Title 34," Capouillez said, referring to the 1987 law that authorizes and empowers the Game Commission. "I tell them: Would you rather have the voluntary agreement or Title 34? We could do zero tolerance on bird kills."

Johnstown veterinarian Tom Dick is a longtime bird-watcher and a battle-scarred veteran of local environmental struggles. So, it’s no surprise to find him at the forefront of concerns about the threat that wind turbines could present to migrating birds and bats. Dick is especially worried about the effect large-scale development of wind farms might have on the rugged and largely unspoiled Allegheny Front, the mountainous wall that stretches north and south along the Cambria-Somerset-Bedford county borders. And like many opponents to the rapid pace of wind-energy development, he is afraid the true cost of the industry will not be known until it is too late for some species.

Two golden eagles that soared along the Allegheny Front ridge in Central Pennsylvania late last year and are now gliding over the hills of West Virginia and Kentucky might one day help determine where new windmills will be built in Pennsylvania and elsewhere in the East. The wide-winged raptors are wearing tiny radio telemetry transmitters that allow National Aviary researchers to track their migration routes and eventually develop the first bird's-eye-view data showing where electric wind turbines should be built and not built to minimize the killing of eagles and other big birds. Most wind turbine development has occurred without any scientific research on the consequences to migrating birds, according to Todd Katzner, director of conservation and field research at the National Aviary on the North Side. That has increased the risk that the turbine blades, some more than 100 feet long, will become bird slicers and dicers.

A HOTEL owner is being driven batty by planning delays for a wind turbine that could bring green power to his business. Stuart McGlynn, who owns the Norwood Hotel, Whalley Road, Accrington, hopes to place a small turbine on the side of his detached house, behind the hotel. But the possibility that a bat population may be roosting nearby has put a temporary halt to the plans until a wildlife survey is carried out.

How many birds and bats are killed by the rotating blades of wind turbines? How many such deaths are acceptable to increase our electricity supply? Those are two unresolved questions for Pennsylvania’s wind-power industry.

In popular Halloween folklore, vampires are able to transform into bats. And, of course, fiction tells us that one way to kill a vampire, and thus the bat, is with a stake through the heart. But in areas around the United States, a new potential bat killer has emerged - wind turbines.

THE comprehensive landscape reasons for planners recommending the IW Council turn down the controversial Wellow wind farm have been unveiled to the public, ahead of Monday’s planning decision on the scheme. Consultants acting for the IW Council concluded the six turbines, two of which are nearly 110 metres tall, would have significant adverse effects on the protected landscape, nearby homes and rights of way, and insufficient consideration had been given by applicant Your Energy to mitigating adverse effects on the countryside. Insufficient information was provided on the impact of the turbines on bats.

The September 20, 2006 VDGIF letter states: “We support the use of alternative energy sources, including wind energy. However, based on review of the information provided thus far by the Highland project applicant, in the absence of accountable mitigation conditions . . . we feel this project presents an unacceptable risk to wildlife.”

University of Calgary researchers are trying to understand why hundreds of bats are dying each year in Pincher Creek, inexplicably drawn to wind turbines. Robert Barclay, a University of Calgary professor who heads up the bat study at the Summerview Wind Farm in Pincher Creek, Alta., believes bats may be attracted by the sound of turbines or simply don't use their sonar when they migrate.

MONTPELIER, Vt. --A company's bid to build a wind farm atop a remote Northeast Kingdom mountain was rejected by the Public Service Board on Monday because of concerns about how the turbines would affect birds and bats.

Preliminary research shows wind turbines kill thousands of bats and birds in the Appalachian Mountains, which are a major migratory flyway, scientists say.....Dan Boone, a Maryland-based botanist and wildlife scientist, said laws such as the National Environmental Policy Act and the Endangered Species Act aren't enough to protect against bird and bat kills, deforestation and other damage done by wind turbines.

“Countries like Guam and Israel have lost their bat populations and are now suffering fairly severe environmental consequences.”

In addition to the threat of collision, wind generators can also pose a risk to migratory birds and bats, he said. Especially dangerous is wind farm turbine configurations that create a "barrier effect." Airborne animals are more likely to come into peril when trying to pass a wall of turbines, rather than a single turbine or small-scale operation.