Blades as fast as a guillotine

The killer of eagles and all birds at wind farms is blade tip speed. This is what kills and this is what the wind industry does not publicize or put in the environmental documents.

The Hatchet Ridge Wind Farm, which was recently approved, is going to construct three different size wind turbines. According to the specifications given, the blades on the proposed turbine towers will be 126 feet, 151 feet and 156 feet long. They will rotate at approximately 20 rotations per minute. The diameter of each rotation is 252 feet, 302 feet and 312 feet.

What is hard to comprehend is that at 20 rotations per minute, the tip speed of the blades for the three turbines works out to 180 mph, 215 mph and 222 miles per hour. The speed and power of these blades is what amputates the wings and heads off flying eagles. From miles away the blades look rather slow, but up close these huge blades move faster than a guillotine.

In contrast, a 24-inch high-velocity fan used to cool warehouses only rotates at 125 feet per second at the maximum 1,200 rpm. This tip speed equals 85 miles per hour. The fan is caged with a wire frame that meets government product safety standards. You would not dare put your finger into these rotating blades because they would be cut off.

This is the danger that is facing bird life across this land. High-velocity fans without cages. Sadly the red kite has just about disappeared from the Italian countryside because of these turbines. A woman from Nebraska called me yesterday because a wind farm is now planned for the habitat of the critically endangered whooping crane. This is all really Wall Street at work reaping profits from its outdated wind turbine technology.

The actual avian death toll coming to Hatchet Ridge we will never know because it will be deliberately concealed, just as it is at virtually every wind farm in America.