Birds Die Over Solar Panels

This mojave desert solar plant kills 6 000 birds a year.

Birds die over solar panels.

With a concentraing solar plant birds can be harmed when they fly too close to the path of the reflected solar energy. News reported that wind turbines are responsible for killing over 573 000 birds annually. The estimate by biologists is that the ivanpah solar plant kills about 3 500 birds per year this way. Bird experts say we don t know much about background mortality rates in the desert the number of birds that might die at project locations even in the absence of solar panels.

Editor s note 9 september 2019. Horror at the world s largest solar farm days after it opens as it is revealed panels are scorching birds that fly over them. We have clarified this article to explain how the solar thermal plant differs from the far more common design used in photovoltaic solar farms. Workers at a state of the art solar plant in the mojave desert have a name for birds that fly through the plant s concentrated sun rays streamers for the smoke plume from birds that ignite.

Birds can be killed when they smash into the facility s solar panels the investigation concluded. The ivanpah solar electric generating system the world s largest. If they do they can basically get cooked by the high energy rays. The other solar farms analyzed by the investigators were of the newfangled trough and solar.

As birds die and. Coverage of the ivanpah bird problem has contributed to the unfounded misconception that solar panels may kill birds. Federal biologists say about 6 000 birds die from collisions or immolation annually while chasing flying insects around the facility.