Expansion of wind energy farms threaten raptors such as the ferruginous hawk.
This Oregonian story is headed for Monday's front page, but you can read it first on PDXgreen:
By Gail Kinsey Hill/The Oregonian
The rapid expansion of wind energy farms in the Columbia River Gorge's shrub steppes could put hawks, eagles and other raptors on a collision course with fields of giant turbines and their 150-foot blades.
By year's end, more than 1,500 turbines will be churning out electricity in the gorge, a windy corridor at the forefront of a nationwide effort to produce cleaner energy. Until now, most of the projects have gone up in wheat fields -- cultivated land that long ago drove away the rodents that raptors hunt....
This Oregonian story is headed for Monday's front page, but you can read it first on PDXgreen:
By Gail Kinsey Hill/The Oregonian
The rapid expansion of wind energy farms in the Columbia River Gorge's shrub steppes could put hawks, eagles and other raptors on a collision course with fields of giant turbines and their 150-foot blades.
By year's end, more than 1,500 turbines will be churning out electricity in the gorge, a windy corridor at the forefront of a nationwide effort to produce cleaner energy. Until now, most of the projects have gone up in wheat fields -- cultivated land that long ago drove away the rodents that raptors hunt....
