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The Science Is Clear: Offshore Wind Isn’t What’s Killing Whales (www.scientificamerican.com)

submitted 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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"Politicians and nonprofit groups have blamed offshore wind turbines for whale deaths, but the science doesn’t support those claims—at all"

"Conducting necropsies on beached whales to pin down a cause of death is made difficult by the animals’ layer of blubber and by the fact that organs can literally cook inside a stranded whale. But it is starkly clear that human activity—in the form of ships that hit whales or fishing gear that wraps around them—is often to blame."

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[–] [email protected] 37 points 4 months ago (1 children)

It's hardly surprising that a theory advocated by groups that normally don't give two shits about killing animals turns out to be false.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 4 months ago

You mean the guys saying EVs are dirtier than petrol cars don't know how to science? That seems unlikely

[–] [email protected] 15 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Yes the things sticking OUT of the water are most definitely killing the whales IN the water.

SERIOUSLY HOW FUCKING STUPID ARE THE PEOPLE MAKING THESE CLAMES?‽!

[–] [email protected] 6 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Their pseudo science blames some kind of infrasound waves from the turbines.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (2 children)

"Some kind of infrasound waves"

Haven't read the article yet so please excuse my ignorance, but wouldn't driving the pillars for the foundation into the sediment produce infrasound? And once the turbine is running, it's hard to imagine such a large device to not cause any kind of sub 20Hz vibrations. After all, you can usually hear and sometimes feel them when standing close by the mills on land. (Edit: or, you're really only hearing the ripples propagating along the infrasound wave, or "woosh", of the blades passing the tower. The time^-1^ between two "whoosh"-es being the frequency of this particular infrasound wave.)

Though, whether the infrasound is loud enough to be a problem is questionable.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

Vibrations that low would make the turbine unstable, the resonant frequency of the structure would be much higher. The control system would also attenuate any resonant frequencies that low.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

I agree that they could be a source of weak infrasound (<20 Hz), but apart of fringe web sites nobody was able to determine a significant effect on humans or animals.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 4 months ago

Science and conservatism.

Name a more iconic rivalry.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 4 months ago

My hypothesis would be that once construction is finished, the inverse could be true, because the foundations provide shelter for a whole ecosystem (see abandoned oil rigs) which might trickle down to bigger fish (or mammals in this case).

[–] [email protected] 5 points 4 months ago

I thought it had been pretty well established that naval/marine sonar is a major contributor?

https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/marine-science/articles/10.3389/fmars.2017.00295/full

[–] [email protected] 4 points 4 months ago

It’s that one-legged motherfucker Ahab.