Habitat use of bats in relation to wind turbines revealed by GPS tracking
Worldwide, many countries aim at countering global climate change by promoting renewable energy. Yet, recent studies highlight that so-called green energy, such as wind energy, may come at environmental costs, for example when wind turbines kill birds and bats. Using miniaturized GPS loggers, we stu...
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ftpubmed:oai:pubmedcentral.nih.gov:4931514 2023-05-15T17:48:37+02:00 Habitat use of bats in relation to wind turbines revealed by GPS tracking Roeleke, Manuel Blohm, Torsten Kramer-Schadt, Stephanie Yovel, Yossi Voigt, Christian C. 2016-07-04 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4931514/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27373219 https://doi.org/10.1038/srep28961 en eng Nature Publishing Group http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4931514/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27373219 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/srep28961 Copyright © 2016, Macmillan Publishers Limited http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in the credit line; if the material is not included under the Creative Commons license, users will need to obtain permission from the license holder to reproduce the material. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ CC-BY Article Text 2016 ftpubmed https://doi.org/10.1038/srep28961 2016-07-10T00:16:13Z Worldwide, many countries aim at countering global climate change by promoting renewable energy. Yet, recent studies highlight that so-called green energy, such as wind energy, may come at environmental costs, for example when wind turbines kill birds and bats. Using miniaturized GPS loggers, we studied how an open-space foraging bat with high collision risk with wind turbines, the common noctule Nyctalus noctula (Schreber, 1774), interacts with wind turbines. We compared actual flight trajectories to correlated random walks to identify habitat variables explaining the movements of bats. Both sexes preferred wetlands but used conventionally managed cropland less than expected based on availability. During midsummer, females traversed the land on relatively long flight paths and repeatedly came close to wind turbines. Their flight heights above ground suggested a high risk of colliding with wind turbines. In contrast, males recorded in early summer commuted straight between roosts and foraging areas and overall flew lower than the operating range of most turbine blades, suggesting a lower collision risk. Flight heights of bats suggest that during summer the risk of collision with wind turbines was high for most studied bats at the majority of currently installed wind turbines. For siting of wind parks, preferred bat habitats and commuting routes should be identified and avoided. Text Nyctalus noctula PubMed Central (PMC) Scientific Reports 6 1 |
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Article Roeleke, Manuel Blohm, Torsten Kramer-Schadt, Stephanie Yovel, Yossi Voigt, Christian C. Habitat use of bats in relation to wind turbines revealed by GPS tracking |
topic_facet |
Article |
description |
Worldwide, many countries aim at countering global climate change by promoting renewable energy. Yet, recent studies highlight that so-called green energy, such as wind energy, may come at environmental costs, for example when wind turbines kill birds and bats. Using miniaturized GPS loggers, we studied how an open-space foraging bat with high collision risk with wind turbines, the common noctule Nyctalus noctula (Schreber, 1774), interacts with wind turbines. We compared actual flight trajectories to correlated random walks to identify habitat variables explaining the movements of bats. Both sexes preferred wetlands but used conventionally managed cropland less than expected based on availability. During midsummer, females traversed the land on relatively long flight paths and repeatedly came close to wind turbines. Their flight heights above ground suggested a high risk of colliding with wind turbines. In contrast, males recorded in early summer commuted straight between roosts and foraging areas and overall flew lower than the operating range of most turbine blades, suggesting a lower collision risk. Flight heights of bats suggest that during summer the risk of collision with wind turbines was high for most studied bats at the majority of currently installed wind turbines. For siting of wind parks, preferred bat habitats and commuting routes should be identified and avoided. |
format |
Text |
author |
Roeleke, Manuel Blohm, Torsten Kramer-Schadt, Stephanie Yovel, Yossi Voigt, Christian C. |
author_facet |
Roeleke, Manuel Blohm, Torsten Kramer-Schadt, Stephanie Yovel, Yossi Voigt, Christian C. |
author_sort |
Roeleke, Manuel |
title |
Habitat use of bats in relation to wind turbines revealed by GPS tracking |
title_short |
Habitat use of bats in relation to wind turbines revealed by GPS tracking |
title_full |
Habitat use of bats in relation to wind turbines revealed by GPS tracking |
title_fullStr |
Habitat use of bats in relation to wind turbines revealed by GPS tracking |
title_full_unstemmed |
Habitat use of bats in relation to wind turbines revealed by GPS tracking |
title_sort |
habitat use of bats in relation to wind turbines revealed by gps tracking |
publisher |
Nature Publishing Group |
publishDate |
2016 |
url |
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4931514/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27373219 https://doi.org/10.1038/srep28961 |
genre |
Nyctalus noctula |
genre_facet |
Nyctalus noctula |
op_relation |
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4931514/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27373219 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/srep28961 |
op_rights |
Copyright © 2016, Macmillan Publishers Limited http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in the credit line; if the material is not included under the Creative Commons license, users will need to obtain permission from the license holder to reproduce the material. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ |
op_rightsnorm |
CC-BY |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1038/srep28961 |
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Scientific Reports |
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