By Jo Nova
Now they tell us
Wind farms save the world, and absolutely do not hurt dolphins or whales but did you know the industry has developed bubble curtains to protect porpoises hearing from the things that never harm them (isn’t that nice of them)? Bubble curtains are being “widely” used in Germany, Denmark and the Netherlands.
The BBC is happy to report it now there are good results from a study, but apparently they weren’t too enthused in 2013 about telling us how pile -driving during construction can permanently destroy hearing in marine mammals. Indeed, ocean noise is such a problem the pile-driving teams use acoustic deterrents — loud noises designed to scare marine life away before they get started on the industrial noise. But even the “safety warning” may itself be dangerous.
So that’s alright then, windfarm construction used to kill porpoises, and the BBC kept that a secret, but now that we’ve solved it, it’s news we can use, right?
“Like a giant jacuzzi.”
How bubble curtains protect porpoises from wind farm noise
The original pile-driving in that study was actually done around 2009. If intrepid investigators from the BBC cared about marine life for real and investigated, they could possibly have reported it 14 years ago and before another 4,000 wind turbines were hammered in to the sea floor. Do dolphins matter or don’t they?
It appears the BBC only mentioned underwater noise pollution once before in 2018, and the one reference to a windfarm was buried in a list of other industrial sources of noise. There were no headlines “Windfarm construction kills porpoises”. If coal miners used pile-drivers and was killing dolphins, the BBC would headline it and then repeat it until children at school were signing songs about it.
But those wind farmers are the nicest guys designing these jucuzzis just for porpoises:
It only took the BBC ten years to mention the Dähne study of 2013:
At close range, pile-driving noise can cause temporary hearing loss or even permanent deafness in harbour porpoises, leaving them disoriented and unable to survive. There can also be indirect damage. A 2013 study of pile-driving during the first offshore wind farm built in the German North Sea found that the noise prompted harbour porpoises to flee the area, swimming more than 20km (12 miles) away. Harbour porpoises need to eat and hunt almost constantly to meet their energy needs. Fleeing over long distances can disrupt that vital activity and make them vulnerable to starvation. Seals may be similarly affected.
Harbour Porpoises have been having a hard time in the Baltic Sea. At least one mammal experts suggests they are dying awfully young:
Siebert points out that while porpoises can generally live for more than 20 years, in the Baltic Sea the average life span for females is just under four years, and in the North Sea, just under six years. “The animals in our waters die far too early,” she says.
Where is Greenpeace when a porpoise needs them?
REFERENCE
Michael Dähne et at (2013) Effects of pile-driving on harbour porpoises (Phocoena phocoena) at the first offshore wind farm in Germany, Environmental Research Letters, Volume 8, Number 2, DOI 10.1088/1748-9326/8/2/025002
What an extraordinarily complicated world we are making for ourselves. “Bubble curtains?”
Apparently 2000 tonnes of insects are killed every year by Germanys on shore land turbines (together with thousands of birds)
The mind boggles as to what energy consuming devices we can think of to keep creatures with wings well clear of the arc of death.
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Each wind turbine might occasionally generate enough energy to create the bubble curtain!
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Ah, but it’s only the construction that’s noisy.
This I doubt!
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“Where is Greenpeace when a porpoise needs them?”
Porpoises are lousy donors.
So are large raptors.
And whales.
But wind energy companies and the governments who love to throw money at them are EXCELLENT donors.
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That is to think that Greenpiss are an environmental organisation when they are eco-activists just like the WWF.
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Thanks Jo.
Another outstanding piece, which sadly reminds us of the anti freedom, anti democratic forces at work here in 2024.
Just where humanity is going to finish up is frightening to contemplate.
How did it get so bad?
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More discussion of the problem: vlf pulsing once the blades are turning.
Hint, it’s not the noise.
https://joannenova.com.au/2022/03/victorian-windfarm-loses-court-case-on-noise-must-turn-off-turbines-at-night/#comment-2532598
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“How did it get so bad?”
“It” has nearly always been pretty bad. The era of western European dominance over humanity – say 1500’s until recently – is ending. It is ending largely of its own volition, undermined by its own fifth column of self-loathing pseudo-Marxists and other anti-civilizational lifeforms. That’s how.
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Pseudo Marxists???? These are full blown communists who are determined to destroy democracy completely. They do not want government by the people they just want government of the people. Name one thing the Greens have done that is of benefit to Australians. Name one thing the ALP has done that benefits a majority of Australians. The communists did not surrender when the wall came down and the USSR was broken up. They just changed how they went about the business of destroying the West. Very cleverly, like a martial arts fighter, they used own own strengths to weaken us. They used our generosity to make us poor, our good will to kill us.
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Has the oil industry ever showed concern for the noise from deep sea drilling and mining? The sound can travel up to 500 km.
https://www.soest.hawaii.edu/oceanography/deep-sea-mining-noise-pollution-will-stretch-hundreds-of-miles/
Unlike wind farm construction, which is a one-off, drilling is near-continuous.
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Ok, when working, windmills stay silent ? Infrasound or subsonic noise is unaudible 😀
What BS you write all the time…
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People come here to be informed AND entertained by the “CNN Trio”.😆
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So, the article you link to is about deep sea mining and not the oil industry. Well done. Once an oil well is established, drilling stops in order for production to start. So no, during oil extraction there is little or no drilling. In fact, if the oil rig has not been built on a modular platform, drilling rigs and extraction and processing rigs are entirely different animals. Modern rigs tend to be modular but drilling still stops for production to start. Deep sea mining is a different game altogether and will continuously produce noise. However, these deep sea mining operations will probably be necessary to supply the rare earths needed to build wind turbines. It’s a no win. But then someone who tries to claim Dansgaard-Oeschger were local and not global – not much more to say really.
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Simon, the anti-energy lobby keep telling us wind and solar intermittents are the cheapest and most reliable form of electricity production, despite this being an obvious lie.
Why then does China, beloved by the Left, keep building two coal-fired power stations per week. Why wouldn’t they use cheaper and more reliable wind and solar?
And the fact that their CO2 emissions (not that it matters) are more than double the next biggest producer, the United States, and rising rapidly while emissions from Western countries are static or decreasing also seems to escape the attention of the anti-energy lobby.
The following is a remarkable graph. Notice how CO2 emissions from the US, Japan, EU and Russia are not significantly different (or lower) from 1970 but China and India have shot up.
Remind me again why the West is destroying their economies with “green” energy?
Source: https://commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:World_fossil_carbon_dioxide_emissions_six_top_countries_and_confederations.png
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Correct David and China, India and the developing countries will continue to emit more co2 emissions for many decades into the future.
India will not let China become a super power forever and they will also be building many more coal and gas BASE-LOAD power stns for a very long time.
Africa hasn’t started yet but they have plenty of coal and gas reserves and a huge population to drag out of poverty.
The climate since 1950 has been very benign for Africa and their combined 53 countries will soon overtake India’s population and they’ll also want a higher standard of living.
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Don’t be ridiculous Simon, drilling is nothing like pile driving. I lived 10km from a wind farm construction and had months of headaches, disturbed sleep, even dust and objects falling from shelves. You’re talking immense rhythmic percussive noise, like being hit around the head with a rubber hammer 20 times a minute. Underwater it would have been 1000s of times worse.
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Stopped reading at ‘ … models … ‘.
FYI.
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This is seafloor mining which has basically not got off the ground anywhere except for small scale trials, thankfully. There is no mention of drilling.
As someone who has spent considerable time on offshore drilling rigs in bass strait and the NE Shelf / East Timor, etc, I am convinced that if the noise from these rigs was a problem for sea life (during actual drilling or other related activities), we wouldn’t have seen all manner of creatures. Sharks, turtles, seals, whales, dolphins… I’m pretty sure that if the rig was causing them distress, they wouldn’t consistently approach it, or, as with the seals (or possibly sea-lions?) in bass strait, live on the production platform jacket itself.
Back in 2009-ish, One of the unmanned platforms in the Bonaparte Gulf had the first couple (at least) of wells where the surface casing (the steel tubing that holds the hole open, amongst other things) on the first shallow section of the well was hammered down to the requisite depth at a few hundred metres, rather than a hole being drilled first. The vibrations from this were felt everywhere for the day or 2 that it took, so I do think it would have been exceptionally noisy underwater. This was the only time I’ve seen casing hammered down in operations near Australia, but I don’t claim to be an authority on this practice. It is not uncommon in other parts of the world.
I think undersea mining will prove to be an environmental disaster, and while I know drilling for oil and gas is not without problems, it has nothing on large scale seafloor scarification, which is being driven by the need for metals like manganese, thanks to this crazy obsession with battery power.
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Simon, they used modeling.
Back in the day, models had to be validated before conclusions could be drawn from them.
Apparently real data is not necessary in any Green “science”.
Modeling and non-validated conclusions is what you get when you have powerful computers, off-the-shelf software and “researchers” that lack deep knowledge about the subject they are modeling.
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Simple Simon
Pile driving has an order of magnitude increase in noise to drilling, and in fact pile driving requires pilot holes to begin with.
And there are orders of magnitude more of these silly windmills in number than oil drillholes.
Your ignorance and lack of ability for analysis does not surprise.
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Surprises me, I didn’t think anybody could be that stupid.
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95% vaxxination rate!
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Drilling is not continuous, they drill over a period of months, commonly 3 to six months depending on the target depth, and then mostly cap the well and move on. If viable a small number of wells may become a producing platform. The noise is mostly generated above sea-level with some small transference down the drilling stem.
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“Unlike wind farm construction, which is a one-off, drilling is near-continuous.”
Do you mean EACH windmill is a one-off, the construction continues unabated.
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The question I want to see answered is whether there is normal sea life around functioning offshore wind “farms”. In the question period Mariana Alves-Pereria says the area around them is a biological desert.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nu8z7dyQA9Y
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We already have the means to produce environmentally friendly, inexpensive and reliable electricity using coal, gas, nuclear and real hydro (not SH2).
Let’s use that instead.
Let’s make 2024 a year of science, reason and anti-wokeness and get back to progressing humanity rather than wasting staggering amounts of money on wind and solar subsidy farms (for the sole benefit of Elite subsidy harvesters).
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It’s about time for people to undermine Greenpiss from within in order to sow some doubt into their feeble, vulnerable heads. This nonsense of wind turbines dotted around our coastline has to be arrested. Getting rid of that dimwit maniac Bowen would be a start.
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I’ve never seen a coal fired station upset a bird or a porpoise or a whale yet.
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The BBC people have used whales for years and pretended to care for sealife for years.
Just like the Democrats have pretended to care for black Americans.
But they were the huge majority who fought to keep them in slavery, committed the lynchings,formed the KKK, demanded segregation,and utilised Jim crow.
Hence over half a million unnecessary deaths.
If wind and solar is ditched in favour of nuclear as it should be the dream of the destruction of Democracy replaced by a number of hideous dictatorships will be in jeopardy.
The BBC and other organisations like them care nothing for sealife, native people or minorities.
They are ruthless in their greed and addiction to power.
Narcissism is such an ugly mental illness.
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How many people realise that the DemocRATs were the original party of slavery and racism in the US? It shows how effectively the Left have rewritten history.
And today, the DemocRATs keep black people as welfare slaves rather than plantation slaves – but still slaves. They keep them in poverty for the sole purpose of having them vote for the RATs.
President Trump provided a huge decrease in black unemployment. He wanted to see them work, not as welfare-dependent slaves.
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! couldn’t agree with you more! We are staring at an ironic scenario; watching people destroy the planet to ‘save’ it. As usual it is the elites, billionaires and couldn’t care less companies except when it comes to money, power and control.
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Well, that may answer a few remaining questions on why Orsted bailed out on the New Jersey project after the parade of dead whales continued to wash ashore.
I recall reading a study a while back on how the ocean in and around wind farms resembled a desert.
Then this popped into my head from Shellenberger.
https://public.substack.com/p/why-this-documentary-may-save-the
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I can imagine a curious, as they are naturally, Porpoise breaking through the veil into the inner sanctum and being trapped there awaiting death by starvation. The veil might work in an aquarium but a fully functioning unit in the ocean? This is just more window dressing to appease the Greens the party that currently rules Germany.
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More “bubble wrap” for the proponents of off-shore wind?
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I have been wondering about the lack of thought about the coming electricity debacle coming for Australia and the lack of debate in Canberra about it, and the apparent refusal to learn from the current disasters in Europe.
At first I thought that it was due to a lack of knowledge about technical matters but I realise now that it goes deeper that that. The problem is that the bureaucracy in Canberra was founded by those going to what was considered a bush camp and whose children and grandchildren have grown up and found employment there as well. Cushioned by benefits flowing their way, and going up with the idea that “following the process” was only the way to succeed, the result is that no failure can be declared e.g. Snowy2 as that would result in blame and possibly retribution by those above them. This results in the following of dubious ideas such as AGW as this comes from the United Nation so they would claim that they were only following “the advice of the best scientists”. That such advice has proved useless and expensive isn’t in anyway mentioned as the same mentality runs through the ABC and most news purveyors that they see. (Have you seen anything about Tim Flannery lately?).
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It’s not called the Canberra bubble for nothing. Prime example – the recent YES/No referendum. Canberra being the only major electorate voting yes.
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Yes, but for some reason has infected our Universities and the media. I can see the pressure on Universities where the Administration end is so much larger than the academic numbers, and are adamant on not upsetting the flow of money from the Canberra bureaucacy and from various shadowy but well-financed Foundations, but why the media? I suppose that many “journalists” now come out of University with their minds indoctrinated.
It seems extraordinary to me that the huge list of predictions/forecasts/scenories etc all being debunked would surely cause some scepticism. Or is scepticism forbinned?
I’ve recently looking at The Piltdown forgery and while many in the UK were convinced but not all, let alone scientists elsewhere who lacked any conviction. Doubts were raised and after 40 years tests proved it a fake, yet here AGW is still running after 43 years (even 112 years if you believe that burning coal would cause the Earth to become to hot for humans to survive).
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Bubble Rap?
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“bubble curtains”
Einstein was correct. There is no limit to human stupidity,
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How much energy is being consumed by running the compressors needed for the bubble wrap 24/7, most likely diesel power, not that there’s anything wrong with that.
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But the power lines needed are shorter (/S)
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Mr. McFly: I read that porpoises and dolphins are almost human in intelligence, so they need to look at the harm of dolphins/porpoises killed when they become obsessed with popping the bubbles.
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Covid News
“Florida Surgeon Makes a Stunning Move”
“Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo is doing what many doctors urged officials to do two years ago — calling for a federal halt in the use of mRNA COVID-19 vaccines.”
https://pjmedia.com/catherinesalgado/2024/01/03/fl-surgeon-general-urges-fda-to-halt-mrna-covid-vaccines-n4925181
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Oops! Meant for the “Day” thread
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In another one of the wonderful “twists” that fill our daily lives:
Cetaceans, (Whales and dolphins) INVENTED “bubble netting” as a HUNTING technique
https://www.zmescience.com/science/whales-bubble-nets-92352342/
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https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-m8COTmLD5rA/V7yb_nQq6CI/AAAAAAAAXp4/h9DU-pnG_RkjeWVjBlAE5Oy3NR0V7K6xwCLcB/s1600/so_long_and_thanks_for_all_the_fish.jpg
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Making, selling, and installing “bubble curtains” create
numerous high paying green jobs.
I’m surprised a certain U.S. president hasn’t been photographed
in brightly colored vest in an inflatable dinghy surrounded by bubbles.
It could make a Michael Dukakis moment, he of dopey grin, helmet, in a tank.
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Would the disturbance from the bubble wall accelerate the release of CO2 from the oceans?
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Great question theotherross!
Indeed it would.
Turbulence causes a release of CO2, as it does in any carbonated drink.
Question: Do the bubble walls cause the release of more CO2 due to outgassing of seawater than supposedly saved by the windmills themselves?
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I just don’t understand how these offshore wind farms can be successful no matter how much power they may produce.
How long does a turbine and its blades last in such a corrosive environment? What is the cost of replacement assuming it is possible?
Sounds like a temporary fix to a non existent problem to me. A disaster waiting to happen. Sure makes a modern coal fired plant look good.
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Economics has nothing to do with it.
Windmills are such a huge scam they make money no matter what, at the expense of consumers and/or taxpayers.
They would not exist in a free market, except small ones for hobby use or remote installations.
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They’re not fit for porpoise!
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Please pay the fine for that joke direct to my account.
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How about Greenbacks? Please provide account number, login and password details asap.
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FBI Headquarters, St. Petersburg, Florida:
The FBI announced today that several employees of the Orlando, Florida Sea World Theme Park and Resort were arrested as they entered Florida from Georgia. The Park employees were returning from North Carolina.
When questioned by the FBI, the employees told investigators that they were assigned to find and trap mynah birds in North Carolina, and bring them to Orlando. They further stated that the dolphin population of the theme park had been in decline, due to low rates of reproduction.
A marine biologist at the Park had found that an enzyme in the meat of mynah birds would cause increased fertility among the dolphin population, and also affect their libido.
When the Park employees asked what crime they were being charged with, the FBI investigators advised them that it is illegal to transport mynahs across State lines for immoral porpoises.
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Soap bubble curtains for land lubbers next? Or better still, infrasound noise cancelling headphones and immage cancelling glasses.
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a bubble curtain along the rio grande??
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We need to stop thinking that any of the so called green groups ( eg Greenpeace etc) are going to stop or delay any renewable energy projects. My belief in the the virtue of the likes of Greenpeace was eroded decades ago. They are just using phony concerns as a front to elicit funds from corporates and public to support salaries for their own workers and ideology. So, not unlike the present Australian government. Greenpeace couldn’t care less about whales, porpoises and world peace. They’re like a lot of charities these days – more concerned about likes, retweets , thumbs up and donations.
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Yes, all about themselves. It became a metropolitan trendy wealthy lifestyle, yuppie image a long time ago. A terrace inner city house, a desk and a macintosh, a european car, posters of forest on the walls. Late 90’s comes to mind.
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Now I know why Flipper doesn’t answer my calls anymore.
I was an environmentalist in my youth. The climate issue made me realise this is not an environmental movement at all, it’s antiwhite ideology.
The blood lust of environmentalists was another major factor in waking me up. They love killing things they deem unacceptable. Thats fine if based on practicality, but it wasn’t, it was based on an ideology (non-native equals kill it, and make it hurt).
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The case of the Brumbies in the Snowy Mountains is a good example. Insane. Worse, a woefully infantile understanding of environment and it’s processes.
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Also, cattle grazing in the high country. I knew a “scientist” doing some research work on the alleged damage by cattle in that area and it was poor quality. Too small a sample size, limited time frame , too simplistic. Yet, it was quoted often in the argument to restrict that practice. Very often by some of these activist groups. I could also relate a story about Greenpeace and a stunt they performed during the 1990’s, but it would be off topic.
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Bubble shields don’t do much. Here is a quote from the US Energy Department’s science side.
“The environmental concerns associated with offshore wind farms vary with foundation type. Monopiles, for example, require pile-driving, which produces INCREDIBLY LOUD NOISES that tend to propagate far in the water, even after mitigation strategies such as BUBBLE SHIELDS, slow start, and acoustic cladding are employed.” (Emphasis added)
From “Fixed offshore wind” at https://tethys.pnnl.gov/technology/fixed-offshore-wind
This is from my https://www.cfact.org/2022/07/26/threat-to-endangered-whales-gets-louder/
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A wall of bubbles?
Well, that defeats the porpoise. 😆
And it was a porpoise built product!
The designers found their porpoise in life.
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Shark of the new.
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By the time the environmental destruction of the planet is complete thanks to the loony GREENS, I’m hoping an Alien probe aka Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, turns up and wipes out what’s left of earth. How absolutely moronic is this renewables energy revolution, destruction of the world to save it, FROM WHAT! Ah well, I’ll be long by the time the shit hits the fan, sucked in kids enjoy.
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The environmental destruction these monstrosities will do to the planets oceans and their land based counterparts will dwarf anything fossil fuel related. The cleanup bill will be huge. Hopefully an Alien probe aka Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home will descend on earth and destroy it before the GREENS destroy it. Enjoy your ruinables covered planet kids….bwahaha.
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Rampion wind farm construction UK.
Thump thump thump 8 miles away.
https://www.theargus.co.uk/news/14711415.residents-still-suffering-sleepless-nights-due-to-wind-farm-work/
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[…] Building offshore wind farms can permanently deafen porpoises, but it’s OK now with Bubble Walls […]
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