Turbine Collisions at Nysted Offshore Wind Farm and Final Quality Control of Thermal Animal Detection System (TADS)
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National Environmental Research Institute Ministry of the Environment . Denmark Preliminary investigations of bird- turbine collisions at Nysted offshore wind farm and final quality control of Thermal Animal Detection System (TADS) Autumn 2003 and spring 2004 Report commissioned by Energi E2 [Blank page] National Environmental Research Institute Ministry of the Environment . Denmark Preliminary investigations of bird- turbine collisions at Nysted offshore wind farm and final quality control of Thermal Animal Detection System (TADS) Autumn 2003 and spring 2004 Report commissioned by Energi E2 2005 Mark Desholm Data Sheet Title: Preliminary investigations of bird-turbine collisions at Nysted offshore wind farm and fi- nal quality control of Thermal Animal Detection System (TADS) Subtitle: Autumn 2003 and spring 2004 Author: Mark Desholm Department: Department of Wildlife Ecology and Biodiversity Publisher: National Environmental Research Institute Ministry of Environment Year of publication 2005 Editor: Karsten Laursen Referees: Johnny Kahlert Proofreading: Else-Marie Nielsen Layout: Helle Klareskov Energi E2 Indhold Synopsis5 1 Introduction ....................................................................................................... 7 2 Methods .............................................................................................................. 9 2.1 Study area ........................................................................................................................... 9 2.2 Thermal Animal Detection System (TADS) ........................................................................... 9 2.2.1 Technical data ............................................................................................................................ 9 2.2.2 Monitoring set-up ................................................................................................................... 11 2.3 Data handling................................................................................................................... 13 3 Results ............................................................................................................... 15 3.1 TADS study, autumn 2003 .............................................................................................. 15 3.2 TADS-study, spring 2004 ................................................................................................ 15 4 Discussion and conclusions.......................................................................... 19 5 Recommendations for future use of TADS ............................................... 21 6 References ........................................................................................................ 23 Appendix I 25 National Environmental Research Institute 3 Synopsis This report presents data on infrared monitoring A the 5-min long manual sequences of horizon- investigations by use of Thermal Animal Detec- tal view successfully detected 52 birds despite tion System (TADS) of migrating waterbirds at the very restricted number of operation hours, the Nysted offshore wind farm, Denmark. B) the radar data on bird flocks migrating within the wind farm show significant avoidance re- Information presented covers the autumn period sponses towards individual turbines, result- of 2003 and spring period of 2004. ing in a higher probability of flying more than 50 m from the turbines than expected by The aims of the report were threefold: chance alone. 1) to present preliminary data on the number of Given the maximum coverage of c. 30% of the avian collisions using infrared video record- sweep area per TADS and the monitoring effi- ing (TADS), ciency of 63.7% during the study period, it is con- 2) to assess the performance of the TADS during sidered highly unlikely that the single TADS used prolonged operation in an offshore environ- in the present study would have detected the sin- ment, gle theoretically estimated flock of Common Ei- 3) to compile information (data collected by ra- ders forecast by the probability model (Appen- dar) to model the probability of birds pass- dix I) to be crossing the sweep area of a single ing the sweep area of offshore wind turbines turbine. (Appendix I) in order to present recommen- dations for the development of a future As a consequence of the extremely low estimated TADS-study to be conducted from autumn probability of Common Eiders passing the sweep 2004 onwards. area of the turbines (Appendix I), the level of cov- erage required to adequately monitor all 72 tur- During operation the thermal trigger software bines would be extremely high, if a realistic and saved 1,223 thermal video sequences on hard disc reliable measure of the daily number of avian (see Table 1), of which only three were triggered collisions are to be registered by use of TADS only. by birds passing the field of view all in a 45° view- Hence, it is considered that using TADS as the ing mode. No birds were recorded as passing the only method to measure actual collision rates of sweep area of the rotating turbine blades nor col- Common Eiders at the Nysted Wind farm is nei- liding with any part of the turbine during the ther an economical nor practical option when it 11,284 minutes of monitoring. comes to estimation of the daily low number of collisions. The final quality control of the offshore utility of the TADS produced excellent results. It can be NERI therefore proposes future collision studies concluded that TADS can be considered as a fully to include a combination of data collected by ra- developed monitoring set-up capable of detect- dar and TADS for use as input to a more accurate ing migrating birds flying over offshore areas and and statistically robust model of the probability passing at the range of distances planned for the of daily number of avian collisions. equipment. Finally, a monitoring programme with TADS at a The fact that no birds were recorded as passing relatively low intensity (i.e. one TADS) could, be- the sweep area of the A2-turbine could give rise to sides collecting data for the probability model, some doubt as to whether the TADS actually func- function as a background monitoring scheme, aim- tioned properly during the trial. However, com- ing at detecting periods with high number of col- parison with data gathered from other sources con- lision casualties under rare and unusual situations, firm the extremely low intensity of waterbird mi- which in contrast to the low daily collision fre- gration in the near vicinity of the turbines: quency do not need any intensive coverage. 5 1 Introduction Millions of birds migrate annually between their To determine the impact of collision mortality on breeding and wintering areas. During these flights populations, it is essential to determine the they often make use of the lowest 150 metres of number and species involved (or at least identify air space above ground level, and hence, risk of casualties to species group). This is important collision with human obstacles such as buildings, because a similar collision frequency may have a bridges, towers, power lines and wind turbines significantly different impact on two different exist. It is well documented world wide that birds populations, dependent on their population dy- collide with such constructions, and in theory namics. Given that the numbers of birds collid- these mortality events are most likely to occur in ing with offshore turbines were expected to be periods of poor visibility (e.g. in dark, rainy, few and the events rare, any method to count the snowy and foggy conditions; Desholm et al. 2003, number of bird collisions will need to be auto- Desholm 2003). The highest number of casualties matic, cost-effective and remotely controlled, has been reported as discrete events, occurring whilst providing information on the species in- especially when sudden weather changes have volved in each collision. The thermal infrared reduced the visibility during periods of high mi- video technology was judged to meet these re- gration intensity. The attraction of birds to sta- quirements since it is capable of detecting mov- tionary lights has been reported for both small ing birds in all light conditions including total passerines and for larger waterfowl. Hence, the darkness. A project was therefore initiated in 2001 combination of illuminated obstacles (for recrea- to develop a system for use in an offshore envi- tional purposes or for air/ship traffic navigation ronment and to be operated from land. The re- warning) and poor visibility constitutes the great- sulting Thermal Animal Detection System (TADS) est collision risk to migrating birds. was ready for use by the end of 2003 (Desholm 2003), and together with surveillance radar it has During the past decade, several studies have fo- formed the basis for data collection for the present cused on the topic of collisions between birds and report. This report presents the first results of off- wind turbines (Pedersen & Poulsen 1991, Win- shore data collection by the TADS and covers kelman 1992), as numbers of wind farms have studies conducted during November 2003 - April increased significantly during this period. How- 2004. ever, up to 2002 the vast majority of the operat- ing wind turbines have been constructed on land The aims of the report were threefold: where searching for casualties and controlling for the removal by predators have been the preferred 1) to present preliminary data on the number of and straightforward way to