October 28, 2024 — Much of the attention around what towering offshore wind turbines could mean for Jersey Shore animals has focused on whales and certain fish species.
Birds, some believe, have gotten short shrift.
As have bats.
Not that wind developers and environmentalists aren’t looking up to the skies.
During a recent tour of the Long Island South Fork wind farm — a project that could be instructive for what’s planned in New Jersey in the years to come — managers from Ørsted said they monitor for birds and bats.
How? With the Motus Wildlife Tracking System, an international collaborative research network.
The equipment is affixed to one of the projects’ 12 turbine platforms, the company said.
Worries have been shared by advocates about what wind structures, simply by the nature of their size and placement, will mean for birds and bats that travel off the coast. Bats have been shown to collide with turbines. Lighting has also been observed to attract certain birds to the structures, an organizer from the National Audubon Society told NJ Advance Media.