SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Bird deaths down 70 percent after painting wind turbine blades:
Something as simple as black paint could be the key to reducing the number of birds that are killed each year by wind turbines. According to a study conducted at a wind farm on the Norwegian archipelago of Smøla, changing the color of a single blade on a turbine from white to black resulted in a 70-percent drop in the number of bird deaths.
Not everyone is a fan of wind turbines, however, because of their impact on local populations of flying fauna like birds and bats.
[...] Previous laboratory studies have suggested that birds may not be very good at seeing obstructions while they're flying, and adding visual cues like different colored fan blades can increase birds' chances of spotting a rapidly rotating fan.
[...] And so, in 2013, each of the four turbines in the test group had a single blade painted black. In the three years that followed, only six birds were found dead due to striking their turbine blades. By comparison, 18 bird deaths were recorded by the four control wind turbines—a 71.9-percent reduction in the annual fatality rate.
Digging into the data a little more showed some variation on bird deaths depending upon the season. During spring and autumn, fewer bird deaths were recorded at the painted turbines. But in summer, bird deaths actually increased at the painted turbines, and the authors note that the small number of turbines in the study and its relatively short duration both merit longer-term replication studies, both at Smøla and elsewhere.
Journal Reference:
Roel May, Torgeir Nygård, Ulla Falkdalen, et al. Paint it black: Efficacy of increased wind turbine rotor blade visibility to reduce avian fatalities [open], Ecology and Evolution (DOI: 10.1002/ece3.6592)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 27 2020, @05:28PM (4 children)
Because white is a nice clean color that's easy to sell. There's no reason for them to be white other than that. Heat dissipation on a something rotating that quickly shouldn't even enter the equation.
As far as white cars go, that's got nothing to do with it. Ford didn't sell any white cars for quite a while after being founded, they were all black. White cars look good on the lot, but they get dirty quickly and really show the dust. Sure, they might be slightly less hot than other colors, but I doubt the difference is large enough to worry about. Plus, when the temperatures dip that becomes a negative rather than positive.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 27 2020, @05:50PM (1 child)
Wrong on both counts. Radiant absorption and emission coefficients are always equal. White cars effectively have better insulation. They are significantly cooler in summer and warmer in winter.
(Score: 2) by Bot on Thursday August 27 2020, @10:27PM
Vehicles in the family have been white, dark blue, medium blue, dark red (plain paint) and light blue, turquoise, tropical yellow, light gray (metallic paint). Of all of them the one which looked worse dirty was the tropical yellow one. The white ones are indeed way better in the summer. The color of the interior counts too.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Friday August 28 2020, @01:40PM (1 child)
White cars also seem to have fewer collisions.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday August 29 2020, @07:12AM
It's pretty close but I think bright yellow just beats it.