Between wildlife conservation and climate protection: Does wind power harm birds, bats and insects?

Wind turbines are a key pillar of the energy transition. They generate electricity without burning fossil fuels and therefore help reduce greenhouse-gas emissions and curb climate change. During operation they produce neither CO₂ emissions nor air pollutants, require little water, and today rank among the most cost-effective forms of electricity generation. Against the backdrop of the escalating climate crisis, they are therefore considered indispensable for transforming the energy system.

At the same time, it is undisputed that wind turbines are not ecologically neutral structures. Beyond questions of landscape appearance or potential noise pollution, the focus is above all on conservation concerns—especially the protection of individual species. Collisions of birds and bats with rotor blades are well documented and have shaped the debate about wind power and species conservation for years. The crucial question is therefore not whether wind power can injure or kill animals, but to what extent, under what conditions—and how these effects compare with other human-made risks.

Birds: Real collisions, limited significance

That birds die at wind turbines is undisputed. Systematic monitoring shows, however, that these collisions are neither random nor affect all species equally. As Marques et al. (2014) explain in a fundamental review, the risk arises from the interplay of flight behaviour, body size, land use and turbine siting: while many species consistently avoid turbines, others more often enter the rotor-swept area when foraging, during territorial flights or during migration.

Particularly affected are larger bird species with wide-ranging movements and lower maneuverability. This includes above all raptors, but also some large bird species of open agricultural landscapes. Thaxter et al. (2017) confirm this pattern in a global analysis: an increased collision risk exists especially for species that regularly fly at rotor height or use large home ranges. At the same time, studies clearly show that even within potentially vulnerable groups the actual risk varies greatly and depends crucially on the specific turbine location.

Particularly sensitive species in Germany (selection)

In Germany’s wind-turbine permitting practice, the focus is primarily on species for which even small additional losses can be relevant at the population level. Langgemach & Dürr (2025) list, among others:

• Red kite (Milvus milvus) – Frequently documented collision victim because its foraging flights over agricultural landscapes often pass through wind farms; Germany bears a special responsibility for a large share (around 60%) of the world population.
• White-tailed eagle (Haliaeetus albicilla) – Large wingspan, comparatively low maneuverability and wide-ranging foraging flights increase the collision risk.
• Black stork (Ciconia nigra) – In addition to direct collisions, pronounced avoidance of wind farms along important flight routes between breeding and feeding areas also plays a role.
• Lesser spotted eagle (Clanga pomarina) – Because populations are very small, even individual losses can be relevant at the population level.
• Great bustard (Otis tarda) – Barrier effects are particularly problematic here: wind turbines cause birds to avoid certain areas, and large-scale open landscapes can lose their function as habitat.

Wind power compared to other causes of death

Only in comparison with other human influences does it become clear what share wind energy actually has in bird mortality: a comparatively small one. Reviews of anthropogenic causes of mortality consistently show that collisions at wind turbines lag far behind other risks in sheer numbers. Loss, Will & Marra (2015) concluded that free-ranging domestic cats, collisions with building glass, road traffic and power lines kill birds by orders of magnitude more than wind turbines. Erickson et al. (2014) also show that for most species the share of individuals killed by wind power—measured against the respective population size—is very small.

This perspective does not mean, however, that bird collisions are negligible from a conservation standpoint. For rare, long-lived species with low reproduction rates, even a few additional losses can be relevant at the population level. That is why the conservation assessment of wind-energy projects is guided less by the absolute number of birds killed than by which species are affected, to what extent—and at which sites.

These orders of magnitude become especially clear in large-scale comparisons from North America. According to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS), each year in the USA
– billions of birds die due to free-ranging domestic cats,
– hundreds of millions to more than a billion due to collisions with buildings,
– many millions due to traffic and power lines.

By contrast, annual bird collisions at onshore wind turbines are estimated at a few hundred thousand individuals—that is, several orders of magnitude fewer.

Even if these figures cannot be transferred one-to-one to Europe, they make one thing clear: wind turbines contribute only a small fraction to overall human-caused bird mortality. For conservation, what matters is therefore less the total number of fatalities than the targeted avoidance of risks for particularly sensitive species and conflict-prone sites.

Germany: bird collisions are concentrated at a few sites

For Germany, the PROGRESS project in 2016 provided one of the most comprehensive data sets to date on bird collisions at wind turbines. In 46 wind farms in northern Germany, systematic carcass searches were conducted over several years. After corrections for search effort and scavengers, extrapolations yielded annual collision numbers of about 7,800 common buzzards, 11,000 wood pigeons and 11,800 mallards in the study area. Relative to the respective total populations, this usually corresponded to only a few percentage points.

What was particularly revealing, however, was less the absolute number of finds than their spatial pattern: most wind turbines caused no or only very few collisions. The vast majority of fatalities was concentrated at a few poorly sited locations that stood out clearly from the overall picture. Exactly this pattern—few hotspots instead of widespread effects—runs consistently through the analyses.

The results thus make clear: bird collisions at wind turbines are real, but highly site-dependent. Common species without pronounced avoidance behaviour make up most of the fatalities in terms of numbers. Raptors are affected less often, but can nevertheless—relative to their small population size—carry disproportionate weight.

Thus, the decisive issue is not the blanket question “wind power: yes or no”, but where turbines are built and which species occur there. Accordingly, the focus of conservation is on careful siting, adequate distances from sensitive areas and targeted, species-specific mitigation measures—not on a general abandonment of wind power.

Why collisions often remain rare: birds usually avoid turbines

How high the collision risk actually is depends crucially on how birds respond to wind turbines. The best way to clarify this is by directly observing their flight behaviour. A detailed insight is provided by the VolZug study (2025) by BioConsult SH at a coastal site in northern Germany.

There, over several years, bird radar, AI-assisted camera systems and systematic carcass searches were used to investigate how migratory birds behave near wind turbines. The result is clear: around 99.8% of the recorded migratory birds actively avoided the rotors—both by day and at night. Out of a thousand birds that approached a turbine at potentially critical height, statistically only one or two actually flew through the rotor plane. Actual collisions were even rarer.

It is also interesting that even during periods of intense migration no increase in risky flight movements was observed. Birds adjusted their flight altitudes and routes flexibly and detoured around the turbines on a large scale. These results help explain why bird collisions remain relatively rare at many sites—and why conflicts often concentrate on a few poorly sited turbines.

The VolZug study is not alone in this. Offshore studies also reach similar conclusions. For example, a long-term study at the Dutch wind farm Egmond aan Zee (Krijgsveld et al. 2011) showed that birds often detour around wind farms already at a distance and, within the farms, actively avoid the rotors in over 97% of cases. This avoidance behaviour was particularly pronounced when the rotors were operating.

Wind turbines kill birds, but they do not have the same effect everywhere. The collision risk is highly site- and species-specific and is concentrated on a few sensitive species and unfavourable sites. This very pronounced avoidance behaviour helps explain why wind power does not explain the general decline of birds—and why targeted siting is more decisive than blanket judgements about the technology. For offshore wind energy, however, some conditions differ.

Offshore wind energy: different risks than on land

Compared with onshore turbines, the ecological mechanisms of offshore wind farms differ markedly. While on land the focus is primarily on site-dependent collisions of a few sensitive species, offshore risks mainly affect nocturnally migrating birds. Studies at offshore platforms and wind farms in the North Sea show that collisions there occur strongly depending on the situation and are often favoured by artificial lighting. Under unfavourable weather conditions such as fog or low cloud cover, migrating birds can become disoriented and collide with illuminated structures. Such events do not occur continuously, but are concentrated on a few nights with high migration intensity.

Hüppop et al. (2016) emphasize that offshore collisions mainly involve common passerine species of the nocturnal migration and generally do not reach a population-relevant scale. At the same time, the results show that the risk can be significantly reduced through adapted lighting concepts and on-demand shutdowns. Offshore wind energy therefore poses different conservation challenges than expansion on land.

Putting it in perspective: what drives biodiversity loss—and what role does wind power play?

On a global scale, wind power is not considered a main cause of species loss. This is shown, among other things, by the review by Díaz et al. (2019), which systematically summarizes the key drivers of global biodiversity loss. According to it, since the 1970s more than 70% of the land surface and around two thirds of the ocean area have been profoundly altered by human use—with serious consequences for population sizes, species diversity and the functioning of ecosystems.

As the main causes, the authors—consistent with the global biodiversity panel IPBES—identify land-use change, direct exploitation of organisms, pollution, invasive species and climate change. Individual technical infrastructures such as wind turbines do not appear as independent main drivers in this global perspective. Their ecological effects are locally relevant, but they do not explain the large-scale patterns of biodiversity loss.

Climate change is highlighted in particular, as it further amplifies many of these pressures. Rising temperatures, changing precipitation patterns and more frequent extreme events increase stress on species and habitats worldwide. Against this backdrop, renewable energies appear not as part of the problem, but as part of a necessary transformation to limit one of the key drivers of biodiversity loss.

For birds, this assessment is supported by large-scale population analyses. A study by Rosenberg et al. (2019) shows that North America has lost around three billion birds since 1970. The authors cite habitat loss, intensive agriculture, environmental pollution and climate change as the main causes—not collisions with wind turbines or other individual infrastructures.

Bats and wind power: well documented, but nuanced

For bats, the state of research is much clearer than for birds. In many regions, more bat fatalities are found at wind turbines than bird collisions. Kunz et al. (2010) showed that bats do not consistently avoid wind turbines. On the contrary, they sometimes approach them deliberately—for example while hunting in open airspace or during seasonal migrations. A global assessment by Sander et al. (2024) confirms this pattern: at many sites, the number of documented bat fatalities exceeds that of birds. The decisive factors are not a lack of perception of the turbines, but species-specific behaviour and physiological susceptibility.

An important difference compared with birds is the type of causes of death. Bats do not die only from direct collisions. Pathological examinations by Baerwald et al. (2008) showed that many animals exhibit severe internal injuries—so-called barotrauma. This is caused by strong drops in air pressure in the area of the rotor blades and can lead to lung ruptures and internal bleeding—even without direct contact with the rotor.

Which species are particularly affected is closely linked to their way of life. A meta-analysis by Rydell et al. (2010) shows for northwestern Europe that high-flying species of open airspace are particularly affected, such as noctules, pipistrelles, serotine bats and parti-coloured bats. Structure-bound species that hunt close to vegetation are much less frequently found among fatalities. Also striking is the temporal clustering: most deaths occur on warm nights with little wind in late summer and early autumn.

Particularly affected bat species in Germany

Fatalities at wind turbines are not evenly distributed across all bat species occurring in Germany. Instead, the vast majority of documented deaths is concentrated in a few ecologically similar species. These are primarily high-flying bats that hunt in open airspace and in some cases migrate long distances—regularly moving at heights where their flight paths overlap with the rotors of modern wind turbines. Five of the 24 species occurring in Germany make up around 85 to 95% of known fatalities:

• Common noctule (Nyctalus noctula) – The most frequently documented fatality. The species preferentially hunts in open airspace and regularly flies at rotor height. It also undertakes long seasonal migrations, exposing it at many sites.
• Lesser noctule (Nyctalus leisleri) – Also a typical high flyer with pronounced migratory behaviour. Collision numbers are particularly elevated in late summer and early autumn.
• Nathusius’ pipistrelle (Pipistrellus nathusii) – One of Europe’s most migratory bat species. Many animals killed at German wind turbines originate from northern and eastern Europe. The species is especially affected during autumn migration.
• Common pipistrelle (Pipistrellus pipistrellus) – Although it mostly hunts at low altitude, it is regularly found among fatalities due to its large population size. On warm nights with little wind, it also uses higher airspace.
• Parti-coloured bat (Vespertilio murinus) – A high-flying hunter with regionally variable distribution. Where it occurs, it is disproportionately common among fatalities, especially during migration periods.

This selection makes clear that collision risk depends less on a species’ rarity than on its flight behaviour and seasonal activity. Structure-bound species that hunt close to vegetation or water bodies are, by contrast, much less often affected.

Why this matters for population ecology

It is particularly problematic that many bats killed do not come from the immediate vicinity of the turbines. Using stable isotopes in fur, Voigt et al. (2012) showed that numerous fatalities originate from regions several hundred to more than a thousand kilometres away—for example from Scandinavia or eastern Europe. Migratory species are especially affected. This makes clear: even individual wind farms can impact transboundary populations.

How strongly these losses affect populations in the long term is difficult to quantify, however. Bats are long-lived, become sexually mature late and usually give birth to only one pup per year. A global analysis by O’Shea et al. (2016) therefore classifies collisions at wind turbines as a new mortality source that has become more important in recent decades and can be relevant for population dynamics—even with moderate fatality numbers.

More recent studies also show that mortality is not evenly distributed. Kruszynski et al. (2021) found an overrepresentation of juvenile animals among fatalities of Nathusius’ pipistrelle. GPS tracking data by Roeleke et al. (2016) also show that female noctules in particular regularly fly at rotor height in summer. This shows: risks are time-, behaviour- and species-specific—not randomly distributed.

Overall, a clear picture emerges: bats are not particularly threatened because wind turbines are “invisible” to them, but because their hunting and migratory behaviour, their low reproductive rate and their physiological sensitivity make them more vulnerable. At the same time, the key risk factors are well identified. That is exactly what enables effective mitigation measures.

Uncertainties nevertheless remain. Long-term population data are lacking for many species, monitoring programmes vary regionally, and it is often unclear whether losses are fully additive or partly replace natural mortality. Accordingly, Sander et al. (2024) also emphasize that robust statements are possible mainly for individual species and regions—not across all bats.

Insects and wind power: lots of debate, little robust data

Compared with birds and bats, the influence of wind turbines on insects has been studied far less. Accordingly, reviews such as Sander et al. (2024) describe insects as one of the biggest knowledge gaps in wind-power research. It is obvious that insects can collide with rotor blades—visible, for example, in residues on the leading edges of blades—yet systematic studies linking such losses to measurable effects on insect populations are still lacking.

A central problem is methodology. Dead insects are difficult to detect, can rarely be identified to species, and disappear quickly from the study area. Unlike birds or bats, there are no practical methods to systematically count fatalities or assign losses to particular populations. Accordingly, it remains unclear which insects are affected and to what extent—and how any such losses compare to other well-known pressures such as intensive agriculture, pesticide use or light pollution.

Against this backdrop, model-based estimates such as those presented by Christian C. Voigt (2021) or, in 2018, in a study by the German Aerospace Center (DLR) must be interpreted with care. These calculations sometimes arrive at very high theoretical numbers of possible insect contacts with rotors. The crucial point, however, is that they are explicitly model calculations whose results depend strongly on assumptions about insect density, flight altitude and activity. They do not allow conclusions about actual mortality or even population declines.

Putting it in the context of insect decline

To assess the possible role of wind power in insect decline, it is crucial first to look at the well-established causes. The Krefeld study showed in 2017, using long-term data from 63 German protected areas, that the biomass of flying insects declined on average by around 76% between 1989 and 2016—and in the summer months by more than 80%. The main causes are considered to be large-scale changes in the landscape: intensive agriculture, pesticide use, nutrient inputs and the loss of structurally rich habitats. This pattern is confirmed by global reviews, for example by Sánchez-Bayo & Wyckhuys (2019). Technical infrastructures such as wind turbines play no central role in these analyses.

Against this backdrop, the occasionally cited high numbers of insect losses at wind turbines need to be put into perspective. A DLR model calculation in 2018 estimated that during the warm season, in theory, several billion insects per day could pass through the rotor-swept zone of German wind turbines, and a small fraction of them might collide. Extrapolated, this yields an order of magnitude of about 1,200 tonnes of insects per year. The important point is: this is a model calculation based on assumptions about insect density, flight heights and activity, and it does not allow conclusions about population declines.

The Bavarian Association for the Protection of Birds and Nature (LBV) refers to an illustrative calculation based on the study by Nyffeler et al. (2018): according to it, insectivorous birds in German forests alone consume more than 450,000 tonnes of insects per year. Compared to that, the model-based losses estimated for wind turbines appear very small. The purpose of this comparison is not to downplay or “explain away” insect losses, but to put orders of magnitude into context: even high model numbers for wind power lie far below natural and established rates of consumption and turnover in ecosystems.

Based on current knowledge, wind power also affects only a very specific subset of insect fauna: mainly flying, wind-tolerant species such as mosquitoes, flies or moths that use open airspace even at greater heights. The vast majority of insect species—including many pollinators in agricultural landscapes—fly close to the ground and rarely enter the hazard zone of the rotors.

What empirical studies on wind power show

All the more important are the few empirical studies that directly investigate wind turbines. Studies by the State Museum of Natural History Karlsruhe (2020) found, using light traps, that insect activity at the height of wind turbines was much lower than near the ground. A pronounced attraction effect could not be demonstrated; moreover, the species composition differed markedly from near-ground insect fauna. The authors explicitly stress that this is not a reason for all-clear—but it does indicate that, based on current knowledge, wind power is not evidenced as a dominant driver of insect decline.

Possible indirect effects are also discussed. An experimental study by Long, Flint & Lepper (2010) showed that bright, wind-turbine-typical colours such as white or light grey can attract more flying insects, especially with high UV or infrared reflectance. The researchers interpret this not as a classic light trap, but as a possible misperception of surfaces as orientation or resting points. Whether such effects have ecological consequences—for example by keeping insect-eating bats or birds longer at rotor height—remains unclear.

Measurements using special laser systems—so-called high-frequency lidar methods—show that insects can also fly in the evening at the height of rotor blades. However, these measurements only capture that insects are present there. Whether they actually collide with the rotors, how high potential losses are, or whether this affects their populations cannot be answered with these measurements.

In summary: wind turbines can interact locally with insects and influence their behaviour. Whether this leads to ecologically relevant consequences is not yet clear and remains a key research gap. Based on the current state of science, there are no robust indications that wind power makes a major contribution to large-scale insect decline. If anything, it affects a very specific subset of insect fauna—flying species in the rotor height range—and cannot explain the known, systemic causes of insect declines.

How risks to wildlife can be reduced

Research shows not only where wind power entails risks for wildlife, but also that a large part of these risks is avoidable. What matters is careful siting and operation adapted to ecological conditions.

Bats: curtailment as the most effective measure

Protective measures for bats are best studied. Numerous field studies, summarized by Arnett et al. (2015), show a clear pattern: most bat fatalities occur at low wind speeds—exactly when bats are particularly active, but power production is low.

If operators increase the cut-in speed, the rotors remain completely still at low wind speeds. Arnett et al. (2010) showed that cut-in speeds of 5 to 6.5 m/s markedly reduce bat mortality, while annual energy loss was usually below one percent. Further field studies confirm that higher cut-in speeds can reduce the number of bat fatalities by about 50% to more than 90%, depending on site and species.

Siting: avoid conflicts before they arise

The biggest lever for risk reduction lies before wind turbines are built. Particularly conflict-prone are sites near migration corridors, forest edges, water bodies or known roosts.

For birds, species-specific minimum distances to breeding, resting and feeding areas play a key role—especially for raptors and other sensitive species. So-called Repowering of existing sites can also be sensible from a conservation perspective: older, less powerful turbines are replaced by modern ones. This can achieve higher electricity yields without opening up additional areas—provided current protection standards are applied consistently.

Birds: technical measures as a complement

In addition to planning approaches, technical measures can also reduce the collision risk for birds. A field study by May et al. (2020) at the Norwegian wind farm Smøla showed that painting one rotor blade black reduced the collision rate by around 70%, presumably because the rotor movement is easier for birds to perceive. Such approaches are considered promising, but their transferability to other sites and species needs further evaluation.

In addition, event-based curtailment is used. This includes automatic shutdowns when birds of certain particularly collision-prone species are near a turbine (so-called anti-collision systems), as well as time-limited shutdowns during short-term spikes in bird activity. The latter can be relevant, for example, during mowing or intensive soil cultivation, when raptors and other species fly into fields more frequently to forage.

Studies and reviews show that camera-based and AI-assisted systems can, in principle, detect large birds and trigger shutdowns. Their effectiveness, however, depends strongly on weather and light conditions, false alarms are common, and these systems are hardly suitable for bats. Accordingly, they are currently seen more as an additional tool for especially conflict-prone sites, not as a standard solution across the board.

This shows that there is still substantial need for research and development. Improvements in species identification, detection reliability and response time are crucial so that such systems can be used more precisely in the future.

Limits and open questions

Despite proven successes, uncertainties remain. For many species, robust long-term data on population development are lacking, and possible cumulative effects—for example when migratory birds or bats pass several wind farms one after another along their routes—have so far been insufficiently studied.

In addition to direct mortality, indirect effects can also play a role. Studies such as that by Scholz, Klein & Voigt (2025) show that bats use certain hunting and drinking sites less frequently near turbines. This suggests that wind power does not act only through collisions, but also via behavioural changes—and underlines the importance of siting and landscape context.

Does wind power harm wildlife—or protect it in the long run?

The body of research paints a nuanced picture: wind power is associated with local risks, but—with careful planning—can be part of a solution that reduces much larger threats to biodiversity in the long term, especially climate change as well as forms of habitat loss and pollution that result from fossil energy production and use.

Bird collisions with wind turbines are real, but wind power plays a much smaller role compared with other anthropogenic causes of death. Birds die in far greater numbers from traffic, building glass, power lines or domestic cats. Moreover, conflicts are highly site- and species-dependent. For bats, the risk is better documented and higher at many sites; at the same time, research shows that mortality can be effectively reduced through targeted curtailment. For insect decline, there is currently no robust evidence that wind power plays a central role. According to the consensus of studies, the main causes of global biodiversity loss lie in large-scale land-use change, intensive agriculture with pesticide use, pollution and climate change.

Climate change in particular is one of the greatest long-term threats to biological diversity. It alters habitats, shifts ranges and accelerates population declines of many species. In this context, wind power has an indirect but central protective function: as part of the energy transition it contributes to reducing greenhouse-gas emissions and thus helps limit one of the most serious causes of future species losses.

Wind power harms wildlife where it is poorly planned, poorly sited, or operated without protective measures for sensitive species. When implemented properly, however, it can be part of a solution that helps curb the far greater, systemic threats to biodiversity. The key is not to forgo wind power, but to expand it in a way that consistently integrates climate, species and nature conservation.

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