Collision..

The decision of the new government to remove the ban on the construction of land-based wind turbines is to be welcomed.

We must push to a greener, more sustainable future that reduces the output of greenhouse gases.

The effects of burning fossil fuels have been known for over a century and we are living the consequences as the speed of the climate crisis increases.

This clipping demonstrates the point:

The article suggests that the effects of burning fossil fuels may be hundreds of years away.

This graph showing the rise in atmospheric CO2 in my lifetime is sobering.

But still, climate-change deniers continue to make every attempt to block progress towards net zero.

One argument has been that wind turbines are harmful to birds.

Well, first of all, they can be. Thousands of birds are reported as colliding with the turning blades and dying. Each death is one too many.

But other man-made causes are more significant as this US chart shows:

Cats, windows and cars are hugely significant in bird deaths. The numbers are staggering.

Intensive farming including the use of agricultural fertilisers, herbicides and pesticides has decimated farmland birds and invertebrates. Once-common birds are now locally extinct.

The intensive rearing of animals - chickens in this case - led to the bird flu virus that has devastated sea bird colonies across the world.

Climate change poses a clear and existential threat to nature and to human life. 

This is the enemy. Not wind turbines.