Thursday, May 04, 2006

Even the best of intentions...

I'm home sick today and watching Daily Planet to pass the time (sick days are always so boring!). They did a piece on the new collection of new wind terbines that England has built in the Irish Sea to help combat greenhouse gasses. Sounds like good news, right? Well, the piece was immediately followed by a bit about scientists in California noticing that their wind turbines have had an effect on the behaviour of the local ground squirrels. It seems that the squirrels near wind turnbines are more edgy, stressed, and more prone to diving for cover in their holes. Speculation is that the noise, or possibly the vibration, makes it difficult for the ground squirrels to hear each other's warning cries - basically, it cuts off the communication system of these very social animals.

It seems a bit of a catch-22 for us humans. Even when we try and fix some of the damage we've been doing for hundreds of years, we end up just causing other problems. As anyone who studied the chain of life in elementary school knows, this doesn't just effect ground squirrels; this also effects the animals that rely on them. For example, golden eagles.

It's hard enough, even in an age that is ever enlightening to the necessity of dealing with these environmental problems while we still can, to get support and funding for the reaserch and implimentation of "earth-friendly" forms of energy production, without finding out that they create further complications. And of course, we have no idea how far such complications could reach when the ripples stop.

Now, I'm not saying we should just stop trying. That would be ridiculous. It's an unfortunate fact of the matter that the things we do to help can also be the same things we do that hinder (just look at World Bank's dealings in the Third World). It's true that everything in this world effects its environment in some way. We've just got to find some way of striking a balance, so that we can make a positive change that isn't also tied to a negative one.

o( )__

1 Comments:

At 4:21 PM, Blogger Mike said...

Reports from Norway have stated that coastal wind turbines are killing sea eagles and other birds.

Perhaps nuclear power my be the way forward after all.

 

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