Wind turbines off Australia’s shores won’t stand up to the massive swells and winds generated by east coast lows and by tropical cyclones. Fact: The waters off Australia’s southern coast are indeed susceptible to strong winds, as are those in the far north, but those areas are not where wind farms are to be located. Instead, the farms will be set in the waters off the Hunter and the Illawarra in NSW, and off Gippsland in Victoria, where the winds are perfectly manageable.  Of course, offshore wind turbines do occasionally get damaged by extreme weather events, but the real damage from such weather is to onshore transmission lines, not platforms out at sea. 

Temperature data is inaccurate because we don’t have good enough technology to measure the Earth’s surface, the oceans, the stratosphere Fact: The safety zone around a wind turbine is about 50 meters, so shipping is barely disrupted at all by the presence of an offshore wind farm. Of course, there have been a few instances where ships have collided with wind turbines – the most famous being when the bulk carrier Julietta D did so off the Dutch coast in 2022 and when the cargo ship Petra L struck one in the North Sea in 2023 – but no one died in those collisions. The same cannot be said for the times when ships have hit offshore oil and gas rigs. Those platforms are highly flammable, and the resultant explosions have caused dozens of deaths. In 2005, for example, a ship hit an oil rig off the coast of India, and the resultant inferno killed 22 people. Wind turbines are positively safe by comparison.

Offshore wind turbines dot the horizon and ruin the coastal landscape.  Fact: While onshore wind farms do have a visual impact on the landscape, the same cannot be said for their offshore counterparts. Most offshore turbines are so far out to sea that they cannot be seen with the naked eye from the coastline, even when the viewing platform has some elevation. This is certainly the case with the wind farm proposed for the Illawarra region in New South Wales. It is 20 kilometres offshore, which is four times the distance to the horizon. From that far out, the turbines would be completely hidden from view. Even from the top of the Illawarra escarpment they would be difficult to spot. The wind turbines proposed for the Hunter region in NSW and Gippsland in Victoria will also be difficult or impossible to see, as they will be located between 10 and 35 kilometres out to sea.  So, if people really are concerned about the visual impact of wind turbines, they should be supporting the offshore variety, as these are largely hidden by the curve of the Earth.  Offshore wind turbines [Source: Public Domain Pictures]

Wind turbine blades only last between 3 and 7 years, rendering wind power expensive and ineffective in fighting climate change. Fact:  Studies show that wind turbine blades last between 17 and 25 years on average. The industry standard is 20 years. The world’s oldest wind turbine, in the town of Tvind in Denmark, has been generating electricity continuously since 1978! At 53 metres high and with a wing diameter of 54 metres, it produces enough electricity to power 1,000 homes. [To put this in context, a modern offshore turbine is five times as tall, has twice the wing diameter and can power 16,000 homes.]

Wind turbines have a very high carbon ‘footprint’ – meaning the manufacturing process emits a lot of CO2. So, it’s a waste of time thinking they can significantly reduce emissions. Fact: This claim is simply rubbish! CO2 emissions do result from the manufacture of wind turbines, but these are dwarfed by the CO2 saved over the life of those turbines. Recent studies have concluded that wind power has a carbon footprint that is 99 percent less than coal-fired power, 98 percent less than natural gas, and 75% less than solar power. Other studies have shown that the ‘energy-payback’ time for wind turbines (that is, the time it takes for a system to generate more energy than it took to make it) is just 4 to 6 months. When the turbines are produced using renewable energy, as will be the case in the not-too-distant future, their carbon footprint will be next to zero. So, there is no truth whatever to this myth. 

Wind turbines kill large numbers of birds, particularly big predators like eagles.  Fact: Wind turbines do kill birds, but the number killed pales when compared with other threats they face. In the United States, cats kill an average of 2.4 billion birds every year, and collisions with glass on buildings kill another 599 million. Wind turbines, by contrast, kill just 234,000. In Australia, the figures are even starker. Wind turbines kill a maximum of 10,000 birds a year, while feral cats kill 377 million!  There are also ways to reduce avian fatalities from wind turbines. These include painting the towers or the blades black and using artificial intelligence to slow the blades down when flocks of birds are approaching. Painting the towers can reduce fatalities by almost 50 percent, while doing the same with one of the blades can reduce them by 70 percent.

Wind turbines are a danger to human health, as they cause dizzy spells and sleep deprivation on the part of those who live nearby.  Fact:  Wind turbines produce what is known as infrasound. Infrasound is defined as any sound below 20Hz, meaning it is usually inaudible. It occurs naturally, but can also be man-made. Numerous studies have been done on the infrasound produced by wind turbines, and none have shown there to be any adverse physiological or psychological effects on those exposed to it. In fact, infrasound levels from wind turbines are usually lower, and certainly no higher, than those we are already exposed to in nature. A recent study conducted by Sydney University’s Woolcock Institute of Medical Research looked at the impact of infrasound from wind turbines on sleep patterns and found there to be none at all. To quote the study’s lead author, Associate Professor Nathaniel Marshall, “We’ve been able to show conclusively that the infrasound generated by wind turbines doesn’t make you dizzy or nauseous, doesn’t impact heart health or mental health, or impact on sleep.”

Clearing trees to build solar farms negates the impact of those solar farms on emissions. You’d be better off not cutting the trees down at all.  Fact: Felling trees does have a negative impact on emissions, but that impact is completely overwhelmed by the emissions that are saved though the installation of new solar panels. In fact, the ratio is over 200 to one, meaning that for every tonne of carbon emitted by felling the trees, 200 tonnes are saved by increasing solar capacity. Hence, the myth is a total furphy.

Solar panels don’t work efficiently in cold countries because snow covers the panels and prevents them from working properly.  Fact: Solar panels work perfectly well in colder climes, as they are installed with sufficient tilt to prevent snow from accumulating on them. A recent study in Canada revealed that snow only reduces the output of solar panels by 3 percent – an insignificant amount. 

Nuclear fusion has been demonstrated to be feasible now. We should wait till it’s commercially available, to provide all the clean energy we need. Fact: Nuclear fusion has been demonstrated to be feasible, but will not be commercially available for decades. If we are to avoid catastrophic climate change, we must act immediately and reach net zero before nuclear fusion becomes available. This makes renewables our only viable option (although a small amount of nuclear power will be in the global energy mix).