Environmental impacts

What are the environmental impacts? Wind plants produce no air pollution. They use no water, and there is no need to tear up the land to extract the wind resource that produces wind power. Nonetheless, there may be environmental problems associated with some wind plants.
Wind power generates three categories of environmental impacts: visual impacts; noise pollution; wildlife impacts. These impacts can vary immensely from site to site.

Because wind farms are comprised of large numbers of turbines each mounted atop tall towers in rural areas, they can often be seen for a long distance. Whether this visual impact is good or bad will vary from location to location. Some find wind turbines to be enduring symbols of self-sufficiency. Others see them as stark intrusions in the "natural" landscape.

Wind turbines, particularly older designs, emit noise that can be heard in the vicinity of the wind farms. The level of noise produced by one wind turbine is equivalent to that of your washing machine. The frequency and volume of this noise can be controlled but not eliminated by wind turbine design.

The most controversial significant negative environmental impact of early wind turbines is the impact on bird populations, an issue largely resolved by new turbine designs.

In the early 1980s, three major wind farms were built in passes in California. At the Altamont Pass site, deaths of birds, particularly raptors, prompted a number of studies that subsequently influenced both the design of newer wind turbines and the siting of wind farms. It was discovered that raptors perch atop the wind generators for a better view while hunting, and upon rare occasion get caught in the spinning blades when the wind begins to blow. Current wind turbine technology offers solid tubular towers to prevent birds from perching on them. Turbine blades also rotate more slowly than those of earlier designs, reducing potential for collisions with birds.
If wind power plants are sited in regions screened for sensitive local bird populations, the environmental footprint of wind-generated electricity is quite small when compared to the wildlife and ecosystem impacts of fossil fuel mining and fuel combustion.
The manufacture of wind generation technology creates some air emissions.