How a Key Climate Agenda Tool Harms Endangered Species
An effort to create ‘carbon-free energy’ is resulting in the injury and death of sea creatures, including protected ones.
As the Biden administration expands its offshore wind projects as part of its goal to reach a carbon-free energy system, whales and other marine life may become collateral damage, according to new research.
Two independent studies measuring ocean wind turbine construction noise found that the sound emitted by vessels mapping the seafloor was significantly louder than estimated, and that noise protection for whales and other sea creatures during wind turbine pile driving doesn’t work.
Intense noise causes hearing loss in whales, other marine mammals, turtles, and fish, compromising their ability to navigate, avoid danger, detect predators, and find prey, according to scientific studies.
Robert Rand, an acoustics consultant with 44 years of experience, took underwater readings of the sonar survey vessel Miss Emma McCall off the coast of New Jersey. He also recorded acoustic readings of pile driving for Vineyards Wind 1, an offshore wind farm project under construction 15 miles south of Martha’s Vineyard.
In his pile-driving report, published March 28, Mr. Rand found that even the most advanced sound-dampening technologies didn’t adequately control harmful noise. The pounding was just as loud as seismic air gun arrays used for oil and gas exploration, long known to cause injury, hearing loss, and behavioral changes in fish and marine mammals.
Furthermore, the noise made by the construction vessel itself, which is not monitored, was almost as loud as the pile driving. Mr. Rand found that the standard formula used by the National Marine Fisheries Service to calculate how noise, over a period of time, affects a mammal’s hearing, significantly underestimates the sound levels experienced by dolphins and whales.
“These are real data,” Mr. Rand, who testified at a Congressional field hearing on January 20, told The Epoch Times. “I measured it. This is not a computer model. This is not a political press release. These are data.”
Many environmentalists fear that noise related to ocean wind farm construction is contributing to “unusual mortality events” affecting whales. From 2016 through April this year, 220 humpback whales have died, according to data collected by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).
“Elevated humpback whale mortalities have occurred along the Atlantic coast from Maine through Florida,” since 2016, the NOAA states.
The NOAA also reported an “unusual mortality event” for North Atlantic right whales, in which 126 have died since 2017.
“The numbers have been decreasing, especially since 2017, when offshore operations really swung into gear,” Mr. Rand said.
“From my experience in noise control, that’s not a coincidence. Noise is an environmental pollutant. In human terms, it’s measured in life years lost.”
The North Atlantic Right Whale Consortium estimates 350 North Atlantic right whales exist in the world’s oceans today.
The Comfortable Collapse: How America Learned to Pretend Obesity Is Normal
The America of 1960 was healthier than the America of 2025 because they lived in an environment that did not conspire against physiology.
Independent Medical Alliance Sep 17
By IMA Co-Founder Dr. Joseph Varon
Originally published by The Brownstone Institute on 09/16/2025
Walk into any American airport today and pause. Look around at the travelers waiting at the gate, the families queuing for fast food, the crowds rushing past. You are looking at a country that our grandparents would not recognize. In less than three generations, the very shape of the American body has shifted so dramatically that what would once have been regarded as rare or concerning is now routine. Airplane seats have been widened, retail clothing racks have been extended, mannequins have been reshaped, and soda cups have been enlarged. Entire industries have recalibrated to accommodate a physiology that is neither healthy nor sustainable.
Yet our cultural ...
University of Alberta law prof placed on leave over Charlie Kirk comments
https://www.junonews.com/p/university-of-alberta-law-prof-placed
I watched this last night and glad I found today to share. Greg was fired up and rightly so.
https://www.smalldeadanimals.com/2025/09/16/we-dont-care-that-shit-is-dead/
