Donald Trump and dead whales: What's behind misinformation on wind farms?
There's no evidence wind turbines cause any harm to whales or other animals, but misinformation is still being spread as the federal government spruiks its plans for wind farms off the coast of NSW.
Scientists have strongly refuted claims that offshore wind turbines kill whales.
November 18 2023 SBS News
There's no evidence that offshore wind turbines cause harm to whales, scientists say.
But a misinformation campaign on Facebook, spreading the completely false claim that the turbines kill hundreds of whales a year, has taken hold, while Guardian Australia reports posters making similar claims have popped up in NSW's Hunter and Illawarra regions.
Australia doesn't have offshore wind farms yet but the federal government has announced six priority areas for offshore wind development, one of which is off the coast of Wollongong.
Figures from the right side of politics have long railed against wind farm technology.
Former prime minister Tony Abbott called them the "dark satanic mills of the modern era", while former US president Donald Trump claimed offshore wind turbines were "causing whales to die in numbers never seen before".
Fact-checking Trump's Claims, the US' peak body for fisheries, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said "there is no scientific evidence that noise resulting from offshore wind site characterisation surveys could potentially cause mortality of whales."
Surfers siting on boards in a circle in the ocean while a crowd on the shore watches
Hundreds of surfers take part in a paddle out at Wollongong Main Beach following a rally at Flagstaff Point against a proposed offshore wind farm, which would be located 10km off the Illawarra coast. Source: AAP / Dean Lewins
"There are no known links between recent large whale mortalities and ongoing offshore wind surveys."
Opponents of the Wollongong wind farm plan held a protest on November 29, where concerns about the environment and whales being killed were raised.
That the turbines kill whales is just one claim among dozens that have been used to spread fear about wind energy, experts said.
There's no evidence that turbines on land cause harm to koalas, but the Liberal party's official Facebook page recently suggested they did in a post featuring federal Energy Minister Chris Bowen and the text: "Wind farms killing koalas: Euthanasia will be conducted using blunt force trauma."
What motivates opposition to wind energy?
Often people who are anti-wind energy are pro-fossil fuel energy, Mark Diesendorf, a sustainable energy expert at the University of New South Wales, told SBS News.
"There's a range of views, but I would say the strongest views ultimately come from promoters of fossil fuels and nuclear power, and they believe in concentrated sources of power.
"It's almost a psychological identification."
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Australian farmers who host wind turbines on their properties are paid tens of thousands of dollars per year.
But there is sometimes opposition from neighbours or others in farming communities to the turbines, which can lead people to spread misinformation about them, Diesendorf said.
Sometimes the opposition is just opposition to change, or a perception that the turbines spoil the rural landscape, he said.
Misinformation has a long shelf life
Misinformation about wind energy can continue to spread even months and years after false claims have been disproven, research director at University of Technology Sydney's Institute for Sustainable Futures Sven Teske told SBS News.
"It sticks even though it's not true — it is a tactic to basically push back a development you don't want," he said.
"The last argument they basically have right now is that it doesn't look good and that it's bad for the environment, which has been proven to be untrue."
He said a turbine killing a whale has never been documented but "what is documented is that climate change will threaten whales and koalas and offshore wind is probably the most industrial-scale renewable power generation we have, with electricity generation volumes equal to a coal power plant."
If people have concerns about the technology, they should be explored "step by step" through research, he said.
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