- To compensate for the eagle deaths, wind farm developer Invenergy will donate $2M to Cornell University to start an eagle rehabilitation program.
- Landowners in upstate towns could make millions leasing their land to wind farm developers.
The bald eagle all but vanished from New York in the 1970s.
The pesticide DDT, ingested by eagles from fish snatched from the state’s lakes and rivers, thinned the shells of their eggs, causing them to soften before they could hatch.
In 1970, there was just one eagle nest in New York, at Hemlock Lake south of Rochester. It wasn’t producing any young. Their eggs were too damaged by DDT.
The eagle became endangered, and, in 1976, as the national bird gained a prominent role in the nation’s bicentennial celebrations, New York officials wondered if eagles would ever inhabit the state again.
But the state embraced the challenge like few others, with an ambitious rehabilitation plan.
Young eagles would be brought from Great Lakes states with plentiful eagle populations − Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin − to the Montezuma National Wildlife Refuge in Seneca Falls.
There, atop a 36-foot tower, baby eagles were fed and cared for by a four-person team of wildlife biologists careful not to get too close so the birds wouldn’t confuse them for their parents.
It worked – 23 bald eagles were released after five years. By 1999, there were 10 eagle nests, and by 2017, 323 breeding pairs of eagles were living in nests across New York.
“This news confirms that our rivers, lakes and forests are capable of supporting our nation’s symbol for generations to come,” Basil Seggos, the head of the state Department of Environmental Conservation, said in 2017.
Less than a decade later, Seggos’ DEC was approving a plan his own experts say will likely kill dozens of bald eagles.
Green energy plan could kill dozens of NY eagles
The decision came during the permitting process for the Alle-Catt Wind Energy project in western New York and the Canisteo Wind Energy Project in Steuben County, the two largest wind farms ever approved by the state.
For the Alle-Catt project, 83 wind turbines extending 600 feet into the air will be scattered across 30,000 acres of private land in Allegany, Cattaraugus and Wyoming counties, touching six towns. Canisteo’s 117 wind turbines will be spread over six towns and 25,000 acres of private land.
In all, the DEC estimates 82 eagles will be killed during the 30-year life of the projects – 41 each.
The DEC’s backing came with a caveat. The developer, Chicago-based Invenergy, would need to come up with a net conservation plan. Invenergy recently agreed to pay nearly $2 million to Cornell University to rehabilitate dozens of injured eagles and return them to the wild.
In letters to the state Public Service Commission, opponents questioned how the DEC’s decision squared with New York’s long history of standing up for the nation’s symbol of freedom.
Cattaraugus County Legislator Ginger Schroder, a longtime opponent of the Alle-Catt project, suggested the payout was “blood money” in a letter to state officials in May.
“How wonderful for them: a true win-win for Invenergy/Alle Catt and a lose-lose for the Bald Eagles in our area, New York State taxpayers and for my constituents,” Schroder wrote. She and her husband own a poultry farm in Farmersville where more than a dozen wind turbines will go.
“God help you if you shot one of these endangered birds,” wrote Norman Ungermann of Cuba, a former Allegany County legislator. “Punishment for doing so was AND STILL IS thousands of dollars in fines and/or jail time! I can also remember that you could not disturb a nest and had to stay some 300′ away from it or be fined. Now, (in the name of ‘green energy’) we are justifying the killing of these birds???”
New York’s success in achieving some of the nation’s most ambitious clean energy goals rests largely on whether it can produce enough wind and solar power upstate to reverse the downstate region’s near-total reliance on fossil fuels. The plan is for wind and solar power generated on upstate farmland to be sent down to the lower Hudson Valley and New York City over a network of high-voltage transmission lines.
But in western New York, that plan is − quite literally − on a collision course with the state’s duty to protect its wildlife, a legacy underscored by the eagle’s comeback. And at the center of it all is the Department of Environmental Conservation, which finds its dual priorities – protecting the environment and protecting wildlife – in conflict.
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