Wind turbines are a major threat to bats. How a fleet of autonomous sailboats can help - KCRA Sacramento

How autonomous sailboats can help protect bats from wind turbines

Wind turbines are a major threat to bats. How a fleet of autonomous sailboats can help

The company Saildrone is teaming up with Bat Conservation International, using its autonomous boats to detect bat migration over open water.

A bat conservation group is teaming up with the autonomous sailing company Saildrone to help reduce deaths caused by offshore wind turbines.

According to Bat Conservation International, hundreds of thousands of bats are lost each year to active wind turbines throughout the United States.

Bats are an important part of California's ecosystem, with 23 different species calling the state home.

As California works to reduce its reliance on fossil fuel, clean energy sources like offshore wind are becoming more popular. Because of this, Bat Conservation International is looking for ways to protect bats while optimizing the use of solar farms.

“[Bats] are very frequent visitors in the offshore environment. Why they’re going offshore is not entirely known,” said Michael Whitby, the director of the "Bats and Wind Energy" program at Bat Conservation International.

Bats navigate their movements and find food using echolocation, producing very high-pitched sound waves inaudible to the human ear.

Technology allows researchers to detect those echolocation sounds. This is where Saildrone comes in.

Saildrone designs and builds autonomous sailboats powered by the sun and the wind. Two years ago, the company gained fame by sailing five boats into the heart of the category 4 Hurricane Sam in the Atlantic, collecting important data from the storm's eye wall.

For the next two years, Saildrone will be used to follow the flight patterns of bats over water using a high-frequency sound detector mounted to each mast.

"They record the sound and we can then put that through software and make a visible representation of it," Whitby said.

By using artificial intelligence, researchers can then identify specific bat species and migration patterns.

“By knowing where and when they are in these locations, we can either avoid the areas that they are most likely to occur, or we can inform minimization efforts that reduce fatalities,” Whitby said.

A pilot project has already been completed. Research voyages are planned beginning in the spring of 2024 from coastal Oregon to Southern California.

Whitby hopes this project can help find a balance between reducing U.S. dependence on oil and protecting ecosystems.

“There’s a real threat to bat populations from wind energy, but we are working hand-in-hand with energy companies and the U.S. government through the DOE to reduce these fatalities and promote clean energy," Whitby said.