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Wind farms have cascading impacts on ecosystems across trophic levels

Nature Ecology & Evolution volume 2, pages 1854–1858 (2018)Cite this article

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Abstract

Wind farms are a cleaner alternative to fossil fuels for mitigating the effects of climate change, but they also have complex ecological consequences. In the biodiversity hotspot of the Western Ghats in India, we find that wind farms reduce the abundance and activity of predatory birds (for example, Buteo, Butastur and Elanus species), which consequently increases the density of lizards, Sarada superba. The cascading effects of wind turbines on lizards include changes in behaviour, physiology and morphology that reflect a combination of predator release and density-dependent competition. By adding an effective trophic level to the top of food webs, we find that wind farms have emerging impacts that are greatly underestimated. There is thus a strong need for an ecosystem-wide view when aligning green-energy goals with environment protection.

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Fig. 1: Numerical effect of wind turbines on predatory birds and lizard prey.
Fig. 2: The presence of wind turbines influences the phenotypic trait responses of lizards.

Data availability

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon request.

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Acknowledgements

We thank the Maharashtra Forest Department for permits and Suzlon for allowing us to work on their property. We appreciate the logistical support provided by the Bhosale family in Satara, D. Gholap, and the Primary Health Centre in Thoseghar. We also thank N. Dandekar, G. Gowande, D. Joshi and R. Kashid for help in the field, A.K. Nageshkumar for remote sensing analysis, J. Endler for MatLab script, A. Ghatage for help with colour analyses and V. Giri for continued support. The Environmental Science Department of Fergusson College, Pune, provided partial support to H.B. during some of the bird surveys. Funding was provided by the MOEF-CC, DST-FIST and DBT-IISc partnership programme. Finally, we thank S.L. Lima, A.T. Vanak, K. Shanker and A. Batabyal for valuable comments on an earlier version of this manuscript.

Author information

Author notes

  1. Amod Zambre

    Present address: Department of Ecology, Evolution, and Behavior, University of Minnesota, Saint Paul, MN, USA

  2. These authors contributed equally: Maria Thaker, Amod Zambre.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centre for Ecological Sciences, Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru, India

    Maria Thaker, Amod Zambre & Harshal Bhosale

Authors
  1. Maria Thaker
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Contributions

M.T. and A.Z. conceived and designed the study, analysed the data and wrote the paper. H.B. conceived and designed the bird data collection. A.Z. and H.B. collected the data. M.T. contributed materials.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Maria Thaker.

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Thaker, M., Zambre, A. & Bhosale, H. Wind farms have cascading impacts on ecosystems across trophic levels. Nat Ecol Evol 2, 1854–1858 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-018-0707-z

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