Most people don’t pay attention to the color of a wind turbine; yet one black-painted blade has become the focus of an experiment that could help solve one of renewable energy’s biggest wildlife challenges. At Norway’s Smøla wind farm, researchers found that painting just one of a turbine’s three blades black reduced bird fatalities by more than 70% compared with nearby unpainted turbines. The idea sounds almost too simple to work, but it has attracted international attention because it doesn’t rely on expensive technology or a complete redesign. Instead, it asks a surprisingly simple question: could a change in color make spinning turbine blades easier for birds to see? According to a study published in Ecology and Evolution , the answer at one Norwegian wind farm was a convincing yes.
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