Guidelines

Pre-construction Monitoring for wind energy is the survey of an area at planning stage to try and limit turbines to those areas which will kill least bats.

To view the SA Good Practice Guidelines for Pre-construction Monitoring, click here.

May 2026 backlog in CAA mast approval. As of May 2026 the South African Civil Aviation Authority (www.caa.co.za) has a large backlog of applications for permissions to erect “at height” masts. As one of the important tenets of estimating future bat fatalities at wind energy facilities is measuring bat activity at height, this backlog has, and will continue to, impact the accuracy of these estimations. However, until such time as this backlog can be resolved the SABAA committee has agreed that monitoring will continue using microphones at 10 m and 40 or 45 m on suitable masts, and the results extrapolated as best as possible to estimate bat activity in the rotor sweep zone.

See attached letter here.

Operational Monitoring for wind energy is the survey of wind farms to look for dead and injured bats to estimate the impact of the wind farm on the environment.

To view the SA Good Practice Guidelines for Operational Monitoring, click here.

For the Mitigation Guidance document, click here.

Thresholds are the maximum number of bats that can be killed before their conservation status or the ecosystem services they provide to the environment are severely affected. Because so little is known of fecundity rates, migration routes, or population numbers this is a difficult area and is the subject of ongoing discussion.

To view the SA Bat Fatality Threshold Guidelines for Operational Wind Energy Facilities Edition 2: October 2018, click here.

If you would like to comment on any of the guidelines please contact chair@sabaa.org.za or info@sabaa.org.za.