Naysayers like to point to wind turbines as brutal bird-killing machines, wiping out huge populations of birds, but new research sheds some new light on the controversy. According to a massive study supported by the American Wind Wildlife Institute, wind turbines account for just 214,000 – 368,000 deaths each year. While any death is something to be avoided, that number is tiny compared to the fatalities from collisions with radio and cell towers, which kill 6.8 million birds every year.