U.S. Geological Survey, Northern Prairie Wildlife Research Center, 8711 37th Street SE, Jamestown, North Dakota, 58401, USA.
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Habitat and Population Evaluation Team, 3425 Miriam Avenue, Bismarck, North Dakota, 58501, USA.
Ecol Appl. 2019 Dec;29(8):e01983. doi: 10.1002/eap.1983. Epub 2019 Aug 30.
Biodiversity offsetting, or compensatory mitigation, is increasingly being used in temperate grassland ecosystems to compensate for unavoidable environmental damage from anthropogenic developments such as transportation infrastructure, urbanization, and energy development. Pursuit of energy independence in the United States will expand domestic energy production. Concurrent with this increased growth is increased disruption to wildlife habitats, including avian displacement from suitable breeding habitat. Recent studies at energy-extraction and energy-generation facilities have provided evidence for behavioral avoidance and thus reduced use of habitat by breeding waterfowl and grassland birds in the vicinity of energy infrastructure. To quantify and compensate for this loss in value of avian breeding habitat, it is necessary to determine a biologically based currency so that the sufficiency of offsets in terms of biological equivalent value can be obtained. We describe a method for quantifying the amount of habitat needed to provide equivalent biological value for avifauna displaced by energy and transportation infrastructure, based on the ability to define five metrics: impact distance, impact area, pre-impact density, percent displacement, and offset density. We calculate percent displacement values for breeding waterfowl and grassland birds and demonstrate the applicability of our avian-impact offset method using examples for wind and oil infrastructure. We also apply our method to an example in which the biological value of the offset habitat is similar to the impacted habitat, based on similarity in habitat type (e.g., native prairie), geographical location, land use, and landscape composition, as well as to an example in which the biological value of the offset habitat is dissimilar to the impacted habitat. We provide a worksheet that informs potential users how to apply our method to their specific developments and a framework for developing decision-support tools aimed at achieving landscape-level conservation goals.
生物多样性补偿，或补偿性缓解，越来越多地被用于温带草原生态系统，以补偿人为发展（如交通基础设施、城市化和能源开发）造成的不可避免的环境破坏。美国追求能源独立将扩大国内能源生产。随着这种增长，野生动物栖息地的破坏也在增加，包括鸟类因适宜繁殖栖息地而被迫迁徙。最近在能源开采和能源生产设施的研究为行为回避提供了证据，从而减少了附近能源基础设施的繁殖水禽和草原鸟类对栖息地的利用。为了量化和补偿鸟类繁殖栖息地价值的损失，有必要确定一种基于生物的货币，以便获得生物等效价值的补偿的充足性。我们描述了一种方法，用于量化因能源和交通基础设施而流离失所的鸟类繁殖栖息地所需的生物等效价值，该方法基于定义五个指标的能力：影响距离、影响面积、 预影响密度、位移百分比和补偿密度。我们计算了繁殖水禽和草原鸟类的位移百分比值，并通过风力和石油基础设施的示例展示了我们的鸟类影响补偿方法的适用性。我们还将我们的方法应用于基于生境类型（例如原生草原）、地理位置、土地利用和景观组成相似的补偿生境的生物价值与受影响生境相似的示例，以及应用于补偿生境的生物价值与受影响生境不同的示例。我们提供了一个工作表，告知潜在用户如何将我们的方法应用于他们的特定开发项目，并提供了一个框架，用于开发旨在实现景观保护目标的决策支持工具。
