Framework for Testing the Effectiveness of Bat and Eagle Impact-Reduction Strategies at Wind Energy Projects

Sinclair, K.; DeGeorge, Elise

doi:10.2172/1248081

Cited by 8 publications

(8 citation statements)

References 27 publications

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“…Scent‐detection dogs would more effectively test hypotheses related to impact assessments and mitigation efficacy by detecting more of the available bat and bird fatalities. They would be more likely than human searchers to reveal whether pre‐construction bat activity patterns can predict post‐construction effects (Hein et al 2013), and they should find enough of the available bats to develop micro‐siting strategies consistent with those developed for raptors (Smallwood et al 2017) and for testing operational curtailment strategies in appropriate experimental designs (Sinclair and DeGeorge 2016). Dogs could also facilitate evidence of absence methods used for estimating the probability of fatalities of particular species (Huso et al 2015).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Dogs Detect Larger Wind Energy Effects on Bats and Birds

Smallwood¹,

Bell²,

Standish³

2020

J Wildl Manag

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As wind turbine‐caused mortality of birds and bats increases with increasing wind energy capacity, accurate fatality estimates are needed to assess effects, identify collision factors, and formulate mitigation. Finding a larger proportion of collision victims reduces the magnitude of adjustment for the proportion not found, thus reducing opportunities for bias. We tested detection dogs in trials of bat and small‐bird carcasses placed randomly in routine fatality monitoring at the Buena Vista and Golden Hills Wind Energy projects, California, USA, 2017. Of trial carcasses placed and confirmed available before next‐day fatality searches, dogs detected 96% of bats and 90% of small birds, whereas humans at a neighboring wind project detected 6% of bats and 30% of small birds. At Golden Hills dogs found 71 bat fatalities in 55 searches compared to 1 bat found by humans in 69 searches within the same search plots over the same season. Dog detection rates of trial carcasses remained unchanged with distance from turbine, and dogs found more fatalities than did humans at greater distances from turbines. Patterns of fatalities found by dogs within search plots indicated 20% of birds and 4–14% of bats remained undetected outside search plots at Buena Vista and Golden Hills. Dogs also increased estimates of carcass persistence by finding detection trial carcasses that the trial administrator had erroneously concluded were removed. Compared to human searches, dog searches resulted in fatality estimates up to 6.4 and 2.7 times higher for bats and small birds, respectively, along with higher relative precision and >90% lower cost per fatality detection. © 2020 The Authors. The Journal of Wildlife Management published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc. on behalf of The Wildlife Society.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Dogs Detect Larger Wind Energy Effects on Bats and Birds

Smallwood¹,

Bell²,

Standish³

2020

J Wildl Manag

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“…It is also imperative that the benefits of wind energy be weighed against the ecological costs [127,128]. Improved methods are also imperative for measuring the efficacy of mitigation measures [129], such as operational curtailment strategies [130][131][132][133] and deterrents [134].…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

USA Wind Energy-Caused Bat Fatalities Increase with Shorter Fatality Search Intervals

Smallwood¹

2020

Diversity

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Wind turbine collision fatalities of bats have likely increased with the rapid expansion of installed wind energy capacity in the USA since the last national-level fatality estimates were generated in 2012. An assumed linear increase of fatalities with installed capacity would expand my estimate of bat fatalities across the USA from 0.89 million in 2012 to 1.11 million in 2014 and to 1.72 million in 2019. However, this assumed linear relationship could have been invalidated by shifts in turbine size, tower height, fatality search interval during monitoring, and regional variation in bat fatalities. I tested for effects of these factors in fatality monitoring reports through 2014. I found no significant relationship between bat fatality rates and wind turbine size. Bat fatality rates increased with increasing tower height, but this increase mirrored the increase in fatality rates with shortened fatality search intervals that accompanied the increase in tower heights. Regional weighting of mean project-level bat fatalities increased the national-level estimate 17% to 1.3 (95% CI: 0.15–3.0) million. After I restricted the estimate’s basis to project-level fatality rates that were estimated from fatality search intervals <10 days, my estimate increased by another 71% to 2.22 (95% CI: 1.77–2.72) million bat fatalities in the USA’s lower 48 states in 2014. Project-level fatality estimates based on search intervals <10 days were, on average, eight times higher than estimates based on longer search intervals. Shorter search intervals detected more small-bodied species, which contributed to a larger all-bat fatality estimate.

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“…This workshop focused on experimental designs associated with studies to assess the effectiveness of an impact reduction strategy and not mortality estimation (Sinclair and DeGeorge 2016). Experimental studies are designed to maximize detection of treatment effects (e.g., control for variation, isolate treatment effects, and support the appropriate level of inference).…”

Section: Study Design Considerationsmentioning

confidence: 99%