Defenders of Wildlife Blog

Eliza Cava, Conservation Associate, Renewable Energy & Wildlife

How do we help advance solar and wind energy projects that help reduce greenhouse gas emissions while also protecting sensitive wildlife and their habitat?

As wind development grows in places like Oregon and Idaho, coordinated landscape-scale planning for both renewable energy and conservation can help us find the best places to build wind farms while protecting and improving habitat for pronghorn and other wildlife. (©Larry Andreasen)

We know that traditional energy sources like oil, gas and coal pose great risks to wildlife, be it from oil spills, habitat destruction or the release of greenhouse gases that contribute to climate change. But what about renewable energy, like solar and wind?

These are an essential part of reducing the pollution that comes from our energy use. But their size and how they function can have a huge impact on wildlife and their habitat. So, how can we develop these renewable energy resources without sacrificing wildlife?

The answer, as the saying goes, is “location, location, location.”

Traditionally, energy developers and land managers have picked project sites by focusing on the available energy resource; thinking about how those projects might affect natural resources and wildlife was an afterthought. But this way of doing business inevitably leads to delays, uncertainty, and conflict when developers discover after the fact that sensitive, threatened, or endangered wildlife may be on the site.

That’s where we come in.

Planning ahead for solar energy development in the desert Southwest can allow us to develop solar projects in the right places while protecting essential habitat for the Desert tortoise. (©Beth Jackson/FWS)

Defenders and our partners are working to change this paradigm in ways that reduce the potential for conflicts with wildlife while still permitting responsible renewable energy development to go ahead in the right places.

It starts with a landscape-scale analysis of energy potential and wildlife conservation priorities using many of the mapping tools and technologies currently available from state and federal wildlife agencies and non-profit conservation organizations. This allows energy developers to identify areas of potential energy-wildlife conflict and avoid them.

Next, developers can attempt to minimize wildlife impacts by adjusting the project’s scope or the way in which the project will be operated (e.g., installing radar to detect when birds are migrating through an area and shutting down wind turbines to reduce the likelihood of collisions).

Finally, when facing unavoidable impacts, developers can offset them by purchasing or restoring habitat or contributing funds to a “mitigation bank” from which proceeds can be used to protect other lands that will benefit the wildlife and habitats impacted by the project. The idea is to ensure that lands and habitat acquired or restored will make up for the lands lost or disturbed by the energy project.

Combined, these mechanisms for dealing with the potential risks posed by a project are referred to as the “mitigation framework.” And, they are the means by which we can produce renewable energy without sacrificing sensitive lands and wildlife in return.

Defenders is developing and promoting this approach on many fronts. Last June, Defenders and our partners hosted a workshop on mitigation policy in Washington, DC. Leaders from the conservation community, energy industries, and state and federal agencies gathered to discuss the latest techniques and tools in mitigation and how to continue to improve their use. We followed that up this spring with another workshop at the annual North American Wildlife and Natural Resources conference in Arlington, VA, where Defenders and others led a series of panels and presentations on landscape-level planning and mitigation.

Panoramic view of the Dry Lake Solar Energy Zone in southern Nevada’s Mojave Desert. (©BLM)

In between these two conferences, we have been working on using the mitigation framework to improve the planning and placement of individual solar and wind projects, and we participated in a series of groundbreaking workshops led by the Bureau of Land Management to define the first Region-wide Mitigation Plan for one of the solar energy zones identified by the Department of the Interior in their western solar plan. We helped Argonne National Laboratory develop a new data mapping tool for understanding and reducing wildlife conflict in transmission line planning, worked with the Arizona BLM on its first-of-a-kind Restoration Design Energy Program to identify and avoid places of high conflict across the landscape, and we continue to participate in the Desert Renewable Energy Conservation Plan process in California.

As our country further embraces renewable energy, the question of how it affects wildlife and habitat will continue to be key, and Defenders is committed to promoting a landscape-scale approach to planning for energy and wildlife conservation in key areas. Remember: “location, location, location…” By using existing science and mapping technologies, we can work with the solar and wind energy industries to help them build better projects – better for wildlife and better for them because reducing conflicts with wildlife increases the likelihood that projects get built in less time and at lower cost. That, in turn, means that more clean energy is available to meet our nation’s energy needs and less dirty energy is needed. And that will benefit us all, particularly sensitive wildlife already threatened by a warming planet and increasing habitat loss.

©USFWS

Chris Haney, Ph.D., Defenders of Wildlife Chief Scientist 

For such a relatively small bird, the robin-sized red knot (Calidris canutus) has an extraordinary migration journey. Each year it travels more than 9,000 miles from breeding grounds high in the Canadian Arctic down to remote Tierra del Fuego in South America, where it spends the winter. To survive the trip, these shorebirds must be strong, healthy and resilient.

Horseshoe crab (©Spakattacks/Flickr)

But the red knot is struggling to overcome catastrophic population loss. Over the past ten years, the North American Atlantic population of the red knot (Calidris canutus rufa) has plummeted by 80 percent. Numbers of red knots have crashed by as much as 54 percent on their wintering grounds in two years alone. In New Jersey, where red knots stop to rest and eat before continuing their north-bound journey, they have been declining at a rate of 17.9 percent annually. So what is responsible for the species’ alarming decline?

Commercial over-harvesting of the prehistoric horseshoe crab is a key culprit. Red knots must concentrate in huge numbers at traditional stop-over sites to refuel during their migration, because a single non-stop flight can cover as much as 5,000 miles. Delaware Bay is a key staging area during spring migration, where knots come to feed on eggs of the once-numerous spawning crabs. Some estimates place nearly 90 percent of the entire North American Atlantic population of the red knot on the bay during a single day in May.

When red knots descend on Delaware Bay this spring, famished from their marathon flight from South America, they might find slim pickings instead of their expected feast of eggs from horseshoe crabs. Superstorm Sandy last fall scoured away much of the sand that crabs need for spawning. Restoring beaches is a top priority for wildlife groups who wish to repair massive damage to the dunes, beaches and salt marshes along the Eastern Seaboard.

(©Jan van de Kam)

Aided by grants from the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation and others, two feet of new sand covers stretches of beach along swaths as much as 5,000 feet long and 10-15 feet wide. Arriving in 20-cubic-yard dump trucks, one load at a time, enough sand has been dumped to cover about 1,000 cubic yards a day. Sand was targeted for spreading on the most well-known and crucial spots for both the horseshoe crabs and red knot.

This beach replenishment is hoped to provide just enough space for throngs of horseshoe crabs as they crawl out of the bay. Each spawning female will lay up to 100,000 eggs.

Despite the restored habitat, problems for the red knot are not over. Beach restoration will complement other measures, namely a continued closure of the commercial fishery for horseshoe crabs. But with its conservation plight now so well-known and supported, perhaps tide and time are turning for this remarkable shorebird.

Wetlands in Izembek National Wildlife Refuge (©USFWS)

Isabel Ricker, Landscape Conservation Coordinator

A few months ago we told you about an important milestone being reached in the battle to preserve the wilderness and wetland integrity of the Izembek National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska. This occurred when the Fish and Wildlife Service released its final environmental impact statement (EIS) recommending against building a $30 million road through the refuge. When a federal agency issues a final EIS, it has to wait at least 30 days before it can finalize its recommendation and begin its implementation. When the Service issued the Izembek EIS, the final decision rested in the hands of then-Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar, but he subsequently retired from office without resolving the dispute over the proposed Izembek road.

So where do things stand at this point with regards to that road? Despite having fallen off the political radar screen in recent weeks, the future of this incredible wildlife refuge remains as uncertain as ever. And for that we can thank Congressional politics playing out as usual.

The problem stemmed from Salazar’s retirement and the need for the Senate to confirm his proposed successor, Sally Jewell. Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska threatened to block Jewell’s nomination unless the Department reversed the Service’s recommendation against the Izembek road. So at the last moment before a vote on her nomination, an unfortunate deal was struck by the Department which agreed to seek further public comment from the supporters of the road. The deal between Senator Murkowski and Interior will likely delay a final decision on Izembek for many months, but it does not bind or force the Department to ultimately approve the road. So the fate of Izembek now rests in Sally Jewell’s hands.

Many species of birds, especially the Pacific black brant, rely on Izembek’s protected habitat (©Ryan Hagerty/USFWS)

Izembek was established in 1960 to protect some of the most distinctive and important wetlands in the world, and is home to an abundance of wildlife, including 98% of the world’s population of Pacific black brant (a sea bird), as well as grizzly bear, caribou, and salmon. The proposed road would bisect refuge and designated wilderness lands in order to connect the communities of King Cove and Cold Bay, crossing sensitive wetlands as well as steep slopes prone to avalanches. Numerous studies – by the federal government, the state of Alaska and wildlife experts – have concluded since the 1980s that a road through Izembek would permanently and significantly damage the wilderness and wildlife habitat value of the refuge. Furthermore, the road would set a dangerous precedent of sacrificing our nation’s protected wilderness national wildlife refuges for indefensible development projects.

The damage from the road is not being exaggerated. In the final EIS for the project, which was released earlier this year, the Service determined that the road would require the construction of eight bridges, 19 culverts and 254 stream crossings. Despite this unambiguous assessment by the Service, proponents of the road continued to push for its approval, saying that the road is a public health necessity for King Cove. Ironically, the village of King Cove had previously been provided with a $9 million all-weather hovercraft to cross the bay in medical emergencies to the air strip at Cold Bay, but the community ultimately gave the hovercraft away.

The hovercraft that they no longer wanted was able to reach Cold Bay in 20 minutes in a medical emergency. By contrast, the proposed road would take more than two hours to travel, even in the best of weather conditions. The hovercraft had a 100% success rate with 30 medical evacuations, while the road would be impassable for much of the year due to frequent icing, high winds, blizzards and other inclement weather. Pete Mjos, the region’s former U.S. Public Health Service director, has said that attempting to travel on the proposed road during the region’s extreme winter storms would be “foolish beyond reason” and “would clearly jeopardize life.”

The Aighleen Pinnacles in Izembek NWR (©John Sarvis/USFWS)

The best estimates suggest that between past efforts to enhance medical services to King Cove and the construction of the proposed road, the final bill to the American taxpayer would be close to $75 million, an extraordinary expense in a time of federal budget austerity. Two weeks ago, Defenders of Wildlife CEO Jamie Rappaport Clark and former Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt co-authored an op-ed in the Washington Post that details the decades-long history of King Cove’s pork-barrel projects and the environmental consequences of this road.

Secretary of the Interior Jewell will face many tough decisions in her new position, but the Izembek road should not be one of them. While Izembek may be politically challenging to decide, from an economic and environmental perspective, it is easy and self-evident – the road must be rejected. We urge the new secretary to make the right decision – the honest and responsible decision – and preserve this iconic wilderness wildlife refuge. Both American taxpayers and the Izembek wildlife will thank her.

Letts Lake, Mendocino National Forest (©Pamela Flick/Defenders)

Pamela Flick, California Representative

From the thundering rapids of Cache Creek to the snow-capped peak of Snow Mountain, northern California’s somewhat undiscovered Berryessa Snow Mountain region is home to iconic wildlife, including the rare and elusive Pacific fisher, thriving elk herds and one of our state’s largest wintering populations of bald eagles. Visitors from nearby Sacramento and San Francisco Bay Area encounter scenic vistas and a wide variety of rare species found nowhere else on Earth, thanks to the region’s distinctive geology.

Indeed, this rich landscape provides habitat for so many plants and animals – among them some of the most unique butterflies and dragonflies in the state – that it has been identified as a “biodiversity hotspot.” The lands between Lake Berryessa and Snow Mountain make up one of the largest tracts of relatively undisturbed public lands in the state, providing invaluable space for wildlife to roam. Spanning nearly 100 miles in length from north to south, and ranging from near sea level to over 7,000 feet in elevation, this landscape includes habitats at such a wide variety of altitudes and latitudes that it also presents an important opportunity for species to adapt as the climate continues to change.

Building on overwhelming support from a wide array of stakeholders – from business owners to local elected officials, wildlife enthusiasts to mountain bikers – Representatives Mike Thompson, John Garamendi, Jared Huffman, Anna Eshoo and Ami Bera, along with Senator Barbara Boxer, recently introduced the Berryessa Snow Mountain National Conservation Act (H.R. 1025/S. 483) “to conserve, protect and enhance for the benefit of present and future generations the ecological, scenic, wildlife, recreational, cultural, historical, natural, educational, and scientific resources of the lands.” These bills would designate nearly 350,000 acres of federal land managed by the Bureau of Land Management, U.S. Forest Service, and U.S. Bureau of Reclamation as a National Conservation Area.

Fishers, an elusive and imperiled species, make their home in the Berryessa Snow Mountain region.

With nearby metropolitan areas expected to gain millions of new residents within the next decade, roads and development threaten to fragment this largely unbroken expanse and limit wildlife movement. The impacts of poorly managed recreation can also threaten important habitat. Protecting the Berryessa Snow Mountain region will safeguard the natural beauty, sensitive areas and the plants and animals that make their homes in this unique landscape. Protection will also secure existing recreation opportunities like hiking, boating, camping and horseback riding, while providing well-managed recreation experiences for residents and visitors alike.

Permanent protection for the Berryessa Snow Mountain region isn’t just good for the environment and wildlife, it’s also good for the economy. The outdoor recreation industry supports more than 400,000 California jobs and generates $46 billion (yes, that’s billion with a b!) of economic activity in the Golden State every year. Protecting our special places encourages tourism, supports local businesses and creates desirable places to live and work. Riffing on the old adage, protect it and they will come!

From meeting with key decision-makers to hosting town hall meetings with our conservation partners to engage local community stakeholders, Defenders is committed to continuing our work to support permanent protection of the Berryessa Snow Mountain region to ensure that wildlife as well as future generations benefit from this unique and diverse landscape just as we do today.

Izembek National Wildlife Refuge, Photo: U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

Jamie Rappaport Clark, President & CEO
Bruce Babbit, former Secretary of the Interior 

The true price of Sally Jewell’s confirmation as the new interior secretary is about to be revealed. Before agreeing not to fight Jewell’s nomination last month, Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R) extracted a commitment from the Interior Department to delay a decision on whether a road can be built to the southwest Alaska village of King Cove, population 950.

A few weeks ago, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service found that the road would severely damage the Izembek National Wildlife Refuge, a national treasure that is home to a vast array of creatures, including seals, salmon, caribou, bears and waterfowl. The senator was buying time in an effort to persuade the new secretary to go against the service’s findings and approve the road anyway. Now the final decision is pending — and more than wildlife is at stake. It is really the U.S. taxpayer who stands to lose if the road goes through.

The additional cost to federal taxpayers for building the road would be more than $33 million — a lot of money for one tiny village. And if it seems like you have heard this story before, that’s because you have.

In 1998, we were the interior secretary and director of the Fish and Wildlife Service, respectively, when the Izembek road proposal was earmarked in an appropriations bill headed for passage in Congress. But a lengthy scientific review determined that the road would devastate the Izembek refuge, so President Bill Clinton threatened a veto unless the earmark was removed.

Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska), then chairman of the Appropriations Committee, rolled out his main argument: The residents of King Cove needed better access to an air strip in the event of medical emergencies requiring evacuation. In response, we suggested upgrading the existing ferry service from King Cove across Cold Bay to the air strip, which would avoid the need for a road through a wildlife refuge.

Stevens responded that an upgraded ferry would work, if we were prepared to also fund an upgrade of the existing marine terminals on the bay. We agreed. The senator then demanded an upgraded video teleconference link to a trauma facility in Anchorage. We agreed. Then he asked for a new ocean-worthy hovercraft capable of crossing the bay in any weather. We agreed to that as well. The final bill to the U.S. taxpayer? Over $50 million; more than $52,000 per resident of King Cove.

It was a huge price to pay to accommodate the rare medical emergencies of one small Alaska village, but accommodate them we did. Alaska got its taxpayer-funded medical emergency solution, and we helped ensure the survival of the Izembek Refuge. End of story.

Or so we thought.

Now the Alaska delegation is back, once again demanding a road through the refuge, as if the 1998 deal had never happened. That hovercraft purchased with taxpayer dollars? Despite a 100 percent success rate in carrying out more than 30 medical evacuations, local officials suspended service in 2010, saying the hovercraft was unreliable and too expensive to operate. But that hasn’t stopped them from using it to transport seasonal seafood workers from a nearby cannery.

Moreover, as Pete Mjos, the former medical director for the area, recently said, the proposed road would be impassable and even life-threatening during the region’s typical winter storms. Even in the best weather conditions, it would still be a two-hour trip. The hovercraft? Thirty minutes each way across the bay. And all without slicing through a pristine wilderness area with 21 miles of road, eight bridges, 19 culverts and 254 stream crossings.

Congress is on record calling for an end to earmarks for pork-barrel projects. And every day we hear more calls for spending cuts and belt-tightening. U.S. taxpayers have already chipped in more than enough for this project. Asking them to pay tens of millions on top of the more than $50 million they have already spent is asking too much. It’s time the Izembek road project was killed for good.

This letter was originally published in the Washington Post.

©Pauline I. Stacey

Laurie Macdonald, Florida Program Director

Last month, we celebrated the First Annual Everglades Day, designated by the Florida legislature in recognition of America’s unique and intriguingly diverse Everglades ecoregion. The date, April 7th, was also the birthday of the late Marjorie Stoneman Douglas, an iconic heroine and newspaper reporter who spent many years writing about and advocating for Everglades protection.

The Everglades region is recognized as an International Biosphere Reserve, a World Heritage Site and a Ramsar Wetland of International Importance. The area encompasses three national parks, and a dozen national wildlife refuges and marine preserves, as well as a host of state, regional and local parks, forests and wildlife management areas. Extensive private land holdings in the region are also an integral component of valuable wildlife habitat ranging from 100,000-acre ranches to thousands of one-acre lots.

Biodiversity here is among the highest in the nation, with many species found nowhere else in the U.S. Many of Defenders’ key species are in the region, including Florida panthers, manatees, sea turtles, gopher tortoises and other listed species such as the Everglade kite, wood stork, Big Cypress fox squirrel, American crocodile and Key deer.

The Everglades are truly a national treasure and deserve the utmost protection and management. Without adequate funding, we’d be unable to acquire the habitat and linkages that species like panthers and bears need, protect water quality or work to protect natural systems from degradation and invasive species.

Throughout the month of April, we took action to protect south Florida’s Greater Everglades region. Defenders’ Florida Representative Elizabeth Fleming, our lobbyist Travis Moore and I, as well as other Everglades Coalition members, met with volunteers from around the state in Tallahassee to speak with our state senators and representatives who were in the midst of the Florida legislative session. Our message: The state budget needs to provide adequate funding for Everglades protection and restoration projects that protect our water and wildlife. One third of all Floridians rely on clean water from the Greater Everglades Ecosystem, and more than 120 federal and state endangered and threatened species depend on the region’s varied wetland, upland and marine habitats. The health of the Everglades brings economic health to the region. Quite simply, what’s good for the Everglades is good for southern Florida and beyond, because its visitors and migratory wildlife come from around the globe.

Staff and volunteers on the steps of the Florida Capitol.(©Pauline I. Stacey)

This was the first trip to the state capital for Will Johnson, a Defenders volunteer who made the nearly 7-hour drive to Tallahassee from Naples, who said, “Everglades Action Day is a great opportunity to engage with legislators and a wonderful group of activists to help preserve and protect the beauty and wildlife of Florida.”

Another volunteer, Magdalena Braker, took the long ride by joining others on a chartered bus that the Everglades Coalition reserved for the event, starting in Miami and picking up activists along way. Magdalena urged legislators to provide funding and support for the Everglades with this message: “La riqueza natural y servicios ambientales de los Everglades se están marchitando debajo presiones urbanas y venimos para emfátizar la importancia de los Everglades tanto para las especies silvestre como para los ciudadanos del sur de la Florida.” Which means:

“The natural resources and ecosystem services of the Everglades are withering under the pressures of urbanization, and we come here to emphasize the importance of the Everglades, not only for the native wildlife, but for South Floridians.”

The nearly 60 volunteers who made the trip from around the state to Tallahassee attended more than 30 meetings with their elected officials, asking them to make funding for the Everglades a priority. And it made an important contribution to Everglades protection! Just last week, as the 2013 legislative session concluded, the Florida Legislature designated $70M for Everglades restoration projects. Thanks for all who participated in our action day! If you’re in Florida, join us next year for lobby days at the state capital! And no matter where you live, get to know your state representative and senator back in your district. It always makes a big difference when elected officials hear directly from their constituents.

Fl. Representative Powell meets with volunteers and activists (©Pauline I. Stacey)