"This bulletin provides information most relevant to reducing impacts of energy developments to sagebrush wildlife habitats in Wyoming. The information applies to sites where energy development is planned, is progressing, or has occurred. The bulletin is framed to provide information to avoid or lessen impacts to sagebrush wildlife habitats including fragmentation and human disturbance that could adversely affect wildlife habitats and populations"--P. [1].

Concern about energy independence and climate change have driven state and federal governments to promote renewable energy production, mainly in the form of wind generated electricity. There are social costs of wind energy development, however, that can lower its environmental value. Most notably, wind turbines can impact wildlife and wildlife habitat. Wind-wildlife conflicts are particularly intense in Wyoming, which has more high-quality wind resources than all other western states combined. Wyoming also has the largest amount of intact sagebrush ecosystem, which provides habitat for 64% of the known greater sage-grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus) population in the eastern portion of the species range. The greater sage-grouse was recently listed as a candidate on the endangered species list due largely to threats from energy development. Current legislation in Wyoming restricts wind energy development within greater sage-grouse core breeding areas. This suggests that the tradeoff between wind development and greater sage-grouse persistence is steep. I develop an econometric model to estimate the probability of wind development across 26 million acres of Wyoming. I then use these probabilities to simulate a range of wind energy build-out levels, with and without the current sage-grouse core-area restrictions. The model predicts that locations closer to transmission lines with higher wind classes are most likely to be occupied in the future by a wind farm. Some of the high probability wind locations also coincide with sage-grouse core breeding areas. Thus, there is potential for conflict between sage-grouse conservation and future wind development. There is relatively little conflict at low build-out levels (1,650 MW); however, as more wind development is distributed across the landscape, conflict increases. In the absence of conservation a build-out of 13,770 MW results in potential impacts to 1,346 males on 56 leks (2.4% of Wyoming's male population based on 2007 maximum lek counts). Restricting development in sage-grouse core areas (as defined by WY state governor in executive order 2011-5) will result in 324 males on 19 leks being potentially influenced, a reduction of 1.82% with an energy development opportunity cost of a 4% reduction in wind energy profits. Thus, while there are certain to be conflicts between sage-grouse and wind energy development, my results suggests that Wyoming can harness its vast wind resources while conserving sage-grouse.

Energy development is expanding rapidly in sagebrush ecosystems of Western North America. This ecosystem is a critical habitat for many obligate wildlife species, and contains substantial soil carbon. Although we have some knowledge about how wildlife species are affected by energy development, there is much that remains to be understood about how energy development affects sagebrush ecosystem structure and function. In my research, I explored 1) how fast sagebrush plant communities recover from oil and gas development; 2) how soil organic matter was impacted by historical oil and gas development; and 3) how oil and gas development and wind development affect ecosystem production. My results showed that some components of the sagebrush plant communities recover in ~ 90 years after oil and gas development, but other components to do not recover at all. Sagebrush density recovered in ~65 years, and both grass and shrub cover recovered to pre-disturbance levels in 30 years. However, there was no indication of any recovery of forbs, nor any trend toward recovery. Since forbs represent a critical component of the biological diversity of sagebrush systems, these results indicate that reclamation activities should target forbs to promote plant diversity in sagebrush ecosystems. Ninety years of oil and gas development had no effect on labile, recalcitrant, or total soil organic matter pools. Site specific conditions such as soils texture and shrub-induced heterogeneity explained substantial variance in soil organic matter pools, but the disturbance from oil and gas development showed no significant impact. While the disturbance had no effect on soil organic matter, it did eliminate the heterogeneity associated with individual shrubs. I found that shrub-induced heterogeneity recovered in about 45 years in loamy sand soils, but in sandy soils, heterogeneity did not recover. On the other hand, the insignificant effect of disturbance on soil organic matter leads us re-think modern well development practices: other studies on recent oil and gas sites show substantial losses of soil organic matter in soils that have been removed, stockpiled, and replaced, due to the physical disturbance of soils. This raises into question some of the current reclamation practices and their influence on soil organic matter, relative to pre-reclamation development. Evaluation of the landscape scale impacts of energy development did not show effects on aboveground production as measured by the annual integral of NDVI. Inter-annual variability had significant effects on both NDVI and seasonality of production. Wind farms, located in higher elevations tend to have higher production than oil and gas wells. More evaluation of remotely sensed indicators of ecosystem structure and function will be important, including growing season NDVI.

The State of Wyoming contains large reserves of oil and gas resources, a substantial portion of which are found in rangeland ecosystems. While any amount of development can affect landscape function, unplanned, excessive, or inefficient planning may lead to potentially otherwise avoidable rangeland degradation. The purpose of this research is to provide an analytic approach to aid in the reduction of environmental impacts associated with road development in energy development sites found in Wyoming rangeland landscapes. The creation of a spatially explicit model can aid in minimizing both ecological costs associated with road development, and as an added benefit reduces associated financial costs. Best management practices developed for addressing landscape ecological issues associated with transportation in oil and gas development are incorporated into a spatially explicit decision making process regarding conservation priorities. Cost surface analysis provides location information from the decision making process that reduces the effect of development on critical rangeland system features. Network analysis results in an optimal route away from those locations to ensure minimized disturbance. Both analyses are improved by using minimum spanning tree criteria to minimize the total impact of road disturbance. The minimized road network results in the additional advantage of reducing financial costs associated with unnecessary development. Results from the validation show that the proposed model is a viable way to reduce landscape disturbance and fragmentation from road development within a development site compared to current development practices. The modeled road network resulted in a reduction in impacts to sagebrush habitat types, crucial for Pronghorn (Antilocarpa americana) and Greater sage-grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus) winter habitat, doubled the average closest road distance to Greater sage-grouse lek locations, and minimized the intersection of roads with Pronghorn migration corridors and riparian areas. The traversal index showed that the ecological resistance of the landscape was reduced for an individual belonging to the same species with the proposed network structure. Finally, the reduction in total mileage reduces the cost of road construction and maintenance. Integrating the proposed GIS modeling approach into the decision making process for road network planning in energy development sites provides an analytic planning approach towards improving rangeland conservation efforts, while also reducing financial developmental costs.