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Forest and Forest-interior Impact
of Allegheny Ridge Windplant
(75 Turbines)
By D. Daniel Boone
The cumulative impact to the forest and the forest-interior of the entire Allegheny Ridge Windplant — comprising seventy-five Gamesa 2-megawatt wind turbines — is shown in a graphic here.
GIS analysis that was performed to derive the estimates of forest acreage cleared and forest-interior acreage "lost" involved a rather painstaking process of carefully digitizing the "before and after" forest and non-forest edges within the project area using high-resolution digital aerial photos from the USDA National Agricultural Information Program (NAIP), which were taken in 2008, 2005, and 2004.
The analysis determined that more than 300 acres of forest habitat was cleared to make way for the seventy-five wind turbines and for the project's very wide and extensive road/utility-line network. The clearing of forest for this windplant and the widening of the relatively narrow openings in forest canopy along the pre-existing forest roads (resulting in linear openings through the forest that are over thirty feet in width) caused extensive fragmentation of the formerly large blocks of contiguous forest that made up this area. The cumulative loss of ecologically significant forest-interior habitat totaled more than 2,360 acres — nearly 4 square miles! On a "per turbine" basis, the forest "loss" averaged over 4.1 acres, and the forest-interior "loss" averaged nearly 31.5 acres. The forest-interior impact is among the worst at windplants built along forested ridgetops of Appalachia — both in terms of total acres and especially for its "per turbine" loss.
The Maryland Department of Natural Resources' land-use planning criteria was used for determining forest-interior and linear "edge" habitats; i.e., "edges" created by roads through forest that create a canopy opening that is 30 feet or wider (see www.dnr.state.md.us/education/envirothon/wildlife/criticalareareg_FIDS.pdf).
Not included as "non-forest" habitat were any isolated clearings or openings within the forest ½ acre or smaller. (There were very few instances.) Openings within forest that are ½ acre or less are much less likely to cause many of the deleterious "edge effects" that may cause harm to forest-interior dwelling birds and other species.