Changes in land use and land management have documented effects on biodiversity—agriculture in particular can have substantial impacts on species. Growing bioenergy crops rather than traditional crops has effects on wildlife abundance. To quantify this effect, we developed Bioenergy-biodiversity Estimation, or BioEST. BioEST is a modeling framework that measures biodiversity by estimating species richness on a landscape. BioEST uses bioclimatic data, land use data, and Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) data of presence/absence data on the species being modeled to determine richness. BioEST is able to produce maps of the studied area that display the calculated probability of occurrence. By inputting future conditions, we are able to generate future landscapes that detail projected species richness.
Results/Conclusions
We used BioEST to evaluate the variation in biodiversity that is associated with changes in land uses and management to grow bioenergy crops. We examined 52 avian species (grassland species, forest specialists, and generalists) under current landscape conditions as well as under future landscape conditions that included biomass crops. We were able to calculate the change in richness by subtracting the two, thereby quantifying the change in species richness that would occur from introducing bioenergy crops into the landscape. Overall, our simulations showed no change in probability of occurrence between current and future landscapes. Decreases were projected in 0.13% of grid cells for grassland species, 1.4% for forest specialists, and 0.36% for generalists. Increases were projected in 1% of grid cells for grassland species, 0.07% for specialists, and 1.13% for generalists.