1D: Balancing healthy ecosystems in Utah drilling areas

The Colorado Plateau hosts unique and valuable resources—a diverse set of extensive oil and gas
deposits and rare plant species. As a high-value resource, deposits have spurred significant investment in the region by extractive industries—including 99,000 oil and gas well pads. This infrastructure can create significant impacts on the biodiversity of the area, especially for the 20% of endemic Colorado Plateau species classified as rare.

A new strategy offers a way to reduce potential conflict between conservation and development priorities by helping managers optimize decisions on the placement of infrastructure to minimize impacts on rare plants. The model uses information about existing plant distributions and spatial optimization data to identify defined locations that conserve sufficient habitat for rare plants while still accounting for and minimizing disruption to oil and gas development. With such an approach, it is possible to maintain relatively high levels of plant conservation at a minimal cost to the industry. The model identifies 2% of the total area where effective management could protect 30% of the distribution of all 29 rare plant species. By prioritizing and protecting these ecologically important locations, restoration costs could be kept low while protecting a minimum population of genetically unique rare plants, impacting 522 oil and gas well pads of the 99,000 existing sites (less than 1%) on the Colorado Plateau. No solution can completely meet objectives for both plant conservation and energy extraction, but where there is direct conflict, this model can help land managers accommodate a level of balance.