China’s solar power rollout is harming birds, a new analysis finds

China is the world leader in solar power, but the country’s massive boom in this clean energy source could have unintended consequences for the country’s birds.

Using birdwatching and policy data from more than 2,300 counties across China, a new analysis found that areas with stricter policies enforcing solar energy development have seen decreases in bird diversity over the last 10 years. The study adds to a body of evidence showing the negative impact of industrial development and habitat loss on birds.

“Our results situate solar expansion within the broader, already well-established set of anthropogenic pressures on birds, including habitat loss, agricultural intensification, climate change and land use conversion,” says Huiming Zhang, an associate professor at Nanjing University of Information Science and Technology in China and lead author on the study.

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Constructing solar power plants can affect the vegetation and landscape around them—including the creatures that live there. Curiously, the researchers found that even in areas where planners had attempted to plant new vegetation in the wake of a solar farm being built, it didn’t mitigate bird diversity loss—a result of what the researchers call “inferior greening.”

The analysis, which published today in Science, will hopefully help to “reconcile energy and conservation goals” in China and elsewhere in the world, Zhang says.

“The lesson is not to slow the energy transition. It is to steer large solar projects toward locations with lower ecological conflict, subject to assessment of each site, and to build biodiversity safeguards into projects from the start.”

The study has its limitations. Ken Rosenberg, a conservation scientist at Cornell University who was not involved in the research, says bird diversity measures can be misleading, as they can obscure how well a specific local bird population is actually doing. Future research might look at bird population numbers instead, he says.

That said, the analysis is the first he has seen that has looked at the relationship between solar policy and biodiversity on a national level. “You don’t want to trade one crisis for another,” Rosenberg says.

“If you’re only looking at energy policy and renewable energy, you could set up these policies and make these decisions without realizing that you’re doing more harm than good in other aspects of the environment. Biodiversity often takes a backseat.”

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