Jill Shaffer is an Ecologist with the USGS Northern Prairie Wildlife Research Center in Jamestown, North Dakota. She is currently an Embassy Science Fellow with the U.S. Embassy in Astana, Kazakhstan.
Jill Shaffer is an avian ecologist whose research advances the understanding of the effects of wind-energy facilities on birds. She has evaluated the behavioral impacts of wind facilities on grassland birds and waterfowl and devised a method, the Avian-Impact Offset Method, that quantifies those impacts so that State and Federal agencies can seek offsetting measures for the impacts. Information gained from Jill’s research will be used to help the U.S. Embassy in Kazakstan provide guidance to the Kazakh government and environmental NGO’s in how to preserve biodiversity in the face of increasing wind-energy development.
When not working on renewable-energy projects, Jill continues work on the writing of a 43-chapter synthesis on the effects of rangeland practices on grassland birds, an endeavor undertaken for 27 years and counting.
Science and Products
Tools for the Mitigation of Habitat-Based Impacts to Birds
Estimating offsets for avian displacement effects of anthropogenic impacts
Impacts of wind-turbine energy complexes on northern prairie grouse
The effects of management practices on grassland birds
Science and Products
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Tools for the Mitigation of Habitat-Based Impacts to Birds
Compensatory mitigation is applied in grassland and wetland ecosystems to offset environmental damage from disturbances such as energy development. Energy facilities continue to proliferate across the United States, yet implementation of mitigation tools to ameliorate habitat loss or behavioural effects on wildlife is rare. NPWRC scientists conducted a 10-year Before-After, Control-Impact (BACI)...Estimating offsets for avian displacement effects of anthropogenic impacts
The avian-impact offset method (AIOM) quantifies the amount of habitat needed to provide equivalent biological value for birds displaced by energy and transportation infrastructure. The AIOM can be applied in situations where avian displacement (i.e., behavioral avoidance) requires compensatory mitigation. The AIOM is based on the ability to define five metrics: impact distance, impact area, pre...Impacts of wind-turbine energy complexes on northern prairie grouse
Wind-energy development in the northern Great Plains primarily occurs along the Missouri Coteau and Missouri River Plateau in North Dakota and South Dakota. While these areas rank high in wind-energy potential they also contain important breeding habitat for sharp-tailed grouse and greater prairie-chickens. The impact of these wind-energy developments on prairie grouse populations and trends in...The effects of management practices on grassland birds
With support from the U.S. Prairie Pothole Joint Venture (PPJV), the U.S. Forest Service, and The Nature Conservancy, Northern Prairie is synthesizing literature on the effects of management practices on grassland bird species. The need for these syntheses was identified by the PPJV, a part of the North American Waterfowl Management Plan, in support of its objective to stabilize or increase... - Data
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