Endangered Species & Wetlands Report

DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE
U.S. ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE                                               DOJ (202) 514-2007
MONDAY, DECEMBER 12, 2011                                       EPA (800) 223-0423             TTY (866) 544-5309

TENNESSEE CONSTRUCTION COMPANY, GEORGIA DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION
AGREE TO $1.5 MILLION PENALTY TO RESOLVE CLEAN WATER ACT VIOLATIONS

WASHINGTON – Wright Brothers Construction Co., of Charleston, Tenn., and the Georgia Department of Transportation (GDOT) have agreed to pay a $1.5 million penalty and spend more than $1.3 million to offset environmental damages to resolve alleged violations of the Clean Water Act (CWA), the Department of Justice and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced today.  The civil penalty is one of the largest ever under the CWA provisions prohibiting the unauthorized discharge of dredged or fill material into waters of the United States.

The complaint alleges that between 2004 and 2007, Wright Brothers, with approval from GDOT, piped and buried all or portions of seven primary trout streams in violation of the CWA. Wright Brothers was hired by GDOT to dispose of excess soil and rock generated during two GDOT highway expansion projects in northeast Georgia. The contracts between GDOT and Wright Brothers specifically required Wright Brothers to obtain written environmental clearance from GDOT prior to using any site as a fill site. GDOT approved sites that included streams considered to be waters of the United States.

Burying and piping streams can destroy valuable aquatic habitat and threatens water quality. The reduced water quality may have adversely impacted downstream trout populations, which are a major recreational resource to the region.  All of the streams that were filled are tributaries of either Lake Burton or Tallulah Falls Lake.

“Construction projects, including important expansions of highway infrastructure, must be conducted in full compliance with the Clean Water Act, which protects our nation’s waterways, aquatic habitats and recreational resources from harm,” said Ignacia S. Moreno, Assistant Attorney General for the Environment and Natural Resources Division of the Department of Justice. “This settlement will restore and mitigate pollution of area streams for the benefit of the people of Georgia.”

“Dumping dirt and waste rock into our nation’s waters threatens water quality and aquatic habitats,” said Cynthia Giles, Assistant Administrator for EPA’s Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance. “Today’s settlement will restore damaged streams, protecting trout habitat and recreational opportunities for the people of northeastern Georgia.”

“Through this enforcement action, we are sending a strong message about the importance of protecting headwater streams in the Southeast,” said Gwendolyn Keyes Fleming, EPA Region 4 Regional Administrator. “The streams impacted by the violations are designated by the state of Georgia as primary trout streams, which provide essential cold water habitat for a variety of species, support the robust recreational fishing industry in north Georgia, and thereby impact the health and well-being of many families.”

In Atlanta, U.S. Attorney Sally Quillian Yates said, “The citizens of Rabun County deserve to have our tributaries and streams kept free of unauthorized fill material and similar pollutants. This significant monetary agreement underscores the commitment of this office and the Justice Department to our water supply, its life sources and the environment.”

Under the settlement, Wright Brothers and GDOT must perform injunctive relief measures, including purchasing 16,920 mitigation credits at an estimated retail cost of $1.35 million to offset the impacts to waters of the United States that cannot be restored. The credits must be purchased from mitigation banks servicing the area in which the violations occurred.  A mitigation bank is a wetland, stream or other aquatic resource area that has been set aside for the purpose of providing compensation for impacts to aquatic resources that occurred under a federal, state or local permit.

Wright Brothers and GDOT will also remove piping from and restore the bed and bank of 150 feet of stream channel that was impacted from their disposal activities. The estimated cost of this work is $25,000. When complete, the restorative measures required under the settlement will mitigate the 2,800 feet of stream impacted by the CWA violations.

The settlement is subject to a 30 day comment period and final court approval.  A copy of the consent decree will be available on the Justice Department website: www.justice.gov/enrd/Consent_Decrees.html.

More on this settlement:www.epa.gov/compliance/resources/cases/civil/cwa/wrightbrothers.html

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Scroll down for longer version of story in Jan. 31 issue.

FWS and NMFS proposed a new policy Dec. 9 interpreting that devilish phrase in the Endangered Species Act, “significant portion of its range.”

Here are a few paragraphs from the services’ press release:

“Uncertainty about the meaning of this important phrase has led to debate and litigation. A formal opinion developed by the Solicitor of the Department of the Interior (known as the “M-Opinion”) had been applied by the FWS since March 16, 2007. But the M-Opinion was withdrawn on May 4, 2011, after two courts rejected key aspects of it. NOAA Fisheries has never applied the FWS interpretation, nor did it issue separate guidance, instead relying on a general understanding similar to the policy interpretation in today’s proposal.

“This proposed policy differs substantially from the DOI’s M-Opinion interpretation. Today’s proposal requires that if a species is found to be threatened or endangered in a significant portion of its range, the entire species must be listed and protections of the ESA applied throughout its range. However, if the significant portion of the range is the exact same area inhabited by a ‘distinct population segment’ of the species, only the distinct population segment would be listed. A distinct population segment is a vertebrate animal population or group of populations that is discrete from other populations of the species and significant to the overall species.

“In contrast, under the M-Opinion, only individuals of a species found within the ‘significant portion of its range’ were protected under the ESA. Today’s proposed policy also establishes a more specific and stringent standard to evaluate whether a portion of a species’ range would be considered ‘significant’ than the standard applied under the M-Opinion interpretation. This higher bar will ensure that the species being evaluated for ESA protection on the basis of threats to only a significant portion of its range are truly in need of conservation.”

More

From the ESA‘s Section 3(6): “The term ‘endangered species’ means any species which is in danger of extinction throughout all or a significant portion of its range other than a species of the Class Insecta determined by the Secretary to constitute a pest whose protection under the provisions of this Act would present an overwhelming and overriding risk to man.”

The definition of “threatened” species is about the same: “(20) The term ‘threatened species’ means any species which is likely to become an endangered species within the foreseeable future throughout all or a significant portion of its range.”

And here is the text of the draft policy, from the document linked above that will be published in the Federal Register:

III. Draft Policy

Below, we provide the text of our draft policy, which we developed based on the preceding information provided in this document.

Consequences of a species being endangered or threatened in a significant portion of its range:
The phrase “significant portion of its range” in the Endangered Species Act’s (the Act’s) definitions of “endangered species” and “threatened species” provides an independent basis for listing; thus there are two situations (or factual bases) under which a species would qualify for listing: a species may be endangered or threatened throughout all of its range; or a species may be endangered or threatened in only a significant portion of its range.

If a species is found to be endangered or threatened in only a significant portion of its range, the entire species is listed as endangered or threatened, respectively, and the Act’s protections apply across the species’ entire range.

Significant: A portion of the range of a species is “significant” if its contribution to the viability of the species is so important that without that portion, the species would be in danger of extinction.

Range: The range of a species is considered to be the general geographical area within which that species can be found at the time FWS or NMFS makes any particular status determination. This range includes those areas used throughout all or part of the species’ life cycle, even if they are not used regularly (e.g., seasonal habitats). Lost historical range is relevant to the analysis of the status of the species, but it cannot constitute a significant portion of a species’ range.

Reconciling SPR with DPS authority: If the species is not endangered or threatened throughout all of its range, but it is endangered or threatened within a significant portion of its range, and the population in that significant portion is a valid DPS, we will list the DPS rather than the entire taxonomic species or subspecies.

FWS, NMFS float draft policy on “significant portion of range” (longer version of story on page 4 of Jan. 31 issue)

Interpretation of a key phrase in the Endangered Species Act would change under a new proposal from the Fish and Wildlife Service and National Marine Fisheries Service.

At issue is the way the two agencies decide whether a species is threatened or endangered “throughout all or a significant portion of its range.”

After two federal courts found unlawful a Bush Administration Solicitor’s Opinion that interpreted the phrase, the Interior Department withdrew it last May. (NMFS had never adopted it.)

The current proposal would require that “if a species is found to be threatened or endangered in a significant portion of its range, the entire species must be listed and protections of the ESA applied throughout its range,” FWS said in a  Dec. 8 news release. “However, if the significant portion of the range is the exact same area inhabited by a ‘distinct population segment’ of the species, only the distinct population segment would be listed.”

Environmental groups were not enthusiastic, claiming the new policy would ignore species’ historic range.

“Under the policy proposed today, a species could be absolutely gone or close to vanishing almost everywhere it’s always lived — but not qualify for protection because it can still be called secure on one tiny patch of land,” said Noah Greenwald, the Center for Biological Diversity’s endangered species director. “The policy absolutely undermines the spirit of the [ESA] and will be a recipe for extinction of our native wildlife if it’s finalized.”

The center also said the policy uses “classic government doublespeak” when it says that if a species is endangered in a significant portion of its range, it will be listed throughout that range, but then defines the phrase to mean that the species must be threatened or endangered in all of that range.

“As with the ‘historic range’ dodge, this will allow the agency to ignore species loss in significant areas and not provide protection,” CBD said, adding that FWS “did just this in a recent decision to deny protection to cactus ferruginous pygmy-owls, even though the animal is at risk of being lost in the entirety of the Sonoran Desert of Arizona and Mexico.”

Rep. Edward Markey (D-Mass.), ranking minority member on the House Natural Resources Committee, also criticized the proposal. In a letter to FWS Director Dan Ashe, Markey said that under the proposal, the bald eagle never would have been listed.
The proposed policy is short but the accompanying analysis is exhaustive. The agencies say that in interpreting “significant,” they have “set[] a relatively high threshold,” thus “minimize[ing] the degree to which restrictions will be imposed or resources expended that do not contribute substantially to species conservation.”

At the same time, “we have not set the threshold so high that the phrase ‘in a significant portion of its range’ does not have independent meaning.”

In contrast to the Solicitor’s Opinion, which allowed FWS to list a species only within that portion of its range where it was deemed threatened or endangered, the proposed policy would require that the species be listed throughout its entire range.

Regarding the threshold for “significant,” the services said that “under this draft policy we ask whether the species would be in danger of extinction everywhere without that portion, i.e., if that portion were completely extirpated.”

“In other words, this draft policy’s definition leaves room for listing a species that is not currently imperiled throughout all of its range.”

The draft says that consideration of historical range will still take place. While it cannot be used as the sole basis for concluding that a species is in danger of extinction –- or threatened with becoming so – “[l]ost historical range may . . . be an important factor in evaluating the current status of the species. The effect of loss of historical range on the viability of the species can be an important consideration in our status determination, and could prompt us to list a species because the loss of historical range has contributed to its present status as endangered or threatened throughout all or a significant portion of its range. In such a case, we do not list a species because it is ‘endangered’ or ‘threatened’ in its lost historical range, but rather because it is ‘endangered’ or ‘threatened’ throughout all or a significant portion of its current range because that loss of historical range is so substantial that it undermines the viability of the species as it exists today.”

Here’s the opinion from Judge John Wiese of the U.S. Court of Federal Claims.

The only news coverage I could find is from the Ventura County Star’s Zeke Barlow. Here are the last three paragraphs of his story, which also quotes John Echeverria, a professor at Vermont Law School who filed a brief in the case on behalf of NRDC:

Casitas board President Pete Kaiser said the board will have to review the ruling “and figure out what is the appropriate measures we need to take for our ratepayers now and in the future.”

The district’s lawyer, Roger Marzulla, would collect more money if he wins the case. But board member Russ Baggerly, who has been against the case from the start, said it is time to call it quits.

He said provisions built into the fish ladder operation allow the district to stop sending water down it during a drought, keeping the lake from going dry.

“This case is over,” Baggerly said.

“While the government has interfered with plaintiff’s ability to divert water—and has done so since the opening of the fish passage facility necessitated by the steelheads’ ESA listing,” Wiese said, “it remains to be seen whether the government’s actions will subsequently interfere with Casitas’s beneficial use of its water. Absent such a present, compensable injury, Casitas’s takings claim is simply not ripe.” (Casitas Municipal Water District page)

The court cited the Federal Circuit’s decision in Northwest Louisiana Fish & Game Preserve Comm’n v. United States, 446 F.3d 1285, 1290 (Fed. Cir. 2006). In that case, Wiese wrote, “The Federal Circuit . . . found that a cause of action accrues only when the damages are ‘quantifiable and present’—an event it defined as occurring when the vegetation had grown to harmful levels and the Corps refused to drain the lake to alleviate the harm caused by the overgrowth. Id. at 1291. Until that time, the Federal Circuit reasoned, the potential harm caused by the vegetation ‘was only a threat.’  Id. The same is true here.”

More from the opinion:

Nor do we believe that the existence of water delivery requests from current customers is the only method of proving demand. If plaintiff can show that as a result of the biological opinion criteria it has turned away water delivery requests, refused new customers, compiled a wait-list of unserved customers, or been forced to employ conservation measures to make up for any water shortfall, plaintiff equally will have established an injury.

In addition, it is our view that the biological opinion’s impact on Casitas’s water supply must take into account the water lost as a result of the fish screen inefficiencies. Contrary to defendant’s assertion, we believe that the inefficiencies should indeed be charged to the United States—along with the necessity for plaintiff’s construction of the fish passageway in the first instance—as the consequences associated with plaintiff’s reasonable response to the government’s action (a conclusion we discuss in more detail in Section IV below). We do not believe, however, that it is legitimate to use data from the first years of the fish passageway’s operation as a basis for calculating fish screen losses when the evidence shows that the severity of those initial losses already has been ameliorated. Presumably, however, a more accurate picture of the fish screen losses (including more years of data and more representative data) will be available by the time plaintiff’s cause of action accrues.

Wiese wasn’t buying the federal government’s argument that Casitas “voluntarily” built the fish ladder.

Defendant thus argues that Casitas voluntarily undertook the construction of a particular fish facility with particular bypass flows and that any consequences of those decisions are not the responsibility of the United States. See, e.g., Norman v. United States, 429 F.3d 1081, 1089 (Fed. Cir. 2005) (finding that a physical takings analysis did not apply because the plaintiffs could have complied with the permit in other ways, and the Corps did not require the plaintiffs to convey the property to a third party).

The difficulty we have with defendant’s argument is that it dramatically underplays the coercive effect of the ESA. See Bennett v. Spear, 520 U.S. 154, 169–70 (1997) (recognizing that a biological opinion has a “powerful coercive effect on the action agency” and observing that while “[t]he action agency is technically free to disregard the Biological Opinion and proceed with its proposed action, . . . it does so at its own peril”). Casitas’s actions can hardly be construed as voluntary when they were in direct response to a federal listing, one that carried with it the very real prospect of criminal and civil liability for Casitas and its employees. See 16 U.S.C. §§ 1540(a), (b) (authorizing civil fines of up to $12,000 per violation and criminal penalties of up to $50,000 and/or imprisonment for one year). Moreover, to say that Casitas had discretion in the project it proposed is to ignore the fact that NMFS’s actions implementing the ESA were the constant driving force behind Casitas’s efforts to achieve an acceptable solution to the hazards that its water project allegedly presented to the steelheads’ habitat. So long as plaintiff’s response to the federal listing was reasonable (and there is nothing in the record to suggest that it was not), the consequences of that response are chargeable to the United States.

Links

http://www.law.georgetown.edu/gelpi/current_research/regulatory_takings/takings_legbrief.cfm Takings briefs from 2009 (from what used to be GELPI)

Briefs mentioning Casitas

From a few days ago (Dec. 1, to be specific): A three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals found that the Gallatin National Forest’s travel management plan did not comply with the Montana Wilderness Study Act of 1977 (Citizens for Balanced Use v. McCallister, 09-36051).

The Forest Service did not properly consider the likely increase in the number of people driving through the area.

The travel plan “improperly ignores the impact of increased volume of motorized and mechanized use on current users’ ability to seek quiet and solitude in the study area,” the court opined. “Because the [Forest] Service entirely failed to consider this important aspect of its duty to maintain the study area’s 1977 wilderness character, its decision is arbitrary and capricious. We affirm judgment in favor of [Montana Wilderness Association] and against the service and Citizens [for Balanced Use].”

The panel included Circuit Judges Raymond C. Fisher, Ronald M. Gould and Richard A. Paez. Fisher wrote the opinion.

Excerpts:

We hold that the Study Act requires the Service to ensure that current users of a wilderness study area are able to enjoy the wilderness character of the area as it existed in 1977, pending a congressional decision on whether to designate the area as wilderness. In this case, the Service has not adequately explained how the 1977 wilderness character of the relevant study area, particularly the opportunities for solitude it offers, has been maintained despite an increase in the volume of motorized and mechanized recreation in the area. We therefore conclude that the Service’s adoption of the travel plan was arbitrary and capricious, and accordingly affirm the district court’s decision finding that the Service’s actions violate the Administrative Procedure Act (APA).

Although it reconfigured the area over which motorized and mechanized use occurs relative to 1977, however, the Service did not explicitly account for the increase in volume of use over time. The Service acknowledged that use volume has increased in the study area since 1977, but noted that accounting for the increase was somewhat problematic because there were no “reliable (statistically valid) recreation use data available.” The Service concluded, however, that the missing data were not relevant in any event because the Study Act requires the Service to maintain only those physical characteristics that may affect a study area’s ability to provide a wilderness experience in the event of future wilderness designation. The Service did not attempt to maintain the area’s 1977 wilderness character, including the relatively low motorized use volumes that existed at that time, for the enjoyment of current users.

Summary of Molloy’s decision by the circuit court:

The district court consolidated the two cases. It then granted MWA’s motion for summary judgment and denied the cross-motions of the Service and Citizens. The court concluded that the Service failed adequately to explain how the travel plan’s reconfiguration of the physical areas open to motorized and mechanized use satisfied the Study Act’s mandate to maintain 1977 wilderness character, in light of acknowledged increases in use volume. See Mont. Wilderness Ass’n v. McAllister, 658 F. Supp. 2d 1249, 1255 (D. Mont. 2009). The court recognized that the Service lacked complete historical data that would allow it to quantify the volume of use increase precisely, see id., but held that the Service was nonetheless not permitted to ignore increased volume of use altogether. See id. at 1256. The court found that the Service had done so, and that the omission “render[ed] the decision arbitrary and capricious” in violation of the APA. Id. at 1255.

The court also ruled that, by asserting that the missing historical volume of use data were not relevant to its Study Act analysis, the Service violated its NEPA obligation to include in the FEIS “a statement of the relevance of . . . incomplete or unavailable information to evaluating reasonably foreseeable significant adverse impacts on the human environment.” 40 C.F.R. § 1502.22(b)(2); see McAllister, 658 F. Supp. 2d at 1255-56. The court enjoined the Service from continued implementation of the travel plan and remanded to the agency. See McAllister, 658 F. Supp. 2d at 1266. The Service appealed.

On solitude:

If the Study Act allowed the Service to focus on physical wilderness characteristics alone, even a massive escalation in noisy, disruptive motorized use would trigger no management response so long as there was no resulting physical degradation. For example, the Service could allow sightseeing helicopters to fly over the study areas in unlimited numbers, filling the study areas with loud and intrusive noise. Because the helicopters would likely never touch the ground, however, their presence — which from a common-sense perspective would plainly degrade the areas’ wilderness character — could persist uncontrolled. We agree with the district court that confronted this very situation that Congress could not have intended to permit such a result. See Greater Yellowstone Coal. v. Timchak, No. CV-06-04-EBLW, 2006 WL 3386731, at *3-*4 (D. Idaho Nov. 21, 2006) (sensibly observing, in analyzing the impacts of helicopters used for heli-skiing in a Wyoming wilderness study area, that “loud helicopter flights [can] be inconsistent with solitude,” and holding that the Service was required to address the impact of a tenfold increase in helicopter flights on the study area’s wilderness character).

Footnote #6:

To the extent the district court suggested otherwise, in finding that the Service properly “considered the direct and indirect effects of plan alternatives to the Study Area” using “ ‘theoretical approaches or research methods,’ ” Mont. Wilderness Ass’n, 658 F. Supp. 2d at 1256 n.4 (quoting 40 C.F.R. § 1502.22(b)(4)), we disagree. Section 1502.22(b)(4) requires that an agency unable to fill a gap in the relevant data “deal with uncertainties” that result from the missing data by evaluating potential impacts using theoretical means. San Luis Obispo Mothers for Peace v. NRC, 449 F.3d 1016, 1033 (9th Cir. 2006). Here, although the Service analyzed the direct and indirect effects of travel plan alternatives generally, it did not attempt to use theoretical approaches or research methods to deal with uncertainties stemming from the gaps in the available volume of use data because it erroneously concluded that such data were irrelevant altogether.

“Suggested strategies to enhance carbon storage in the Great Plains region include conserving natural land cover (such as forests and grasslands/shrublands) and finding ways to reduce nitrous oxide and methane emissions in agricultural lands or wetlands while maintaining their productive sequestration,” says a new report released today by the U.S. Geological Survey.

Cover page

“Baseline and Projected Future Carbon Storage and Greenhouse-Gas Fluxes in the Great Plains Region of the United States” will be discussed at a press conference to be held at the American Geophysical Union‘s fall meeting in San Francisco. The event is scheduled for 7 pm ET (4 pm PT).

The report is “the first regional study in a national assessment of how much carbon may be stored in U.S. ecosystems,” according to DOI’s announcement.

Here is the press release (link, left, and pasted below):

Report evaluates amount of carbon absorbed by wetlands, grasslands and forests in the Great Plains region

12/05/2011

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Department of the Interior today released the first in a series of regional studies measuring the amount of carbon stored in U.S. ecosystems. Published by Interior’s U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), the study examines the current and projected future carbon storage in the Great Plains region, as part of a nation-wide assessment.

“This is truly groundbreaking research that, for the first time, takes a landscape-level look at how our lands naturally store carbon and explores how we can encourage this capability in ways that enhance our stewardship of natural resources,” said Deputy Secretary of the Interior David J. Hayes. “Our landscapes are helping us to absorb carbon emissions that would otherwise contribute to atmospheric warming.”

This is the first regional report applying a comprehensive methodology designed by the USGS in 2010 to assess how much carbon is stored in various ecosystems, such as wetlands, forests and rangelands. The study covers an area of the United States that includes parts of fourteen states from eastern Montana to southern Texas and eastern Iowa.

Following the Great Plains study, the USGS is expected to release studies on the western, eastern, Alaskan and Hawaiian regions. The full national assessment is expected to be completed around 2013.

A key finding in the Great Plains study is that the region is currently an overall “carbon sink,” meaning it takes up more carbon than it emits. In addition, the amount of carbon sequestered offsets most of the emissions of nitrous oxide and methane from this region.

On a national scale, the amount of carbon that is currently stored per year in ecosystems within the Great Plains is about 21 percent of emissions from personal vehicles and 3.6 percent of total fossil fuel emissions nationwide. The values for vehicle and total fossil fuel emissions are not part of the USGS study but were calculated using the 2009 EPA national greenhouse gas inventory report.

Using the uniform methodology developed by USGS also allows for comparisons between regions and ecosystems. For example, the regional study shows that the southern part of the Great Plains has a substantial amount of woody vegetation, which has a strong potential to store additional carbon. Agricultural lands in the eastern part of the Great Plains similarly have a strong potential to store carbon; however, these areas also are associated with high greenhouse gas emissions.

“For the first time, we will have a comprehensive view of how carbon is cycling through our Nation’s ecosystems: sources, sinks, and relative residence times in the various biological components,” explained USGS Director Marcia McNutt. “This study will not only result in better land-use decisions but should also advance our fundamental understanding of one of the most important chemical cycles on the planet.”

Congress called for the USGS carbon sequestration research in 2007 legislation sponsored by then-Senator Ken Salazar. At the 2009 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP-15), Salazar – as Secretary of the Interior – presented the initiative, noting the importance of biological carbon sequestration.

As part of the study, USGS scientists produced current carbon storage estimates and made projections into the year 2050. Future estimates incorporate Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change projections of climate change as well as USGS projections of land use and land cover change. By 2050, the USGS study estimates that carbon stored in the region is expected to increase by 29 to 36 percent , while emissions of nitrous oxide are expected to increase by 7 to 11 percent and methane is expected to change by -1.6 to 16%.

“This report will give tools to the policymakers, land managers and the public to make sound decisions, such as whether to restore wetlands, harvest trees, develop agricultural lands, or consider no-till farming practices,” said Hayes. For example, a community might need to decide whether to convert grasslands and forests to croplands or urban areas to meet the demands of a growing population. Such decisions have varying consequences related to carbon sequestration and greenhouse gas emissions.

Changes in carbon storage are driven by both short – and long-term changes to the landscape. In the Great Plains, carbon storage is expected to increase based on near-future land use and management practices such as decreased timber harvesting and changes to crop management, including expanded fertilizer applications and no-till farming. The rate of increase is projected to slow somewhat over time due to climate change and land-use transitions such as grasslands or forests conversion to croplands or urban areas.

Research conducted by USGS scientists on the carbon cycle and potential for carbon sequestration was mandated by the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007. In addition to the biological carbon sequestration assessment, the USGS is also assessing the nation’s potential for geologic carbon sequestration, which is the storage of carbon dioxide in underground rock formations.

Following the Great Plains study, the USGS is expected to release studies on the western, eastern, Alaskan and Hawaiian regions. The full national assessment is expected to be completed around 2013.

The report “Baseline and Projected Future Carbon Storage and Greenhouse-Gas Fluxes in the Great Plains Region of the United States” can be found online in the USGS publications warehouse at http://pubs.usgs.gov/pp/1787/.

A photograph of the Great Plains in Montana is available here.

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