BLM CA Evaluate/Model Impacts of Roads, Washes, and Fences to Desert Tortoise Population Viability

The development of utility-scale solar energy in the Desert Southwest brings with it policy concerns over impacts to legally protected species such as the desert tortoise. Listed as threatened since 1990, the desert tortoise is threatened by the loss of habitat and other development-related impacts such as roads. As BLM has been approving renewable energy development on public lands, the Bureau sought ways to minimize new impacts to the desert tortoise and to mitigate existing impacts to improve the recovery and status of the species. One such mitigation is installing roadside fencing as a means of reducing tortoise mortalities and recapturing habitat adjacent to roadways that is depauperate of tortoise.