Co-authored with the Southern Adirondack Audubon Society, this opinion piece appeared in print in the Times Union on March 15, 2026.
As New York advances its transition to wash power, we face one other environmental emergency — the dramatic lack of grassland birds.
The 2025 “State of the Birds” report, produced by a coalition of scientific and conservation organizations, revealed that these birds are the fastest-declining species, with populations down greater than 40% since 1970.
Habitat loss is on the heart of this disaster, and now the disaster is hitting residence within the 13,000-acre Washington County Grasslands.
Right here, sweeping fields anchor a uncommon ecosystem that is without doubt one of the state’s final lifelines for weak grassland birds, together with the state-endangered short-eared owl and threatened northern harrier.
These species use the core of the Washington County Grasslands for winter and breeding habitat and are exceptionally delicate to habitat fragmentation — even the addition of tall constructions can render the encompassing habitat unusable. The scientific literature is evident on this level: Space-sensitive birds abandon or keep away from fields when visible or structural disturbances break up the panorama.
Photo voltaic arrays, if poorly sited, have the potential to do precisely that.
But the proposed Fort Edward Photo voltaic Venture locations photo voltaic panel arrays round this delicate habitat, threatening to straight remove greater than 500 acres of occupied habitat and doubtlessly displace weak birds within the core of the grasslands. The proposed photo voltaic arrays would encircle the Washington County Grasslands Wildlife Administration Space to the south, east and west, doubtlessly displacing short-eared owls and northern harriers and forcing birds to cross over or close to the arrays to succeed in the higher-quality habitat within the administration space.
The undertaking space will not be merely good habitat; it’s precedence habitat repeatedly recognized in conservation plans. It lies throughout the Nationwide Audubon Society’s Fort Edward Grasslands Necessary Chicken Space and the state Division of Conservation’s Washington County Grasslands Grassland Chicken Conservation Middle. It’s included within the New York State Open House Plan, and it’s a state-designated Wintering Raptor Focus Space, amongst others. Few landscapes in New York carry this stage of ecological significance.
Regardless of these designations, the Fort Edward Photo voltaic Venture is required to observe solely the state’s minimal mitigation necessities. The Workplace of Renewable Vitality Siting’s components requires that solely 0.4 acres be conserved per acre of breeding habitat destroyed and 0.2 acres be conserved per acre of wintering habitat destroyed – that means that their plan would protect solely 20% to 40% p.c of the affected habitat for 30 years.
To place it mildly, that falls brief for a web site as vital because the Washington County Grasslands.
As well as, a current ruling on the proposed photo voltaic undertaking denied get together standing to the Grassland Chicken Belief, a conservation group with intensive expertise in managing grassland hen habitat within the Washington County Grasslands. Now Grassland Chicken Belief has no standing to straight advocate for habitat safety and should ask for voluntary concessions from Boralex, the Quebec-based power firm slated to assemble the ability.
The ruling straight reductions tons of of public feedback from neighborhood members, specialists and Northeast-based conservation organizations, such because the Nationwide Audubon Society, the New York State Ornithological Affiliation and a number of Audubon chapters.
Audubon strongly helps renewable power growth — but it surely should keep away from, reduce and meaningfully mitigate impacts to birds and the atmosphere. The Washington County Grasslands are irreplaceable, and if New York is to steer on local weather and biodiversity, the state should be sure that renewable power and wildlife conservation advance collectively — not in battle. Defending these grasslands protects the birds that outline them and preserves a dwelling legacy we can’t afford to lose.
