Sage‐Grouse Conservation Forecasting for Barrick’s Bank Study Area and Deep South Expansion Project Plan of Operations Study Area

Introduction 

The sagebrush biome in the Great Basin supports a diverse range of plant and animal species as well as important resource‐dependent human communities. Conserving sagebrush habitat in Nevada for the benefit of wildlife and people is a priority for The Nature Conservancy (TNC) in Nevada. As such, TNC has long recognized the importance of businesses and sustainable economic development as critical to successful conservation. Based on these foundational principles, TNC in North America has pursued mitigation as a key strategy for achieving gains for conservation. The Nevada Chapter of TNC is uniquely suited to support mitigation through a new application of the well‐developed, Landscape Conservation ForecastingTM tool (Low et al. 2010, Provencher et al. 2013). This quantitative tool, when paired with the University of Nevada, Reno’s (UNR), Greater sage‐grouse (Centrocercus urophasianus, hereafter GSG) habitat suitability model has been dubbed the Sage‐Grouse Conservation Forecasting tool. This methodology has become the scientific underpinnings of Barrick Nevada Sage‐Grouse Bank Enabling Agreement (Barrick Nevada Sage‐Grouse Bank Enabling Agreement 2015), a mitigation mechanism which seeks to achieve a net conservation gain for GSG while providing increased regulatory certainty for future mining growth.