A recently proposed analytical wake model for a horizontal axis utility scale wind turbine is revisited, and revised and improved. The model is based upon conservation of momentum in the context of ...actuator disc theory, and the assumption of a distribution of the double-Gaussian type for the velocity deficit in the wake. The model is developed and improved and reveals characteristics of the wind turbine wake velocity deficit for the full wake, including the near-wake to within close proximity of the wind turbine rotor. Full 2-dimensional model fitting to lidar wake measurement data obtained from a 5 MW utility scale wind turbine is carried out for the full range of inflow wind velocities of primary interest. Such a full wind turbine wake model has the potential to facilitate analytic calculations within the wind turbine wake region, and the potential to improve understanding of wind turbine aerodynamics.
•Double-Gaussian analytical wake model for a horizontal axis wind turbine.•Wake model validation for utility scale wind turbine.•Characteristics of wind turbine wake velocity deficit modelled.
Social science methodologies are increasingly used by conservation organisations to improve social‐ecological outcomes. However, ethnographic approaches seeking to understand organisations themselves ...and how organisational culture impacts biodiversity and social justice are rarely discussed. By exploring previous studies of the methodological considerations of organisational ethnography in conservation, we provide conservationists and ethnographers with an empirically grounded understanding of the opportunities, challenges and underlying ethical considerations of this approach.
We conducted a scoping review of a disparate body of literature where ethnographers were embedded in conservation organisations and discussed their methodology, identifying 26 studies for analysis. We then extracted information on key themes relevant to methodological process and uptake.
Our review found such research spanned the globe, with a broad range of methodological and ethical considerations related to how ethnographers and conservationists interact. For example, organisational ethnography was perceived as valuable by conservationists as it allowed tracking progress toward internal goals such as diversification of staff and providing moral and emotional support and valuable information for transforming organisational practices. However, conservationists also worried about ethnographers' presence in their organisations. A key methodological challenge we identify, corroborating with the literature, is how ethnographers can benefit organisations while supplying critique.
Based on the results, we provide recommendations and areas of reflection for conservation organisations and ethnographers. Mainstreaming organisational ethnography through attention to certain methodological considerations can be beneficial for the future of conservation organisations and the biodiversity and people they impact.
Celebrities are frequently used in conservation marketing as a tool to raise awareness, generate funding and effect behaviour change. The importance of evaluating effectiveness is widely recognised ...in both marketing and conservation but, to date, little research into the effectiveness of celebrity endorsement as a tool for conservation marketing has been published. Using a combination of interviews and an online choice survey instrument, we investigated the extent to which a sample of UK-based conservation organisations, and other charities, evaluate their own usage of celebrity endorsement, and then carried out an experimental evaluation of a hypothetical marketing campaign. This experiment compared participants' willingness-to-engage (WTE) with, and recall of, a conservation message presented in versions of an advert featuring one of three prominent UK celebrities (David Beckham, Chris Packham or HRH Prince William) or a non-celebrity control treatment (featuring Crawford Allan, a director of TRAFFIC USA). We find that the organisations we interviewed did not routinely evaluate their marketing campaigns featuring celebrities. Furthermore, our experiment provides evidence that celebrity endorsement can produce both positive and negative effects. Participants were more willing to engage when presented with an advert featuring one of the three celebrities than the non-celebrity control, and WTE varied according to the characteristics of the celebrity and the respondent. However, celebrities were less effective at generating campaign message recall than non-celebrities. These findings suggest that celebrity endorsement should be used carefully. Further work is required to fully understand the role celebrity endorsers can play in conservation but, drawing on best practice from the field of marketing, this study introduces an approach to evaluation which could be applied more widely to improve the effectiveness of conservation marketing.
Combating the surge of illegal wildlife trade (IWT) devastating wildlife populations is an urgent global priority for conservation. There are increasing policy commitments to take action at the local ...community level as part of effective responses. However, there is scarce evidence that in practice such interventions are being pursued and there is scant understanding regarding how they can help. Here we set out a conceptual framework to guide efforts to effectively combat IWT through actions at community level. This framework is based on articulating the net costs and benefits involved in supporting conservation versus supporting IWT, and how these incentives are shaped by anti‐IWT interventions. Using this framework highlights the limitations of an exclusive focus on "top‐down," enforcement‐led responses to IWT. These responses can distract from a range of other approaches that shift incentives for local people toward supporting conservation rather than IWT, as well as in some cases actually decrease the net incentives in favor of wildlife conservation.
This article reports on an open-source ontology that has been developed to establish an industry-wide consensus on wind lidar concepts and terminology. The article provides an introduction to wind ...lidar ontology, provides an overview of its development, and provides a summary of its aims and achievements. The ontology serves both reference and educational purposes for wind energy applications and lidar technology. The article provides an overview of the creation process, the outcomes of the project, and the proposed uses of the ontology. The ontology is available online and provides standardisation of terminology within the lidar knowledge domain. The open-source framework provides the basis for information sharing and integration within remote sensing science and fields of application.
Abstract Terrestrial and marine protected areas have long been championed as an approach to biodiversity conservation. For protected areas to be effective, equitable and inclusive, the involvement of ...local residents in their management and governance is considered important. Globally, there are many approaches to involving local residents in protected area law enforcement. However, opportunities for comparing different approaches have been limited by the lack of a clear common framework for analysis. To support a more holistic understanding, we present a framework for analysing the contributions of local residents to protected area law enforcement. Informed by a review of the literature and discussions with conservation practitioners, the framework comprises five key dimensions: (1) the different points in the enforcement system at which local residents are involved, (2) the nature of local participation in decision-making, (3) the type of external support provided to local residents, (4) the different motivating forces for participation, and (5) the extent to which local participation is formalized. We apply the framework to three real-world case studies to demonstrate its use in analysing and comparing the characteristics of different approaches. We suggest this framework could be used to examine variation in local participation within the enforcement system, inform evaluation and frame constructive discussions between relevant stakeholders. With the global coverage of protected areas likely to increase, the framework provides a foundation for better understanding the contributions of local residents to protected area law enforcement.
Fencing is a ubiquitous part of the landscape across the Great Plains of North America. This can fragment habitats and reduce the ability of wildlife to move between patches. A relatively novel ...conservation tool aimed at mitigating these impacts is the use of wildlife‐friendly fencing. However, there is still an incomplete understanding as to how this tool affects ungulate movement and whether it increases habitat connectivity across barriers. Using camera trap data from three properties across the American Prairie Reserve, Montana, we investigated the effects of fencing on four ungulate species. Averaged across species and demographics, this wildlife‐friendly fencing design increased the probability that ungulates successfully crossed a fence by 33% and reduced the time taken to cross by 54%, but has limited effects on species' crossing behavior. Responses to the wildlife‐friendly fencing differed between species, sex, and age class. The greatest improvement in permeability was detected for mule deer, females, and juvenile groups. Yet, permeability remained lowest for elk, juveniles, and males overall at both fence types. Understanding these differences between groups is important when improving or selecting fence designs, and we highlight vulnerable groups that may require further study when implementing this conservation tool.
Conservation conflicts represent complex multilayered problems that are challenging to study. We explore the utility of theoretical, experimental, and constructivist approaches to games to help to ...understand and manage these challenges. We show how these approaches can help to develop theory, understand patterns in conflict, and highlight potentially effective management solutions. The choice of approach should be guided by the research question and by whether the focus is on testing hypotheses, predicting behaviour, or engaging stakeholders. Games provide an exciting opportunity to help to unravel the complexity in conflicts, while researchers need an awareness of the limitations and ethical constraints involved. Given the opportunities, this field will benefit from greater investment and development.
Conservationists need to measure human behavior to guide decisions and evaluate their impact. However, activities can be misreported and reporting accuracy may change following conservation ...interventions, making it hard to verify any apparent changes. Techniques for asking sensitive questions are increasingly integrated into survey designs to improve data quality, but some can be costly or hard for nonexperts to implement. We demonstrate a straightforward, low‐cost approach, the bean method in which respondents give anonymous answers by adding a colored bean to a jar to denote a yes or no response. We applied the bean method to measure wild‐meat hunting and trading over 2 years at a conservation‐project (hunting reduction) site in Gola Forest, Liberia. We extended the technique to accommodate questions about hunting and meat‐selling frequency. We compared responses given using the bean method and direct questioning for groups that did and did not participate in conservation interventions. Results from the bean method corresponded to those from direct questioning, and there was no indication of change in question sensitivity following conservation interventions. Estimates from both methods indicated that wild‐meat trading decreased in project and nonproject households (from 36% to 20%) and that hunting decreased in 1 project group (38–28%). Where inconsistent answers were given (2–6% of respondents), differences were in both directions and were most likely attributable to measurement error. The bean method was quick and straightforward to administer in a low‐literacy setting. We showed how it can be modified for answers of more than 2 categories and consider it a valuable tool that could be adapted for a wide range of conservation settings.
El Método del Frijol como Herramienta para Medir los Comportamientos Sensibles
Resumen
Los conservacionistas necesitan medir el comportamiento humano para dirigir las decisiones tomadas y evaluar su impacto. Sin embargo, las actividades pueden estar mal reportadas y la fiabilidad de los reportes puede cambiar después de implementadas las intervenciones de conservación, lo cual complica la verificación de cualquier cambio aparente. Las técnicas para realizar preguntas sensibles cada vez se integran más al diseño de los censos y así mejorar la calidad de los datos, aunque algunas pueden ser caras o complicadas de implementar para quienes no son expertos. Demostramos una estrategia directa y de bajo costo, el método del frijol, en el cual los respondientes proporcionan respuestas anónimas al añadir un frijol pintado dentro de un frasco y así indicar una respuesta de sí o no. Aplicamos el método del frijol para medir la cacería y el mercado de carne silvestre durante dos años dentro de un proyecto de conservación (reducción de la cacería) en el bosque Gola, Liberia. Extendimos la técnica para acomodar preguntas sobre la frecuencia de la caza y la venta de carne. Comparamos las respuestas dadas usando el método del frijol y aquellas dadas en el cuestionamiento directo a grupos que participaban o no en las intervenciones de conservación. Los resultados obtenidos con el método del frijol correspondieron a aquellos obtenidos con los cuestionamientos directos y no hubo indicación de cambios en la sensibilidad de las preguntas después de las intervenciones de conservación. Las estimaciones de ambos métodos indicaron que el mercado de carne silvestre disminuyó en los hogares participantes o no en el proyecto (de 36% a 20%) y que la cacería disminuyó en un grupo del proyecto (38% a 28%). En donde se dieron respuestas contradictorias (2‐6% de los respondientes), las diferencias fueron en ambas direcciones y en su mayoría probablemente eran atribuibles al error en la medición. El método del frijol fue rápido y directo para administrarlo en un ambiente de bajo alfabetismo. Mostramos cómo puede modificarse para respuestas con más de dos categorías y lo consideramos una herramienta valiosa que podría adaptarse para una gama amplia de escenarios de conservación.
摘要
保护主义者常常需要测量人类行为来指导决策及评估其影响。然而, 对人类行为的报告可能存在问题, 且报告的准确性可能会随着保护措施变化而变化, 以致难以确定明显的变化。设计调查时已越来越多地纳入了询问敏感问题的技巧, 以提高数据质量, 但对于非专业人士来说, 有些技巧可能成本过高或难以实现。本研究展示了一种简单、低成本的方法——bean方法, 在使用该方法时, 受访者只需向罐子中放入一个彩色的豆子 (bean) 来匿名地回答“是”或“否”。我们在利比里亚戈拉森林利用该方法调查了一个保护项目 (减少狩猎) 中人们对野味狩猎和交易的态度。我们通过扩展相应的方法, 将其应用于狩猎和野味交易频率的提问中, 并在曾经参与和没有参与保护干预的群体中, 比较了使用 bean 方法和直接询问获得的回答。使用 bean 方法的结果与直接询问的结果相互一致, 且在进行保护干预后, 问题敏感性没有明显变化。两种方法的估计结果均表明, 有无参与保护项目的家庭的野味交易都有所下降 (从 36% 减少到 20%), 另外, 保护项目的一个参与组还减少了狩猎 (从 38% 减少到 28%) 。当受访者给出不一致的答案时 (占受访者 2–6%), 差异存在于两个方向, 这最有可能是来自测量误差。 bean 方法在受访者的低文化水平背景下有助于快速而直接的实施调查。我们还展示了当答案超过两种类型时如何调整该方法。最后, 我们认为 bean 方法作为一项保护工具很有价值, 可以广泛适用于不同背景下的保护。【翻译: 胡怡思;审校: 聂永刚】