Supporting practitioners and decision makers in achieving more ecologically sustainable infrastructure development

该基金将帮助解决两项国家优先事项之间的持续冲突：对新基础设施的需求，以及保护受保护物种及其栖息地。改善国家基础设施是英国工业战略的五大支柱之一。除了大力加强交通网络和能源安全外，《国家基础设施交付计划》还包括大规模供应住房，目标是每年新建30万套住房。然而，包括生物多样性在内的自然资源的可持续管理，也是英国长期经济和社会福祉的基础。因此，确保建筑环境中预期增长的生态可持续性是一项紧迫的挑战。只有当NERC科学以合适的形式易于获取，并且伴随着用户和研究人员之间的双向对话时，它才能帮助应对这一挑战。该奖学金将帮助从业者和决策者更有效地了解和减轻重大基础设施发展对受保护野生动物和栖息地的影响。因此，它将使法定自然保育机构（sncb）以及其他利益相关者能够实现其既定的目标，即更具战略性的环境保护和更有力和透明的决策。我将以最终用户参与的非常成功的记录为基础，总结和传达有关主要基础设施生态影响的证据（例如Mathews等人，2015年；Fensome等人，2016年；Lintott等人，2016年）。我将与包括英国特许生态与环境管理学会和sncb在内的伙伴合作，制定新的良好实践指南。将与利益攸关方共同确定证据差距并确定其优先次序，并制定解决这些差距的战略。方法将包括对现有数据进行量身定制的分析，为新研究开发合作资助申请，以及改进工业使用的监测策略。例如，我的一名博士生即将被借调到自然英格兰的改革小组，探索如何使用新的建模方法来最大限度地减少建筑开发对更多马蹄蝠的影响。这包括将为这个物种建立的研究模型转移到一个新的、更大的地理区域。在这项研究中，我将评估和试验将这种方法推广到其他物种的可行性。我还将探讨如何将建模方法与利益相关者现有的计算和建模能力结合起来，使其在未来“内部”使用，而无需持续依赖学术合作伙伴的输入。为了响应用户的需求，并与Defra的战略目标（https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/defragroup-研究兴趣领域）保持一致，即“更有效地利用观察、数据和流程，以更好地了解决策中的风险、不确定性和复杂性”，我还将支持制定严格的生态监测和缓解计划。虽然开发地点的生态实地调查经常使用研究科学家开发的技术，但对统计原理和替代技术（例如理论建模、种群遗传学）的有限理解意味着许多计划目前面临法律挑战，因为它们要么在成本和时间方面不成比例，要么无法提供所需的证据。改进监测战略也将有助于填补本研究金确定的证据空白。

This Fellowship will help resolve ongoing conflicts between two national priorities: the need for new infrastructure, and the safeguarding of protected species and their habitats. Improving national infrastructure is one of the 5 key pillars of the UK's Industrial Strategy. Alongside major enhancements to the transport networks and energy security, the National Infrastructure Delivery Plan includes the large-scale supply of housing, with the ambition to build 300,000 new homes per year. Yet the sustainable management of natural resources, including biodiversity, is also fundamental to the UK's long-term economic and social well-being. Ensuring the ecological sustainability of projected growth in the built environment is, for this reason, a pressing challenge. NERC science can help to meet this challenge only if it is readily accessible, in suitable formats, and accompanied by two-way dialogue between users and researchers. This Fellowship will help practitioners and decision makers to understand and mitigate more effectively for the impacts of major infrastructure developments on protected wildlife and habitats. It will therefore allow the Statutory Nature Conservation Bodies (SNCBs), as well as other stakeholders, to achieve their stated objectives of more strategic environmental protection and more robust and transparent decision-making. I will build on a highly successful track record of end-user engagement to summarise and communicate evidence on the ecological impacts of major infrastructure (e.g. Mathews et al. 2015; Fensome et al. 2016; Lintott et al. 2016). Working with partners including the Chartered Institute of Ecology and Environmental Management and the SNCBs, I will develop new Good Practice Guidelines. Evidence gaps will be co-identified and prioritised with stakeholders, and strategies will be developed to address them. Approaches will include the tailored analysis of existing data, the development of collaborative grant applications for new research, and the improvement of monitoring strategies used by industry. For example, one of my PhD students is about to go on secondment to Natural England's Reform Team, exploring how new modelling approaches can be used to minimise the impacts of built developments on greater horseshoe bats. This involves transposing research models built for this species to a new, larger, geographical area. In this Fellowship, I will assess and pilot the feasibility of extending the approach to other species. I will also explore how the modelling approach could be aligned with stakeholder's existing computing and modelling capabilities, enabling its future use 'in house' without continual dependency on academic partner input. Responding to users' needs, and aligning with Defra's strategic aim (https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/defragroup- areas-of-research-interest) to "make more effective use of observations, data and processes to better understand risk, uncertainties and complexities in decision making", I will also support the development of rigorous ecological monitoring and mitigation schemes. Whilst ecological field surveys at development sites frequently utilise techniques developed by research scientists, limited understanding of statistical principles and of alternative techniques (e.g. theoretical modelling, population genetics) means that many schemes are currently open to legal challenge for being either disproportionate in terms of cost and time, or for failing to provide the required evidence. Improved monitoring strategies will also help to fill the evidence gaps identified in this Fellowship.