Abstract
Rapid renewable energy development is vital for tackling the climate crisis. Wind farms play a key role but raise conservation concerns for birds due to collision with turbines and avoidance or loss of valuable habitats. Siting turbines away from important areas for vulnerable bird species would reduce the impacts on biodiversity while still generating electricity. Sensitivity mapping provides a robust way to choose candidate sites for development at a landscape scale, which complements but should not replace site-specific environmental impact assessments. Here, we mapped avian sensitivity to onshore wind energy development that prioritises species based on risk of collision with wind turbines and displacement, and conservation status. Our method then integrates species' ranges, area of habitat maps, national bird surveys and citizen science data to estimate species distributions. We applied this approach to Italy and Poland, two European countries with different biodiversity, habitats and avian communities that have committed to targets on renewable energy production and biodiversity conservation. Our maps show that both countries have areas of higher and lower avian sensitivity and that there are opportunities to place wind developments away from the most sensitive areas for birds. The areas of higher sensitivity align well with the existing protected area network, but our maps reveal very highly sensitive areas outside of protected areas, where development should also be avoided. Sensitivity maps can be used by governments, NGOs, funders, and industry to ensure biodiversity is considered in spatial planning at national and regional levels.