Answer To Saving The Sage Grouse Could Be In The Wind

A chicken-sized game bird native to western sagebrush has become the focus of the biggest conservation project in U.S. history.

This week, the U.S. Department of the Interior announced management plans for the greater sage grouse across federal public lands in 10 Western states. It’s part of an effort to keep the bird off the endangered species list, one that has become a complex balancing act between saving critical ecosystems and protecting the region’s key industries.

Biologists list energy development as one of the primary threats to the sage grouse, and as Dan Boyce with Inside Energy reports, the biggest threat comes from a source thought of as one of the greenest: wind power.