Renewable energy infrastructure impacts biodiversity beyond the area it occupies

Dunnett et al. (1) conclude that current and predicted priority areas for wind and solar energy development (renewable energy areas, REA) overlap minimally with important conservation areas (PA) in some regions of the globe. Their analysis assumes that land is a limiting resource to be shared among sustainability goals and focuses on area overlap between goals to assess their potential conflicts. However, conflicts may arise from impacts of infrastructure beyond their spatial delimitation. We add to their study (1) by highlighting that measures of area overlap are insufficient to encompass how complex social–ecological systems are affected by industrial activity. The area infrastructure occupies does not say everything about its impacts—which may be indirect, accumulate, and affect larger areas. Here, we distinguish direct effects of infrastructure (habitat removal, as considered by Dunnett et al. (1)) from impacts, understood as functional responses of species, ecosystems, or human communities (2). In many ecosystems, the zone of influence (ZoI) of infrastructure extrapolates the occupied area and extends over several kilometers (3, 4). For example, roads modify small areas, yet