Land use

The National Environmental Research Park (NERP) encourages the use of Hanford Site ecological habitats and facilities through graduate students from universities and colleges and for senior investigators with funding support from sources other than US DOE. Terrestrial ecology studies are mostly confined to the Arid Lands Ecology Reserve and are concerned with short and long-term impacts relating to energy technologies and perturbations of natural origin in shrub-steppe ecosystems. These projects provide the kind of ecological information needed to meet the intent of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) as well as advancing the state of ecological knowledge in the scientific community at large. Land restoration studies are aimed at testing alternative ways to successfully revegetate surface-mined lands in the most arid parts of the Western United States. Current research projects are discussed briefly