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Based on work by the Federal Agency for Nature Conservation (BfN) on the effectiveness of measures to ensure continuous ecological functionality (CEF) (RUNGE et al. 2010), the Ministry for Environment of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) has initiated the development of a guideline on the “ Effectiveness of species conservation measures for the consideration of measures required under species protection law in North Rhine-Westphalia" (MKULNV & FÖA 2013). This serves to standardise the assessment of the species-specific suitability and effectiveness of CEF measures for a large part of planning-relevant species in NRW. Since there was still need to supplement requirements for evidence of the effectiveness of measures initiated under species protection law and concerning consistent design of risk management for these measures, this guideline has been supplemented by a “Manual of Methods for Species Protection Assessments in North Rhine-Westphalia – Survey and Monitoring" (MKULNV & FÖA 2017). Regarding the legal framework, standards developed in the two guidelines for NRW will be presented. Questions being addressed include which species conservation measures require monitoring, as well as how the selection of methods and the procedure can be standardised in practice. The methodology, criteria and results can essentially be transferred to other German federal states – provided that respective (state-specific) particularities are considered and the corresponding assessment is adjusted if deemed necessary. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Within an appropriate assessment, the treatment of typical species of habitat types protected under Annex I of the Habitats Directive has received little attention so far. Due to this, the state of North Rhine-Westphalia developed the guideline “Consideration of natural habitats and their typical species during the appropriate assessment in North Rhine-Westphalia", which is described in this document. The paper describes the approach for the selection of typical species for the 44 habitat types occurring in North Rhine-Westphalia. With regard to the so far enclosed dispensation of justice, the selection of typical species in consideration of various criteria (core area of occurrence, degree of bond, and function as habitat/structure creator) was conducted. Within the appropriate assessment, only those typical species of the group with assigned habitat type should be regarded that occur within the Natura 2000 site and that show sensitivity towards the construction- relevant impacts. Furthermore, a method for assessing significant impacts on the habitat types as a consequence of the impairment of the typical species is proposed and tools developed in this context are explained. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Expert reports, presented as part of the permit application, should consider bat protection issues during the planning process of a wind power project. Therefore, several German states agreed on methodological guidelines. However, it is unknown to what extent these guidelines have been applied so far. The study compares the quality of 156 expert reports on bats from six German federal states based on a minimum standard instruction extracted from all guidelines. Is was investigated whether or not the existence of a methodological instruction influenced the quality of expert reports, and how far their quality depended on regional factors (or the federal state) and the year of conduction. On average, expert reports have met 78 % (ranging between 19 and 96 %) of the methodological requirements. However, significant differences in quality between reports from different federal states became obvious. In particular the evaluation of the conflicts showed a high variation. Whilst the results revealed a positive effect of the methodological guidelines on the quality of the reports in general, an improvement of their quality between 2005 and 2013 cannot be confirmed. An average degree of compliance of 80% of the criteria is not acceptable, with particular deficits in the evaluation of conflicts. In conclusion, the study requires an urgent revision of methodological standards, quality management and quality assurance of bat expert reports. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The German Environmental Damage Prevention and Remediation Act regulates the liability of damages of species and habitats protected under European Law. Such a "damage of biodiversity" includes each alteration of the respective species and habitats which has "significant negative effects on the restoration or maintenance of a favourable conservation status of these habitats or species". The enforcement of the Environmental Damage Act requires methods and scales for the evaluation of the significance of damaging events. The valuation standards to be applied in the method proposed have to be brought into line with the scales of the European protection of species and habitats and in this context contribute to a harmonization of the checking tools according to European nature conservation legislation. The scales are embedded in a pragmatic series of checking steps derived from the legal specifications of the Environmental Damage Act. The testing starts with a checking of those aspects which help to exclude the existence of a damage of biodiversity rather simply. Only if a serious damage can obviously not be excluded the significance of damages has to be analyzed in the course of a more detailed investigation and specific scales of significance have to be applied. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]