Supplementary disturbance figures for quantifying impacts of natural gas development on forests.

As energy demands continue to rise, energy production from sources
including natural gas is expected to rapidly accelerate in the coming
decades, potentially leading to substantial land-use changes. In the
Appalachian region of the United States, natural gas development often
occurs in forested areas, which can cause high levels of forest
disturbance and loss. Here, we use nationwide forest inventory and
remotely sensed data in a Bayesian model to quantify the impacts of
natural gas development at fine spatial resolutions between 2008-2021.
Based on well permit locations in the states of Ohio, Pennsylvania, and
West Virginia, the analysis quantifies disturbance area, forest carbon
loss, and opportunity cost with associated levels of uncertainty at the
pixel-level. Overall, we estimate 10,854 ha of forest land were disturbed,
resulting in 542,675 Mg ($\pm$ 4,275) of forest carbon loss. The
opportunity cost associated with these disturbances is estimated to be
575,246 Mg ($\pm$ 30,774). Pixel-level estimates are generated for
individual well sites, which can be aggregated to the county-level to
highlight regional patterns. Specifically, we observe greater levels of
disturbance in Northern West Virginia, while opportunity costs are
greatest for large forested counties in Northeastern Pennsylvania. This
study demonstrates the importance of quantifying balances and tradeoffs
between energy production and forest ecosystem services, and provides
important insights into the impacts of energy development on forest
carbon.