One of the theme areas monitored within the OSM program is terrestrial biodiversity, known programmatically as Terrestrial Biological Monitoring (TBM). Biodiversity refers to the diversity of wild species, habitats, and ecosystems. These biological resources provide incredible value, including cultural and spiritual, recreational, subsistence, and ecosystem services. A Hierarchical Before-After Dose-Response (BADR) study design was developed to provide an integrated, efficient framework
for the TBM program. The framework is used to address the following key questions in terrestrial ecosystems:
1. Have changes occurred?
2. To what degree are those changes attributable to oil sands activities?
3. What are the cumulative effects of oil sands stressors?
The BADR framework represents a major shift in how terrestrial ecosystems are monitored in the oil sands region and is directly y aligned with the conceptual model.
BADR is a monitoring design that measures changes in selected indicator groups and attributes those changes to oil sands activities using two monitoring approaches:
1. Before-After: Monitoring at different phases of oil sands development (currently developed, not yet developed, and reference)
2. Dose-Response: Monitoring along a gradient of current oil sands disturbance (high to low)
The combination of these two approaches forms the BADR design. By repeatedly surveying monitoring locations within this design over time, we will gain information on how biological systems are changing as oil sands activity changes.