Technology has great potential to inform our understanding of the natural world at macro and micro-scales. I manage remote sensing projects that increase our knowledge of wildlife interactions with onshore and offshore wind turbines.

Hi, I'm Greg Forcey, wildlife biologist, data analyst, project manager, and Certified Wildlife Biologist® with Normandeau Associates, Inc, a private-sector environmental consulting firm.

Growing up in rural Pennsylvania, I had tremendous opportunities to spend time outside and connect with nature, which motivated me to pursue a career in the wildlife profession. My interest in computers and technology honed my wildlife interests in modeling, GIS, and remote sensing technology. I enjoy finding the best technology applications to understand wildlife behavior and spatial and temporal distributions.

Currently, my work involves managing and conducting wildlife studies at electric utility structures, including offshore and onshore wind turbines, transmission towers, distribution poles, and substations. This research aims to better understand interactions between birds and bats and utility structures to minimize displacement, collision, and electrocution impacts. I also enjoy data analytics, modeling, programming with R and Python, and automating as many repetitive tasks in my daily life as possible.

  • I believe there is always a solution to a problem or challenge.
  • Furthermore, I enjoy working in teams and using each person’s talents to solve a problem.
  • I listen more than I talk.

My background

  • I’ve worked in the wind and wildlife field since 2006, starting with bird and bat risk assessments and pre-construction monitoring for terrestrial wind projects.
  • In 2016, I began a transition to offshore wind projects and began working on remote sensing technology projects to facilitate wildlife sampling in the offshore environment.
  • I also build collision and electrocution risk models for government agencies and utilities. These models are used to prioritize siting strategies and retrofitting for optimal benefit.

Education

  • I completed my Ph.D. at North Dakota State University in 2006, studying landscape-level influences of land use and climate on spatial distributions of wetland birds.
  • My master’s work at West Virginia University evaluated two different double-observer point count approaches for counting birds.
  • I completed a B.S. in wildlife and fisheries science in 1996 from Penn State University.

What I’m working on now

  • I manage a remote sensing project at the Dominion Coastal Virginia Offshore Wind Project, where we utilize Acoustic and Thermographic Offshore Monitoring (ATOM) technology to monitor bird and bat activity in the rotor swept zone of the turbines.
  • I manage a smart curtailment study testing the efficacy of Turbine Integrated Mortality Reduction (TIMR) technology to curtail turbine operations when bats are present at a wind facility.
  • Last, I’m working on publishing previous work on an eagle electrocution model for a Florida utility.

Site purpose

This site serves as my personal blog, where I write about science, data analysis, scripting, and notable books I've read. I hope you enjoy the content, and I look forward to hearing from you. Please connect with me on social media or send me a message if you want to discuss more.