Recent large-scale renewable energy projects, such as the Luzia Solar and Chafariz Wind energy plants in Santa Luzia, Paraíba, Brazil, raised environmental concerns due to their impact on vegetation cover and landscape structure. This study used geospatial technologies to evaluate changes in tree cover and landscape configuration resulting from the installation of these projects. Sentinel-2 imagery processed in Google Earth Engine generated NDVI, SAVI, NDWIveg, and LAI vegetation index data for the dry and rainy seasons of the six years between 2019 and 2024. With these vegetation index values and considering MapBiomas (version 8.0) and FRAGSTATS software (version 4.2), we analyzed the changes in land use and vegetation cover of Santa Luzia municipality during this six-year period. Land use and vegetation cover remained stable from 2019 to 2020 (before the installation of the energy plants), characterized by an NDVI value of 0.60, while tree cover decreased in the following four years, during or after the installation of the energy plants, as indicated by the consistent decreases in NDVI and NDWIveg values. Grassland class areas declined from 41.80% (18,434.59 ha) in 2019, to 34.36% (15,151.22 ha) in 2023, while non-vegetated areas increased by 148%. Landscape metrics showed increased fragmentation, with patch density rising from 3.31 to 3.88 patches/100 ha and core area decreasing from 3045.60 ha to 1395.01 ha. These data demonstrated measurable ecological impacts linked to the infra-structure built to run the two solar and wind energy plants in the semi-arid region of Santa Luzia, Paraíba, Brazil.
Canata et al. (2026) studied this question.