The Department of Defense’s (DOD) ability to conduct realistic live-fire training, weapons system testing, and essential operations is vital to preparing a more lethal and resilient combat force. To meet these training needs, warfighters rely on unencumbered access to open lands and ranges that contain a variety of environments and replicate the operational environment in which they may fight.

DOD manages and maintains nearly 27 million acres of land, water, and airspace across the United States and its territories, which aims to support mission-related activities and further the national defense strategy. Realistic environments are essential to field testing new technologies and for the military to train, which requires access to deserts, grasslands, rainforests, tundra permafrost, coastlines, and other ecosystems. Training and testing in varied ecosystems prepare our warfighters for any challenges they may face while conducting global operations. DOD’s Natural Resources (NR) Program ensures no net loss in the ability of these military installation lands and waters to sustain a combat-ready and lethal military force.

DOD’s NR Program provides guidance and tools for managing and protecting irreplaceable testing and training ranges, operating areas, and the mission-critical natural resources that sustain our force and national defense. Aligned under the Office of the Secretary of Defense, the NR Program provides DOD Components with the policy, guidance, oversight, and resources needed to implement their natural resources programs to support the military mission in compliance with all federal environmental laws and requirements, such as the Sikes Act, Executive Orders, and Presidential memoranda.

Managing for Mission Readiness

DOD’s NR Program aims to maintain mission readiness and guarantee continued access to all DOD lands, waters, and airspace to perform mission activities by safeguarding natural ecosystems critical to the Department and ensuring their long-term viability. The NR program ensures mission-resilient lands by addressing threats to mission operations and military infrastructure from encroachment, wildland fire, invasive species, and weather-related hazards such as flood and drought.

To achieve these goals, installation natural resource managers focus on ecosystem management that provides high-quality landscapes for warfighters to train and test new technologies and systems, work to reduce legal and environmental encumbrances that may restrict the military mission, and mitigate threats to installations from natural hazards. Ecosystem management sustains and enhances mission-essential lands and helps the Department avoid or minimize impacts to its mission, such as damages to mission-critical infrastructure and training delays from wildfires, the inability of lands to support training due to the spread of invasive species, and encroachment from development.

Managing these natural resources allows troops to train in the conditions they will fight by providing natural environments to test and hone their skills, resulting in a more combat-ready force. These natural environments serve the military mission while preserving natural spaces for future DOD mission needs and supporting wildlife.

Planning and Executing for Success – Integrated Natural Resources Management Plans

Section 670a(b)(1)(I) of the Sikes Act requires the Secretary of Defense to carry out Natural Resources programs to ensure no net loss in military installation capabilities and to maintain or improve their resilience through the implementation of Integrated Natural Resources Management Plans (INRMPs).

For installations with “significant natural resources,” INRMPs are the blueprint to outline specific strategies and approaches that support each installation’s mission through natural resources management, stewardship, and conservation. INRMPs are living documents that guide daily natural resources management activities and require a comprehensive approach to ensure mission access across the landscape or ecosystem. INRMPs are coordinated and developed with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and State Fish and Wildlife agencies, including partners like NRI.

Of the Department’s 550 installations, 364 of them require INRMPs, including:

Mission Partnerships

To further the national defense mission, the DOD works with Federal, state, and local partners like NRI and the Southeast Regional Partnership for Planning and Sustainability (SERPPAS) to protect strategic defense priorities, promote flexibility and certainty for the DOD to execute its mission, and support partner missions.

Another example is the Recovery and Sustainment Partnership Initiative (RASP), established in 2018 and affirmed in 2024. This initiative builds on years of collaboration between the DOD and the Department of the Interior (DOI). RASP focuses on reducing and alleviating Endangered Species Act (ESA) regulatory constraints on DOD lands while contributing to species recovery. 

Through partnerships like RASP, DOD and DOI develop solutions that support military readiness by exploring innovative ESA approaches that provide greater flexibility for military installations to conduct their missions, streamline regulatory processes, and ensure resources are used efficiently and effectively to produce outcomes that will support DOD’s mission, landscapes, and decision space in the future. 

SERPPAS Southeast Regional Partnership for Planning and Sustainability is a unique partnership among leaders from the Department of Defense, the military services, and the federal natural resource, wildlife, ocean, and working lands agencies in the Southeast. serppas.org

 

 

 

 

ALRI America's Longleaf Restoration Initiative, a SERPPAS partner, focuses on functional, viable longleaf pine ecosystems. americaslongleaf.org

 

SASMI The South Atlantic Salt Marsh Initiative is a regional effort to determine the greatest threats to the salt marsh ecosystem and opportunities to ensure its survival. marshforward.org