The Shannon-Wiener Index can help determine if supplementing a loss in biodiversity with a gain that is different is justifiable. Human development is without question altering the landscape and in turn altering where species diversity. Fragmentation by roads, properties, parking lots etc. is separating species making it harder and harder for complex communities. If a new development takes place, does it eliminate on the of the species occupying that area? If so, biodiversity offsetting should supplement the loss of that species with either an equal replacement or replacing the same species that was lost. More typically an equal, but not the same, supplement is put in place to keep the net biodiversity the same. This however is unjust. Not all amounts of species are equal. This is where measuring species evenness comes into play. Rather than just measuring species richness, how many different species are there, the measure of species evenness will show how close in numbers each species is.
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