skip to main content
US FlagAn official website of the United States government
dot gov icon
Official websites use .gov
A .gov website belongs to an official government organization in the United States.
https lock icon
Secure .gov websites use HTTPS
A lock ( lock ) or https:// means you've safely connected to the .gov website. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites.

Explore Research Products in the PAR
It may take a few hours for recently added research products to appear in PAR search results.


  • NSF Public Access
  • Search Results
  • An ecosystem-based natural capital evaluation framework that combines environmental and socio-economic implications of offshore renewable energy developments
Title: An ecosystem-based natural capital evaluation framework that combines environmental and socio-economic implications of offshore renewable energy developments
Abstract There is about to be an abrupt step-change in the use of coastal seas around the globe, specifically by the addition of large-scale offshore renewable energy (ORE) developments to combat climate change. Developing this sustainable energy supply will require trade-offs between both direct and indirect environmental effects, as well as spatial conflicts with marine uses like shipping, fishing, and recreation. However, the nexus between drivers, such as changes in the bio-physical environment from the introduction of structures and extraction of energy, and the consequent impacts on ecosystem services delivery and natural capital assets is poorly understood and rarely considered through a whole ecosystem perspective. Future marine planning needs to assess these changes as part of national policy level assessments but also to inform practitioners about the benefits and trade-offs between different uses of natural resources when making decisions to balance environmental and energy sustainability and socio-economic impacts. To address this shortfall, we propose an ecosystem-based natural capital evaluation framework that builds on a dynamic Bayesian modelling approach which accounts for the multiplicity of interactions between physical (e.g. bottom temperature), biological (e.g. net primary production) indicators and anthropogenic marine use (i.e. fishing) and their changes across space and over time. The proposed assessment framework measures ecosystem change, changes in ecosystem goods and services and changes in socio-economic value in response to ORE deployment scenarios as well as climate change, to provide objective information for decision processes seeking to integrate new uses into our marine ecosystems. Such a framework has the potential of exploring the likely outcomes in the same metrics (both ecological and socio-economic) from alternative management and climate scenarios, such that objective judgements and decisions can be made, as to how to balance the benefits and trade-offs between a range of marine uses to deliver long-term environmental sustainability, economic benefits, and social welfare.  more » « less
Award ID(s):
2137701
PAR ID:
10357324
Author(s) / Creator(s):
; ; ; ;
Date Published:
Journal Name:
Progress in Energy
Volume:
4
Issue:
3
ISSN:
2516-1083
Page Range / eLocation ID:
032005
Format(s):
Medium: X
Sponsoring Org:
National Science Foundation
More Like this
  1. ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; et al (, Environmental Research Letters)
    Abstract The Amazon biome is being pushed by unsustainable economic drivers towards an ecological tipping point where restoration to its previous state may no longer be possible. This degradation is the result of self-reinforcing interactions between deforestation, climate change and fire. We assess the economic, natural capital and ecosystem services impacts and trade-offs of scenarios representing movement towards an Amazon tipping point and strategies to avert one using the Integrated Economic-Environmental Modeling (IEEM) Platform linked with spatial land use-land cover change and ecosystem services modeling (IEEM + ESM). Our approach provides the first approximation of the economic, natural capital and ecosystem services impacts of a tipping point, and evidence to build the economic case for strategies to avert it. For the five Amazon focal countries, namely, Brazil, Peru, Colombia, Bolivia and Ecuador, we find that a tipping point would create economic losses of US$256.6 billion in cumulative gross domestic product by 2050. Policies that would contribute to averting a tipping point, including strongly reducing deforestation, investing in intensifying agriculture in cleared lands, climate-adapted agriculture and improving fire management, would generate approximately US$339.3 billion in additional wealth and a return on investment of US$29.5 billion. Quantifying the costs, benefits and trade-offs of policies to avert a tipping point in a transparent and replicable manner can support the design of regional development strategies for the Amazon biome, build the business case for action and catalyze global cooperation and financing to enable policy implementation. 
    more » « less
  2. ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; (, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences)
    Sustainable development requires jointly achieving economic development to raise standards of living and environmental sustainability to secure these gains for the long run. Here, we develop a local-to-global, and global-to-local, earth-economy model that integrates the Global Trade Analysis Project (GTAP)-computable general equilibrium model of the economy with the Integrated Valuation of Ecosystem Services and Tradeoffs (InVEST) model of fine-scale, spatially explicit ecosystem services. The integrated model, GTAP–InVEST, jointly determines land use, environmental conditions, ecosystem services, market prices, supply and demand across economic sectors, trade across regions, and aggregate performance metrics like GDP. We use the integrated model to analyze the contribution of investing in nature for economic prosperity, accounting for the impact of four important ecosystem services (pollination, timber provision, marine fisheries, and carbon sequestration). We show that investments in nature result in large improvements relative to a business-as-usual path, accruing annual gains of $100 to $350 billion (2014 USD) with the largest percentage gains in the lowest-income countries. Our estimates include only a small subset of ecosystem services and could be far higher with inclusion of more ecosystem services, incorporation of ecological tipping points, and reduction in substitutability that limits economic adjustments to declines in natural capital. Our analysis highlights the need for improved environmental–economic modeling and the vital importance of integrating environmental information firmly into economic analysis and policy. The benefits of doing so are potentially very large, with the greatest percentage benefits accruing to inhabitants of the poorest countries. 
    more » « less
  3. ; ; ; ; ; ; (, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences)
    null (Ed.)
    Sustainable development (SD) policies targeting marine economic sectors, designed to alleviate poverty and conserve marine ecosystems, have proliferated in recent years. Many developing countries are providing poor fishing households with new fishing boats (fishing capital) that can be used further offshore as a means to improve incomes and relieve fishing pressure on nearshore fish stocks. These kinds of policies are a marine variant of traditional SD policies focused on agriculture. Here, we evaluate ex ante economic and environmental impacts of provisions of fishing and agricultural capital, with and without enforcement of fishing regulations that prohibit the use of larger vessels in nearshore habitats. Combining methods from development economics, natural resource economics, and marine ecology, we use a unique dataset and modeling framework to account for linkages between households, business sectors, markets, and local fish stocks. We show that the policies investing capital in local marine fisheries or agricultural sectors achieve income gains for targeted households, but knock-on effects lead to increased harvest of nearshore fish, making them unlikely to achieve conservation objectives in rural coastal economies. However, pairing an agriculture stimulus with increasing enforcement of existing fisheries’ regulations may lead to a win–win situation. While marine-based policies could be an important tool to achieve two of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (alleviate poverty and protect vulnerable marine resources), their success is by no means assured and requires consideration of land and marine socioeconomic linkages inherent in rural economies. 
    more » « less
  4. ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; et al (, Oceanography)
    Addressing global challenges such as climate change requires large-scale collective actions, but such actions are hindered by the complexity and scale of the problem and the uncertainty in the long-term benefit of short-term actions (Jagers et al., 2019). In addition to climate change, socio-ecological systems face the cumulative pressures associated with resource needs, technology development, industrial expansion, and area conflicts. In marine systems, this has been called “the blue acceleration” (Jouffray et al., 2020) and is referred to as “socio-ecological pressures” in this paper. These socio-ecological pressures reduce our ability to reach the UN Sustainable Development Goals and meet the challenges of the UN Ocean Decade, and require integrating knowledge within a shared conceptual framework. For example, achieving sustainable growth must integrate ecological, socioeconomic, and governance perspectives on a larger scale by considering ecological impacts, ecosystem carrying capacities, economic trade-offs, social acceptability, and policy realities. This requires capacity development whereby actors unite to bridge disciplinary boundaries to meet challenges of complex systems. 
    more » « less
  5. ; ; ; ; (, Marine Ecology Progress Series)
    Phenological shifts have been observed among marine species due to climate change. Modeling changes in fish spawning aggregations (FSAs) under climate change can be useful for adaptive management, because it can allow managers to adjust conservation strategies in the context of specific life history and phenological responses. We modeled effects of climate change on the distribution and phenology of Caribbean FSAs, examining 4 snapper and 4 grouper species. An ecological niche model was used to link FSAs with environmental conditions from remote sensing and project FSA distribution and seasonality under RCP8.5. We found significant differences between groupers and snappers in response to warming. While there was variation among species, groupers experienced slight delays in spawning season, a greater loss of suitable ocean habitat (average loss: 72.75%), and poleward shifts in FSA distribution. Snappers had larger shifts towards earlier phenology, with a smaller loss of suitable ocean habitat (average loss: 24.25%), excluding gray snapper, which gained habitat. Snappers exhibited interspecific variability in latitudinal distribution shifts. Snapper FSAs appeared more resilient to climate change and occupy wider and warmer spawning temperature ranges, while groupers prefer cooler spawning seasons. Consequently, groupers may lose more suitable ocean spawning habitat sooner due to climate change. When comparing species, there were trade-offs among climate change responses in terms of distribution shifts, phenology changes, and declines in habitat suitability. Understanding such trade-offs can help managers prioritize marine protected area locations and determine the optimal timing of seasonal fishing restrictions to protect FSAs vulnerable to fishing pressure in a changing climate. 
    more » « less
  • Citation Formats
  • MLA
  • APA
  • Chicago
  • BibTeX
  • Save / Share this Record
  • Send to Email