Talk

Science Seminar: Maryland’s Accounting for Ecosystem Services Framework

Thursday, Feb 2, 2017 - 11:00am - 12:00pm
Event Location
Schmidt Conference Center

Event Details

Summary:
Ecosystem services—the benefits people receive from the environment—vary across the landscape, both in supply (e.g. grams of carbon sequestered or cubic meters of runoff avoided) and in demand (the monetary value society places upon them). This talk will present results of modeled changes in stormwater runoff, groundwater recharge, air quality, wildlife habitat, soil erosion, carbon and nutrient sequestration across Maryland. It will also give numbers for the ecosystem services of oyster beds and submerged aquatic vegetation within the Chesapeake. Campbell and his colleagues estimated the financial values of various biophysical flows by observing cases where money has been exchanged for the work of the environment, termed “eco-prices.” They then used the ratios of energy to money to convert ecosystem services to dollars.

The methodology presented here has the advantages of considering both biophysical and monetary values, allowing for flexibility of the model, and suggests that ecosystem services are most  appropriately  valued according to societal, rather than individual, preference. Preliminary results show that the six ecosystems calculated for Maryland provide over $8 billion of benefits to residents every year. Broadly, the goal of this work is to have the value of natural lands incorporated in decisions made in Maryland affecting these lands. This would translate to ecosystem service value influencing the state land acquisition prioritization process, targeting of state restoration funds, and informing the local land-use planning process.