TY - JOUR
T1 - Evaluating the Return in Ecosystem Services from Investment in Public Land Acquisitions
AU - Kovacs, Kent
AU - Polasky, Stephen
AU - Nelson, Erik
AU - Keeler, Bonnie L
AU - Pennington, Derric
AU - Plantinga, Andrew J.
AU - Taff, Steven J
PY - 2013/6/11
Y1 - 2013/6/11
N2 - We evaluate the return on investment (ROI) from public land conservation in the state of Minnesota, USA. We use a spatially-explicit modeling tool, the Integrated Valuation of Ecosystem Services and Tradeoffs (InVEST), to estimate how changes in land use and land cover (LULC), including public land acquisitions for conservation, influence the joint provision and value of multiple ecosystem services. We calculate the ROI of a public conservation acquisition as the ratio of the present value of ecosystem services generated by the conservation to the cost of the conservation. For the land scenarios analyzed, carbon sequestration services generated the greatest benefits followed by water quality improvements and recreation opportunities. We found ROI values ranged from 0.21 to 5.28 depending on assumptions about future land use change, service values, and discount rate. Our study suggests conservation is a good investment as long as investments are targeted to areas with low land costs and high service values.
AB - We evaluate the return on investment (ROI) from public land conservation in the state of Minnesota, USA. We use a spatially-explicit modeling tool, the Integrated Valuation of Ecosystem Services and Tradeoffs (InVEST), to estimate how changes in land use and land cover (LULC), including public land acquisitions for conservation, influence the joint provision and value of multiple ecosystem services. We calculate the ROI of a public conservation acquisition as the ratio of the present value of ecosystem services generated by the conservation to the cost of the conservation. For the land scenarios analyzed, carbon sequestration services generated the greatest benefits followed by water quality improvements and recreation opportunities. We found ROI values ranged from 0.21 to 5.28 depending on assumptions about future land use change, service values, and discount rate. Our study suggests conservation is a good investment as long as investments are targeted to areas with low land costs and high service values.
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U2 - 10.1371/journal.pone.0062202
DO - 10.1371/journal.pone.0062202
M3 - Article
C2 - 23776429
AN - SCOPUS:84878946991
SN - 1932-6203
VL - 8
JO - PloS one
JF - PloS one
IS - 6
M1 - e62202
ER -