Balancing Ecosystem Values: Innovative Experiments for Sustainable Forestry is a compendium of more than 40 contributions from Asia, Europe, and North America. The theme encompasses experiments implemented at an operational scale to test ecological, social, or economic responses to silvicultural treatments designed to balance the complex set of objectives currently targeted in sustainable forest management. Several invited and plenary papers emphasize the variety of outcomes demanded by the public, as well as the essential role that these long-term studies will play in allowing natural resource managers to make better-informed, science-based decisions. A broad spectrum of silvicultural treatments and systems are covered, as are simulation runs with different types of models and discussion about design challenges for scaling up from stands to landscapes. Diverse forest ecosystems, stand structures and plant, animal, and fungal species are also considered. The conference included 2 days in the field where participants saw several types of the comprehensive field experiments firsthand. The conference concluded with a critique from state, private, and public land managers.

The Western Riverside County Multiple Species Habitat Conservation Plan mitigates development effects on 146 plant and animal species by establishing a 500,000-acre conservation reserve. This monograph examines land-acquisition strategies and costs, revenue adequacy and potential new funding sources, the plan's habitat-conservation goals, and whether the plan has streamlined transportation and development permitting processes.

‘Environmental Problem-Solving' presents short excerpts from carefully selected readings, expert commentaries on those readings, assignments, and the best MIT student responses to the assignments and exam questions with excellent student response. The book presents four main models of environmental policy-making: competing theories of environmental ethics; tools for environmental assessment and environmental decision-making; and techniques for public engagement and group decision-making. The book covers the material presented in the semester-long course required of all students enrolled in MIT’s Environmental Policy and Planning Specialization.

Balancing Ecosystem Values: Innovative Experiments for Sustainable Forestry is a compendium of more than 40 contributions from Asia, Europe, and North America. The theme encompasses experiments implemented at an operational scale to test ecological, social, or economic responses to silvicultural treatments designed to balance the complex set of objectives currently targeted in sustainable forest management. Several invited and plenary papers emphasize the variety of outcomes demanded by the public, as well as the essential role that these long-term studies will play in allowing natural resource managers to make better-informed, science-based decisions. A broad spectrum of silvicultural treatments and systems are covered, as are simulation runs with different types of models and discussion about design challenges for scaling up from stands to landscapes. Diverse forest ecosystems, stand structures and plant, animal, and fungal species are also considered. The conference included 2 days in the field where participants saw several types of the comprehensive field experiments firsthand. The conference concluded with a critique from state, private, and public land managers.

The competition for groundwater sources as a water supply reinforces the need for a strong economic rationale in decision-making. Evaluating economic decisions in the context of total water management and life-cycle water use is essential to making critical development and remediation choices. This revised volume provides fundamental economic and policy concepts related to groundwater, discusses important factors in life-cycle cost-benefit evaluation and explains triple-bottom-line analysis for different groundwater projects. It includes new and updated case studies on groundwater issues with solutions for a range of situations based on economic data. FEATURES OF THIS VOLUME Provides an understanding for the fundamental economic approaches to groundwater policy and project evaluation Incorporates life-cycle cost-benefit approaches in a triple-bottom-line framework Includes new case studies on the economics of health protection, managed aquifer recharge, local versus regional supply and strategic life-cycle analysis Addresses local and regional groundwater economic choices through a series of practical applications Explores transboundary, international, climate change and macroeconomic factors influencing groundwater project and program decisions Cost-Benefit Analysis of Groundwater Policy and Projects, with Case Studies, Second Edition, the second volume of the two-volume set Groundwater Economics, is a must-have for any professional or student who needs to understand and evaluate water resources and manage their use from a variety of sustainable approaches.

This book sets out the building blocks of an economic approach to biodiversity, and in particular brings together conceptual and empirical work on valuation, international agreements, the policy instruments, and the institutions. The objective is to provide a comprehensive overview of the issues and evidence, and to suggest how this very urgent problem should be addressed. Whilst there has been an enormous growth and research focus on climate change, less attention has been paid to biodiversity. This collection of high-quality chapters addresses the economic issues involved in biodiversity protection. This book focuses on the economics, but incorporates the underpinning science and philosophy, combining the application of a number of theoretical ideas with a series of policy cases. The authors are drawn from leading scholars in their specific areas of economics, philosophy, and conservation biology.

The ecosystem approach embodies a concept of the environment which emphasizes the integrated components of nature as complex adaptive systems. This book examines the relationship between the architecture and design of environmental law and the implementation of the ecosystem approach as a means to maintain ecological integrity. The main issue addressed is: in which manner and to what extent does fragmentation and administrative discretion in environmental law impede the implementation of an ecosystem approach? This is explored through analysis of several questions: what is an ecosystem approach and how could it be implemented; how can economic evaluation of ecosystem services contribute to the debate; to what extent is environmental law fragmented and how does this affect the implementation of the ecosystem approach; to what extent does environmental law contain administrative discretion and how does this affect the implementation of the ecosystem approach; is there a need for greater consistency, coherence and a stronger rule of law in environmental law in light of the ecosystem approach? The main focus is on Europe, with additional international comparisons where appropriate. The book concludes by providing a normative portrayal of future environmental law as protective, systemic and predictable.

This collection offers a sympathetic but critical perspective on contemporary ecological political theory, and gives proposals for a reorientation of some of its key aspects.

Includes a new chaper on sustainable groundwater management and all chapters are updated with a focus on sustainability Comprehensively explains the economic value of groundwater for sustainable use and needs, with practical examples Includes 13 new and updated case studies on economics of groundwater data for decisionmaking Addresses local and regional groundwater economic choices through a series of applications at an international level Written for professionals who need to understand and evaluate water resources and manage their use from a variety of sustainable approches