Entry Points for Considering Ecosystem Services within Infrastructure Planning: How to Integrate Conservation with Development in Order to Aid Them Both

Abstract

KeywordsEnvironmental impact assessment; infrastructure investments; landscape-scale development planning; multilateral development bank; natural capital; road development strategic environmental assessment. Correspondence AbstractNew infrastructure is needed globally to support economic development and improve human well-being. Investments that do not consider ecosystem services (ES) can eliminate these important societal benefits from nature, undermining the development benefits infrastructure is intended to provide. Such tradeoffs are acknowledged conceptually but in practice have rarely been considered in infrastructure planning. Taking road investments as one important case, here we examine where and what forms of ES information have the potential to meaningfully influence decisions by multilateral development banks (MDBs). Across the stages of a typical road development process, we identify where and how ES information could be integrated, likely barriers to the use of available ES information, and key opportunities to shift incentives and thereby practice. We believe inclusion of ES information is likely to provide the greatest development benefit in early stages of infrastructure decisions. Those strategic planning stages are typically guided by in-country processes, with MDBs playing a supporting role, making it critical to express the ES consequences of infrastructure development using metrics relevant to government decision makers. This approach requires additional evidence of the in-country benefits of cross-sector strategic planning and more tools to lower barriers to quantifying these benefits and facilitating ES inclusion.

Optimizing the positioning of wildlife crossing structures using GPS telemetry

“…The increased pace of land-use change and ecosystem degradation poses serious threats to wildlife (Cardinale et al, 2012), demanding novel mitigation approaches. Solutions to mitigate landuse change are chronically underfunded (Lindsey, Balme, Funston, Henschel, & Hunter, 2016;Miller, 2014), requiring smart planning to maximize impact from limited resources (Kiesecker, Copeland, Pocewicz, & McKenney, 2010;Mandle et al, 2016). Decades of large mammal research have generated valuable data that can be applied to such tasks.…”

Aging infrastructure creates opportunities for cost‐efficient restoration of aquatic ecosystem connectivity

“…, Mandle et al. ). In industrialized nations of North America, Europe, and Australasia, however, nearly all infrastructure spending supports the maintenance and occasional decommissioning of existing structures (Doyle et al.…”

“…The prevalence of each type of opportunity varies geographically. In developing nations, most infrastructure spending supports new construction, and hence, conservation opportunities will be associated with designing projects to minimize their impacts (Dulac 2013, Laurance et al 2014, Mandle et al 2016. In industrialized nations of North America, Europe, and Australasia, however, nearly all infrastructure spending supports the maintenance and occasional decommissioning of existing structures (Doyle et al 2008, Doyle andHavlick 2009).…”

Quantifying the conservation gains from shared access to linear infrastructure

“…We sought to determine the potential for infrastructure sharing to improve biodiversity outcomes from a set of potential development scenarios that span a range of realistic scenarios. Although proposed development projects should be evaluated in light of multiple criteria (e.g., economic, social, and environmental) (Mandle et al 2016), we focused on construction costs and biodiversity impacts. We then considered discussions in the literature on barriers to infrastructure sharing by mining companies and the potential implications for efforts to facilitate collaboration in light of these barriers.…”