Identifying priority ecosystem services in tidal wetland restoration.

Classification systems can be an important tool for identifying and quantifying the importance of relationships, assessing spatial patterns in a standardized way, and forecasting alternative decision scenarios to characterize the potential benefits (e.g., ecosystem services) from ecosystem restoration that improve human health and well-being.

Connecting stakeholder priorities and desired environmental attributes for wetland restoration using ecosystem services and a heat map analysis for communications.

Framing ecological restoration and monitoring goals from a human benefits perspective (i.e., ecosystem services) can help inform restoration planners, surrounding communities, and relevant stakeholders about the direct benefits they may obtain from a specific restoration project.

Ecosystem Services Profiles for Communities Benefitting from Estuarine Habitats along the Massachusetts Coast, USA.

The Massachusetts Bays National Estuary Partnership is one of 28 programs in the United States Environmental Protection Agency's National Estuary Program (NEP) charged with developing and implementing comprehensive plans for protecting and restoring the biological integrity and beneficial uses of their estuarine systems. The Partnership has recently updated their comprehensive management plan to include restoration targets for coastal habitats, and as part of this effort, the program explored how to better demonstrate that recovery of ecological integrity of degraded ecosystems also provides ecosystem services that humans want and need. An essential step was to identify key stakeholders and understand the benefits important to them.

Synthesis of Two Decades of US EPA's Ecosystem Services Research to Inform Environmental, Community, and Sustainability Decision Making.

A conceptual framework is helpful to understand what types of ecosystem services (ES) information is needed to support decision making. Principles of structured decision making are helpful for articulating how ES consideration can influence different elements in a given decision context resulting in changes to the environment, human health, and well-being. This article presents a holistic view of an ES framework, summarizing two decades of the US EPA's ES research, including recent advances in ES, those ES that provide benefits directly to people.

The ecosystem service of property protection and exposure to environmental stressors in the Gulf of Mexico.

Environmental stressors such as sea-level rise, erosion, and increased storm frequency and intensity are exposing coastal properties to greater amounts of damage. Coastal habitats like beaches, dunes, seagrasses, and wetlands can help reduce exposure and property damage. Using InVEST's Coastal Vulnerability Model, an exposure index value was calculated for every 250 m2 segment along the coastline in Escambia and Santa Rosa counties in Florida, USA.