REFORM - WP5

Risks and Uncertainty in River Rehabilitation

tom.buijse@deltares.nl — Fri, 04 Dec 2015 11:50:03 +0000

Analyses of costs and benefits require the prediction of the effects of restoration measures and the quantification of societal values. Both of these estimates are uncertain. In this report, some of the key issues related to the assessment, description and quantification of uncertainty are discussed and guidelines are provided for considering uncertainty.

This report provides a brief overview on the representation and quantification of uncertainty in scientific prediction followed by examples of typical risks associated with river restoration that could lead to unintended, adverse effects and in more detail, how uncertainty can be considered in CEA/CBA and in MCDA.

There are two important sources of uncertainty to consider in environmental management in general, and in particular for river restoration:

Uncertainty about scientific predictions of outcomes.

Depending on alternatives, this requires prediction and uncertainty estimation of the behavior of a natural system, natural-technical system, or even of a combined natural-technical-socio-economic system (e.g. in case of measures that include incentives to some of the affected stakeholders). In particular, one has to consider the potential for adverse outcomes as discussed in chapter 3.

Uncertainty about the preferences of the society elicited from inquiries or stakeholders.

In addition to the difficulties of the stakeholders to be aware of their own preferences and to be able to quantify them, this also includes their risk attitude (how uncertainty about the outcomes affects their preferences).

Policy recommendations:

Communication of uncertainty is a key element of any communication of scientific predictions. Visualization of uncertainty ranges can support this task. Lack of communication of scientific uncertainty in the past led to a reduction of trust of stakeholders to scientists.
Clearly separating scientific predictions and societal valuations is an essential element of any decision support procedure. Uncertainties in both elements should be clearly communicated separately. In particular if there are disagreements among experts about scientific predictions and of stakeholder groups about preferences.
Uncertainty about scientific predictions can be addressed by probability distributions and scenarios; uncertainty about societal preferences are often better addressed by sensitivity analysesof the ranking of the alternatives resulting from combining predictions of the outcomes of decision alternatives with preferences.

5.4 Risks and Uncertainty in River Rehabilitation - FINAL.pdf

Work packages:

Deliverables:

D5.4 Risks and uncertainty of different restoration strategies and options analysis

Document type:

Report

File status:

Final

Policy Brief:

Effects of climate and land use changes on river ecosystems and restoration practices

tom.buijse@deltares.nl — Fri, 04 Dec 2015 11:30:38 +0000

Rivers are highly complex ecosystems with interrelated processes between physical, chemical and biological components. River restoration efforts are put in place to overcome pressures from the development sector to improve river process and function, nevertheless, river restoration tends to encounter obstacles as a result of these societal demands. To stop restoration projects falling short of their objectives, there is a need to demonstrate and predict the effects of human activities on these components spatially and temporally.

The overall aim of this document is to provide guidance and tools for river managers to analyse the potential effects of degradation, restoration, climate and land use change to optimise benefits between cross-sectoral river services and ecological requirements whilst considering climate change effects. Failure to plan across the full array of ecological and socioeconomic co-benefits can have undesirable and unanticipated consequences.

The motives, pressures and restoration measures for the dominant sectors are summarised in this document to identify the potential for interactions between pressures and restoration measures (benefits and losses for different conservation features). Guidance, tools and models to identify options for restoration and multiple-benefits are overviewed with focus on the potential effects of climate and land use changes on river processes. Specific emphasis is on synergistic strategiesto assist project managers with decision making, problem solving and planning strategies to identify suitable Programme of Measures (PoM) to support future RBMP cycles and the tuning of the WFD with other directives (Habitats, Birds, Flood, Groundwater, Renewable Energy, Sustainable Transport).

Synergies in river restoration occur when benefits can be found for both ecosystem services and the environment, whereas a trade-off occurs when one changes at the expense of another. Adopting a ‘synergy and trade-off’ approach to river restoration is discussed with specific focus on soft engineering techniques in relation to climate change enabling planners to consider the links in integrated freshwater conservation planning and overcome constraints that might hinder other (or multiple) sectors. Synergistic approaches are now emerging in river restoration and cross-sectoral interactions, and are supported by various policy documents. For example, synergies between flood-risk and river management or between hydropower development and restoration of longitudinal connectivity for fisheries. Flood-risk management is perhaps the policy with the best potential for synergies with other aspects of water management, provided that adequate strategies are implemented (CIS 2007). Working with natural processes & nature-based restoration are key features of the strategy to overcome climate change impacts whilst providing multiple-benefits thus, allowing important opportunities for synergies between directives such as EU Floods Directive, WFD, Habitats Directive and Birds Directive, amongst others.

The main methods promoted in this document are hydro-economic models, cross-impact balance analysis and the nested-DPSIR framework.

Hydro-economic modelling can support integrated river basin management and they represent regional scale hydrological, engineering, environmental and economic aspects of water resources systems within a single framework. The complexity of interactions between water and the economy can be captured through formal, mathematical models linking relevant hydrological and biogeochemical processes to economic ‘laws’ of supply and demand underlying the provision of scarce water services (Brouwer & Hofkes 2008). Integrated hydro-economic models can suggest least-cost combinations of actions to attain specified goals and examine how alternative choices will affect different interests. In summary it can be argued that hydro-economic modelling is especially suitable to address water quantity issues, but that it is much more difficult to make the link with WFD environmental objectives that are ecological in nature. The main bottleneck in full application of hydro-economic modelling is to integrate type-specific pressure-impact relationships where hydrological regime is linked with ecological status.
Cross-impact Balance Analysis creates a hypermatrix and can be applied by river managers to anticipate the potential impacts of possible hydrological changes on stream channel morphology, ecological function and services provision (Slawson 2014). CIB analysis is a helpful approach that can give a number of options for plausible future scenarios. It is based on a qualitative judgement scale and relies on expert judgement across a number of disciples, the benefit here is that CIB is not data dependant, however, expert judgement can result in bias and strongly influence any outcome.
The nested-DPSIR framework is a conceptual tool that identifies key relationships between society and the environment and should be applied in the early stages of project planning. It aims to reconcile conflicting interests between societal and the ecological needs of rivers, in addition to land uses change by capturing key relationships between society and the environment, encouraging decision-makers to think about the challenges at a larger scale, across multiple sectors. At a catchment scale the nested-DPSIR can identify restoration potential and aid decisions for PoM objectives. The outcome from a CIB Analysis can be used alongside DPSIR to explore synergies and new opportunities.

Weighted prioritisation matrices are easily understood, simple to apply and have the advantage of allowing various alternatives to be compared numerically. Scoring is based on existing information, both quantitative and qualitative, and incorporates the opinions of stakeholders, ecological specialists and economists. Physical, chemical and biological aspects of broad-scale processes of freshwater rivers and interfaces between connecting ecosystems, such as natural habitat continuum from upstream to downstream catchments and between river and its surrounding land use are considered during the scoring. Nevertheless, there are a few disadvantages to this method, mainly because the evaluation procedure depends heavily on the weightings assigned and these can be subjective and open to bias.

Conclusions and recommendations from this document are:

Ø In many scenarios the domains of environment, society and institutions are disconnected and sustainability is compromised

Ø Identifying relevant political and economic incentives can help overcome the inadequate budget situation for restoration

Ø Simple decision support methods are generally easier to use, but lack a full understanding of the economic and social interactions, while complex models incorporate these aspects but suffer from data paucity and need huge investments to achieve the required input

Ø Optimising ecosystem services in conjunction with the ecosystem approach appears to be a useful mechanism for selecting the best management options, but to convince other users of the importance of ecological services requires ecological and socio-economic information at a catchment scale and the more fundamental economic data to support the dialogue.

Ø Adopting a synergy approach to river restoration will maximise multiple benefits between sectors and ecosystem form and function, tools such as DPSIR help identify synergies but its application by river managers is generally lacking

Ø The consequences of climate change e.g. through more extreme discharge regimes create a moving target for planning and implementation and require an anticipating and adaptive strategy

Ø Identifying the impacts of different sectors and the potential synergies should be part of the project planning cycle and be inherent in the identification and formulation phases of the project development.

Case studies to support the processes described are provide in Part 2 of the deliverable.

5.3 Restoration practises climate and land use change.zip

Work packages:

Deliverables:

D5.3 Effects of climate and land use changes on river ecosystems and restoration practices

Document type:

Report

File status:

Final

Policy Brief:

Cost-effective restoration measures that promote wider ecosystem and societal benefits

tom.buijse@deltares.nl — Sun, 28 Jun 2015 09:41:17 +0000

The report provides an overview of existing guidelines and manuals related to the assessment of costs and benefits of river restoration. Although there exist many cost-benefit analysis handbooks, there are not many related specifically to river restoration. This report aims to fill this gap, and focuses on the specific characteristics of the estimation of costs and benefits related to river restoration. The report discusses the classification and assessment of costs and benefits of river restoration, and develops a benefits transfer approach that can be used to assess benefits when it is not possible to carry out primary valuation research. Key methodological issues in a CBA of river restoration are identified, discussed and illustrated. The report provides a number of practical recommendations to practitioners.

Water policies are often evaluated primarily on the basis of their financial (budgetary) costs, as these can be assessed relatively easily. The calculation of all costs and benefits, including second-order indirect effects on sectors and non-priced environmental effects, often also referred to as the broader social costs and benefits, is a more difficult task. Social cost-benefit analysis is a widely applied method for evaluating public water policies, since government interventions are often related to the provision of public goods, having an impact on society as a whole. Such impacts should consequently be valued and evaluated from a societal perspective, not the perspective of the investor only such as a central or local government or a private company. Restored or ‘natural’ river corridors typically have the potential to provide a wide range of ecosystem services. It is the wider social value attached to these ecosystem services besides their ecological value that is often missing in information supply supporting river restoration policy and decision-making.

Keywords: River restoration, Cost-benefit analysis, Non-market valuation, Benefits transfer.

5.2 Cost Effective Measures promoting wider benefits.pdf

Work packages:

Deliverables:

D5.2 Cost effective restoration measures that promote wider ecosystem and societal benefits

Document type:

Report

File status:

Final

Policy Brief:

Measuring success of river restoration actions using end-points and benchmarking

tom.buijse@deltares.nl — Mon, 02 Dec 2013 11:32:57 +0000

With an increasing emphasis on river restoration comes a need for new techniques and guidance. Despite the rapid increase in river restoration projects, little is known about the effectiveness of these restoration efforts. Restoration outcomes are often not fully evaluated in terms of success or reasons for success or failure. This report strived to meet this need by developing a protocol for benchmarking and setting specific and measurable targets for restoration and mitigation.

With an increasing emphasis on river restoration comes a need for new techniques and guidance. These are tools to assess stream and watershed condition, to identify factors degrading aquatic habitats, to select appropriate restoration actions, and to monitor and evaluate restoration actions at appropriate scales. Unfortunately, despite the rapid increase in river restoration projects, little is known about the effectiveness of these restoration efforts. Restoration outcomes are often not fully evaluated in terms of success or reasons for success or failure. This seems an anomaly if restoration measures are to be carried out in an efficient and cost effective manner. This report (REFORM Task 5.1) strives to meet this need by developing a protocol for benchmarking and setting specific and measurable targets for restoration and mitigation.

Specific objectives of the task were:

• Identify endpoints and benchmarks against which to measure performance - reviewed against reference conditions (from WP2), to determine appropriate targets for restoration activities.

• Use metadata analysis to quantify strategic endpoints (focussing on ecological indicators sensitive to the functional response of rivers) that are consistent with WFD objectives and can serve to evaluate the outcomes of restoration measures.

• Compare quantifiable indicators of end-points in project proposals against realised endpoints – SMART analysis.

• Establish a protocol to set realistic quantifiable endpoints for restoration projects that are socially acceptable, ecologically appropriate and economically feasible.

The task was broken down into three main components:

· Review of concepts to measure the success of river restoration

· Review of river restoration case studies to assess measures of success

· Development of river restoration planning protocol.

The review of concepts to measure the success of river restoration found that despite large economic investments in what has been called the “restoration economy”, many practitioners do not follow a systematic approach for planning restoration projects. As a result, many restoration efforts fail or fall short of their objectives, if objectives have been explicitly formulated. This often appears not to be the case. Some of the most common problems or reasons for failure include:

Not addressing the root cause of habitat degradation
Upstream processes or downstream barriers to connectivity and habitat degradation that affect ecosystem functioning
Not establishing reference condition benchmarks and success evaluation endpoints against which to measure success
Failure to get adequate support from public and private organizations
No or an inconsistent approach for sequencing or prioritizing projects
Poor or improper project design
Inappropriate use of common restoration techniques because of lack of pre-planning (one size fits all)
Inadequate monitoring or appraisal of restoration projects to determine project effectiveness
Improper evaluation of project outcomes (real cost benefit analysis)

The second component explored case studies where procedures for measuring restoration success had been developed. The review specifically identified best practice and procedures for measuring performance and determining appropriate targets for restoration activities. One of the first steps is to establish benchmark conditions against which to target restoration measures. This requires i) assessment of catchment status and identifying restoration needs before selecting appropriate restoration actions to address those needs, ii) identifying a prioritization strategy and prioritizing actions, iii) developing a monitoring and evaluation programme, and iv) participation and fully consultation of stakeholders. The third topic requires that objectives of the restoration programme are established against which the success can be measured. These targets or endpoints of any restoration project should be specific, measureable, attainable, relevant and timely.

To support this process, REFORM has developed a protocol in WP 5.1 for restoration project planning that incorporates benchmarking and setting specific and measurable targets for restoration and mitigation measures. The restoration planning approach developed uses project management techniques to solve problems and produce a strategy for the execution of appropriate projects to meet specific environmental and social objectives. It provides knowledge of the technical policy and background to conflicts of multiple users of resources and develops a plan for comparison of status with objectives. Such restoration planning should become an integral part of the river basin management, and full consultation with all user groups is essential to promote optimal, sustainable use of the water body whilst meeting WFD targets.

In using this strategy it is important to recognise that each restoration scheme proposal should be treated individually as no situation is alike i.e. not ‘one size fits all’. It is therefore impossible to provide threshold criteria on which to make decisions. In addition, sufficient information should be provided to evaluate the overall risk of a scheme not having environmental, economic and social benefits that is commensurate with costs. The decision support tools allow the proposal to be evaluated at different levels and stages and will effectively curtail a proposal at an early stage should the proposal be potentially impractical or unviable.

5.1 Measuring river restoration success.pdf

Work packages:

Deliverables:

D5.1 Review of methodologies for benchmarking and setting end-points for restoration projects