Cross scale spatial and temporal indicators for measuring the effects of landscape heterogeneity on pollination service

Spatial heterogeneity as well as landscape services’ provision are a function of spatio-temporal scales, therefore, pattern–process relationships must be assessed at the multiple scales. In this context, this research aims at: (1) analyzing at the regional scale how pollination service can be affected by landscape heterogeneity, using two landscape indicators useful to quantify the multiscale landscape composition and landscape configuration simultaneously; and (2) assessing the effect that the infection of Xylella fastidiosa has exerted on the pollination services. The multi-scale spatial assessment has been focused on two land-covers: forests and olive groves that can act as source of pollination services. The multi-temporal analysis, based on the annual NDVI, has been used to assess the functionality of olive groves before and at the beginning of the infection of Xylella fastidiosa, and currently. The results have shown that in 2012 the most representative cluster (C1) (73.6% for forests and 63% for olive groves) is in the lower left part of the multiscale metric space, meaning that both land-covers show a fragmented spatial configuration at small spatial scales and tend to be aggregated at large scales. The multitemporal analysis has allowed to show the evident change in the landscape functioning in the provinces interested by the infection of Xylella fastidiosa (Lecce, Brindisi and Taranto) from 2013 to 2021, highlighting that the stability of the landscape has resulted completely changed for the loss of permanent land-covers (olive groves). In this study the spatio-temporal analyses have helped in giving a more complete indication in the assessment of landscape services where different factors can play a crucial role. The analysis of spatial patterns along a continuum of scale has been implemented by the analysis of multi-temporal dynamics to consider the effect of Xylella fastidiosa infection on pollination. The temporal behavior of NDVI has resulted completely changed in the provinces interested by this infection, meaning that recovering policies need to be undertaken to regenerate the landscape. When studying landscape services, some considerations must be considered in choosing the suitable spatial and temporal scale for its assessment. One of the recent drivers of change, represented by the infection of Xylella fastidiosa, and the planning of landscape functionality recovery interest higher spatial scales and will affect the scale at which landscape services, included pollination, are delivered

Patterns of disturbance at multiple scales in real and simulated landscapes

We describe a framework to characterize and interpret the spatial patterns of disturbances at multiple scales in socio-ecological systems. Domains of scale are defined in pattern metric space and mapped in geographic space, which can help to understand how anthropogenic disturbances might impact biodiversity through habitat modification. The approach identifies typical disturbance ’profiles’ based on the similarity of trajectories in a pattern metric space over a range of spatial scales. When different profiles are coherent in pattern metric space, they describe a regional spatial pattern. The divergence of a profile indicates a scale-dependent transition to a local spatial pattern, which can be examined for correspondence to different regions of geographic space. We illustrate the conceptual model with simulated maps and real disturbance maps from satellite imagery in south Italy. The results suggest that management of disturbances in the study region depend less on local drivers of disturbance and more on broader-scale drivers within the socio-ecological framework

Global environmental sustainability trends: A temporal comparison using a new interval-based composite indicator

Assessing progress on the pursuit of the Sustainable Development Goals is crucial for evaluating the sustainability of a Country, although this is not easy, considering the interdependencies or interconnections of individual goals with others, and the fact that there are several indicators for each goal. The aims of this research are: (1) to propose a novel interval-based environmental sustainable composite index (ESI) suitable to monitor the worldwide environmental SDGs' implementation at national scale, (2) to solve the problem of missing data in large databases and the subjectivity in computing a composite index (CI), (3) to group and compare statistically countries according to the ESI, and (4) to represent spatially the results to identify areas of the world more or less environmentally sustainable than others. Clustering and Sankey diagrams have supported the temporal and spatial analysis of ESI trends, showing that Canada, Brazil, New Zealand, and several European countries have been the most sustainable in 2019. The novelty of this indicator is that each country presents an ESI central value, the most probable value of the composite indicator, and a range, which represents the uncertainty given by the lower and upper bounds. In this sense, it is possible to better interpret the results of the composite indicator, while simultaneously obtaining a measure of the uncertainty of the results. The composite indicator can be used to monitor countries’ vulnerability towards the unsustainability risk, as well as countries that are not able to escape from a sort of “unsustainability trap”

Sustainable landscape development and value rigidity: the Pirsig's monkey trap

New broader, adaptable and accommodating sets of themes have been proposed to help to identify, understand and solve sustainability problems. However, how this knowledge will foster decisions that lead to more desirable outcomes and analyses necessary to transition to sustainability remains a critical theoretical and empirical question for basic and applied research. We argue that we are still underestimating the tendency to lock into certain patterns that come at the cost of the ability to adjust to new situations. This rigidity limits the ability of persons, groups, and companies to respond to new problems, and can make it hard to learn new facts because we pre-select facts as important, or not, in line with our established values. Changing circumstances demand to reappraise values like in the case of Pirsig's monkey and its rice. There is an urgent need to go beyond such local, static and short-term conceptions, where landscape sustainability has been incorrectly envisioned as a durable, stable condition that, once achieved, could persist for generations. We argue that to manage a global transition toward more environmentally efficient and, therefore, more sustainable land-use we have to reappraise societal values at the root of overregulation and rigidity

Fostering the Resiliency of Urban Landscape through the Sustainable Spatial Planning of Green Spaces

none5siBackground: It has been recognized that urban green spaces play a crucial role in providing many landscape services. The research aimed at identifying the main knowledge gaps in this framework and to support urban planning, taking into account the spatial configuration of green areas through a pilot study area, and mapping urban landscape services. Methods: In this research, (1) a systematic review, analyzed through a network analysis; (2) an urban pilot study to map the Urban Green Index and, jointly, the spatial composition and configuration of urban green areas, through the integration of three landscape metrics; and (3) the mapping of Urban Landscape Services Index have been carried out. Results: The 37% of the reviewed articles focused on regulating services, while the network analysis identified four clusters. The total Urban Green Index was 26%, and some districts showed a percentage that surpassed it. The total overall Green Connectivity Index was 21%. Some districts were the best providers of landscape services. Conclusions: This research was in line with the EU Joint Science for Policy Report suggesting giving emphasis to the spatial pattern map of green spaces in European cities to provide spatial data available for decision-makers in relation to GI deployment.openDonatella Valente, María Victoria Marinelli, Erica Maria Lovello, Cosimo Gaspare Giannuzzi, Irene PetrosilloValente, Donatella; Marinelli, MARIA VICTORIA; Lovello, ERICA MARIA; Gaspare Giannuzzi, Cosimo; Petrosillo, Iren

The contribution of Utility-Scale Solar Energy to the global climate regulation and its effects on local ecosystem services

One solution to mitigate climate change can be the production of renewable energy. In this context, the aims of this paper are: (1) the identification of local unsuitable areas for the installation of Utility-Scale Solar Energy (USSE) in a municipality in southern Italy; (2) the assessment of the effects of their installation on local natural CO2 sequestration and on avoided CO2; and (3) the evaluation of their contribution to the global climate regulation through scenario analysis. Since 2007, 82 authorizations have been obtained for the installation of USSE in the municipality and 42 over 64 already completed have been installed in unsuitable areas. For what concerns the remaining USSE, two short-term scenarios are analysed in order to take into account their contribution in terms of climate regulation service. The first scenario is called Business As Usual with new planned USSE installed by 2014 also in unsuitable areas, and the second one with the new USSE installed only in suitable areas identified in this study. Surprisingly, Scenario 2 is characterized by a reduced natural capacity to sequester CO2 emissions and by a lower contribution of vegetation in providing the ecosystem service climate regulation in comparison with Scenario 1. Keywords: Sustainable renewable energy use, Spatial ecosystem service trade-offs, Renewable energy–ecosystem services interactio

A first analysis on the need to integrate ecological aspects into financial insurance

It is known that financial insurance can address the economic impacts of a natural disaster, but some ecological aspects can play a crucial role in mitigating the overall risks for socio-ecological systems. To better strengthen the study of these relations, the aims of this paper are: (1) to analyze the main research topics of the scientific literature on ecological and/or financial-economic insurance to face natural disasters, through a co-word network analysis; (2) to analyze the temporal trends of the total Gross Insurance Premium and Meteorological and climatological extreme events in 29 OECD countries; and (3) to carry out a Principal Component Analysis (PCA) of some selected variables in order to conceptualize a first empirical model combining financial-economic and ecological insurance to face natural disasters. The literature review has shown a predominance of topics related to financial insurance (about 60%), and the co-word map of key words has highlighted a common space where economic and ecological insurances interact. PCA highlighted three major components explaining 90.6% of the overall variation and discriminating aspects more related to the “financial” insurance, from those related to the “ecological” insurance. More in detail, PC1, which represents the financial insurance, explains the 60.4% of variation, PC2 and PC3 that represent surrogates of the “ecological” insurance explain respectively the 19.6% and the 10.6% of variation. On the basis of the application of the proposed empirical model, countries with high levels of financial and ecological preparedness have been identified. The next steps of this research will be focused on a pilot study area where a quantitative assessment will be applied to better define the landscape contribution to natural disaster risk mitigation, the analysis of the role of social capital through a cross-scales approach, in terms of policies and management strategies, and the investigation of innovative economic tools to take into account specific payment for ecosystem services in the context of natural disasters

Towards Land Consumption Neutrality and Natural Capital Enhancement at Urban Landscape Scale

Among the UNCCD SDGs 2030, there is the recognition that land consumption can strongly affect the provision of ecosystem services. From the perspective of land degradation neutrality, urban level is the right scale when planning actions against land consumption. The aims of this research are: (1) to assess land consumption at urban landscape scale and its effects on natural capital flow provision; and (2) to identify sustainable strategic planning choices for land consumption mitigation and natural capital enhancement. We propose and test an approach based on multi-temporal landscape spatial analysis (land use/land cover map, land consumption map, and landscape metrics) and ecosystem services’ flow assessment for the identification of areas at risk of loss of natural capital flow. The results have shown that from 2006 to 2019, land consumption has increased with a consequent decrease of natural capital flow. LULC dynamics has been analyzed in terms of landscape risk to lose natural capital flow, highlighting that the management of Galatone urban landscape is still far from land consumption neutrality. Landscape metrics have allowed the analysis of the aggregation among land consumption areas. The mitigation of land consumption should be based on the identification of suitable nature-based solutions towards the balance between past land consumption and future land recovery