Factors Affecting Sediment Transport, Deposition and Erosion in Intertidal Wetlands in Louisiana.

Processes leading to land loss in Louisiana are defined, measured and analyzed with special emphasis on the deposited and suspended sediment budgets. The findings were used to assess coastal management in Louisiana. In a spatial model of long term habitat succession, the degradation of a Louisiana wetland was based upon simulated exchanges of sediments across irregularly shaped polygons. Habitat distribution within a cell was estimated by elevation. The model findings were confirmed when the impact of two Louisiana marsh management plans caused reduced short-term sedimentation due to impaired water and materials flux. The sedimentation-erosion table (SET) is described and applied to assess the effect of experimental sediment fences on the elevation developments in intertidal and shallow sub tidal areas. The SET is precise to within a 1.5 millimeter range. SET measurements made over a three year period showed a significant elevation increase of 1.38 cm/yr at sites close to sediment fences, and a non significant decrease of $-$0.73 cm/yr at sites away from the fences. The wave transmissivity coefficient for sediment fences is presented. The potential impact of Louisiana marsh management and sediment fences on elevation changes and subsequently vegetation establishment were evaluated with the use of the hydrodynamic sector of the General Ecosystem Model (GEM) which was calibrated for intertidal water bodies. The results of this research are important because they provide more insight on the sediment dynamics of coastal wetland systems and the potential impact of different management options. The simulation models are designed to predict spatial changes and potentially can be used to develop dynamic geographic information systems (GIS)

Stranded capital: environmental stewardship is part of the economy, too

The many values that humans place on biodiversity are widely acknowledged but difficult to measure in practice. We address this problem by quantifying the contribution of marine-related environmental stewardship, in the form of donations and volunteer hours, to the economy of coastal Massachusetts. Our conservative evaluation suggests that marine stewardship activities contributed at least $179 million to the state economy in 2014, a figure that exceeded revenues derived in that same year from commercial finfish operations ($105 million) and whale watching ($111 million), two acknowledged cornerstones of the regional economy. Almost imperceptibly, the coastal economy has been transformed from one dependent on commercial exchange to a diverse economy that includes, to a large measure, marine stewardship. Donations and volunteer efforts are useful indicators of environmental values that can be hard to quantify, and represent one measure of human determination to protect the planet

Leveraging big data and analytics to improve food, energy, and water system sustainability

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O Ciberespaço e a mutação da realidade: o caso dos EUA

Understanding the way regional landscapes operate, evolve, and change is a key area of research for ecosystem science. It is also essential to support the placebased management approach being advocated by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and other management agencies. We developed a spatially explicit, process-based model of the 2352 km2 Patuxent River watershed in Maryland to integrate data and knowledge over several spatial, temporal, and complexity scales, and to serve as an aid to regional management. In particular, the model addresses the effects of both the magnitude and spatial patterns of human settlements and agricultural practices on hydrology, plant productivity, and nutrient cycling in the landscape. The spatial resolution is variable, with a maximum of 200 X 200 m to allow adequate depiction of the pattern of ecosystems and human settlement on the landscape. The temporal resolution is different for various components of the model, ranging from hourly time steps in the hydrologic sector to yearly time steps in the economic land-use transition module. We used a modular, multiscale approach to calibrate and test the model. Model results show good agreement with data for several components of the model at several scales. A range of scenarios with the calibrated model shows the implications of past and alternative future land-use patterns and policies. We analyzed 18 scenarios including: (1) historical land-use in 1650, 1850, 1950, 1972, 1990, and 1997; (2) a buildout scenario based on fully developing all the land currently zoned for development; (3) four future development patterns based on an empirical economic land-use conversion model; (4) agricultural best management practices that lower fertilizer application; (5) four replacement scenarios of land-use change to analyze the relative contributions of agriculture and urban land uses; and (6) two clustering scenarios with significantly more and less clustered residential development than the current pattern. Results indicate the complex nature of the landscape response and the need for spatially explicit modeling