Green infrastructure is a core concept in the frame of an ecosystem approach to advance urban resilience. However in practice, to justify the need of Green Infrastructure to policy makers, often a quantification of the benefits is demanded. Does somebody has recommendations for models to quantify ecosystem services benefits of Green Infrastructure, for instance like air purification, heat buffer function and GHG reduction? We collected already some experience with the i-tree model, however we are interested also in other types of Green Infrastructure. Preferably we are interested in free models, but commercial models are not excluded from the interest as well.
The performance of the suggested Green Infrastructure interventions is affected by land use or urban typology, slope of terrain, groundwater depths and dynamics, soil type, and climate characteristics (Dolman et al., 2013). Currently, most tools, guidelines and benchmarks for urban adaptation raise awareness of climate change impacts, assess the city’s vulnerability (e.g. climate stress test) and/or address the need for adaptation at a policy level. However, tools that have the ability to implement adaptation solutions in the actual urban planning and design practice seem to be missing. Such a tool that fills this gap is the Adaptation Support Tool (Van de Ven F.H.M. et al., 2016).
This [free] Adaptation Support Tool (AST) has been developed to support local policymakers, planners, designers and practitioners in defining the program of demands and setting adaptation targets and has been shown to be successful (McEvoy et al., 2020). The AST can be used in design workshops, to support dialogue among stakeholders on where and how each ecosystem-based adaptation measure can be applied. The tool provides quantitative, evidence-based performance information on (cost)effectiveness of adaptation measures regarding climate resilience and co-benefits; https://publicwiki.deltares.nl/display/AST/Adaptation+Support+Tool+and+KBS+Toolbox+Home.
The AST includes a toolbox of 62 blue, green and grey measures for ecosystem-based adaptation – also called blue-green infrastructure (such as green roofs, bioswales, porous pavement and water squares) – a selection assistant for ranking based on their applicability, and an assessment tool to estimate the effectiveness of applied adaptation measures. The performance of the measures has been estimated in the AST for a number of key metrics, e.g. created storage capacity, frequency reduction of the normative runoff, heat stress reduction, extra groundwater recharge, water quality effects, costs and additional benefits. Performance is determined for each adaptation measure separately as well as for the total package of measures.
Another recent development is the Nature Based Solutions (in Cities) selection tool; https://www.urbangreenup.eu/resources/nbs-selection-tool/nbs-selection-tool.kl
GI can be created in many places, covering natural and semi-natural areas in urban, rural and marine areas, as well as man-made elements, such as green roofs and products over motorways, and restored lands, such as wetlands and mangroves. One of its major attractions is its ability to perform multiple functions on the same piece of land and/or water. While biodiversity remains at the core of GI, it is much more than a biodiversity conservation instrument. The roles of GI are highly interdependent, for example, societal wellbeing in coastal and river areas depends on flood retention by wetlands or natural drainage systems, which in turn depend directly on the provision of ecosystem services, such as soil and water regulation. These, in turn, are highly reliant on biodiversity to uphold the health of the ecosystems to provide ecosystem services. A good example of this multifunctionality is provided by the urban GI of a green roof, which reduces stormwater runoff and the pollutant load of the water, while also decreasing the urban heat effect, improving the insulation of the building and providing habitat for a variety of species. finally, Quantitative research and high levels of certainty are desirable, but not always possible with a concept, such as GI. As such its implementation should encourage new and innovative ways to comprehensively evaluate this exciting policy initiative, which can also amalgamate the views of multiple stakeholders.
Thanks to all for your responses. We are working with the InVest tool since a while, using Magdeburg as example, and we start a project in 2022 on the development of a GIS tool on urban green infastructure.
In the literature, there is growing consensus on defining ecosystem services as the direct or indirect contributions that ecosystems make to human well-being . Scientists are using the classifiers intermediate and final services to describe how ecosystem structure and functions relate to human benefits. Intermediate services are ecosystem characteristics measured as ecosystem structure, processes, and functions that support final services . Final services are components of nature possessing an explicit connection to human well-being that have direct value to society .
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