Ecosystem Services: River and Watershed Restoration
Introduction
The natural process of the hydrologic cycle provides mankind with many benefits including clean water, clean air, energy, and habitat for food sources. The concept of viewing natural processes in terms of human value has been termed ecosystem services. Ecosystem services provide a framework for promoting restoration, rehabilitation and prevention of further degradation of ecosystems by assigning economic values on the services humans receive from nature. In many instances it more costly to provide these services through modern technology than through nature.
Although the concept of ecosystem services is not new, it has recently received much more attention. Federal and international agencies and organizations including the United States
Department of Agriculture and the United Nations Environment Program have both produced publications on ecosystem services in recent years.
Ecosystem services provide natural resource managers with a new tool to manage lands.
Traditionally natural resource managers focused management on protection of ecosystems including “maintaining viable populations of native species, representing native ecosystem types across their natural range of variation, and maintaining the evolutionary potential of species and ecosystems” (Collins and Larry, 2007). Whereas, ecosystem services is a model that emphasizes management of the supply and delivery of natural services (Collins and Larry, 2007). This extends the scope of measuring ecosystem health to include the ecosystems ability to provision services for a population.
Ecosystems
Ecosystems are “a set of interacting species and their local, non-biological environment functioning together to sustain life” (Bolund and Hunhammer, 1999). This definition takes into account all biotic (living) and abiotic (non-living) factors including chemical and physical components.
The type and productivity of an ecosystem is largely determined by climates. Climates are long term weather patterns comprised of variable quantities of moisture, temperature, sunlight and wind (Freeman, 2005). Climate influences the diversity and abundance of primary producers
(autotrophs), which in turn influences the diversity and abundance of consumers (heterotrophs).
Primary producers and consumers both exhibit impacts on the physical and chemical components of their environment through such interactions as nutrient cycling and physical alterations of landscapes. These
[A1 ] interactions when functioning properly help maintain a healthy ecosystem.
Healthy ecosystems are sustainable systems. Costanza and Mageau define sustainability of an ecosystem as its “ability to maintain its structure (organization) and function (vigor) over time in the face of external stress (resilience)” (1999). This view focuses on end results (vigor/function) based on the ability to maintain actions or structure of individual components (organization) of an ecosystem when stressed as characterized by resiliency. Mageau and Costanza’s framework is used to establish measurements for ecosystem health. Ecosystem health is important to quantify because it allows for the measurement of rehabilitation and restoration successfulness. Increasing ecosystem health along with services should be the focus of restoration and rehabilitation activities.
Freshwater Ecosystems
Freshwater ecosystems and the watersheds that support them are of particular importance to

humans because they provide a limited resource that is essential for sustaining life. Human reliance on water has led to the degradation of lentic water systems through trans-basin water transfers, pollution, channelization, narrowing of natural flood plains and the establishment of reservoirs for flood control and water delivery for the purpose of agriculture, as well as, direct consumption.
The emergence of ecosystem services
Ecosystems provide a wide range of services that humans directly and indirectly benefit from including provisioning of clean air, water and energy (Costanza et al., 1997). These services have been collectively dubbed ecosystem services and have brought about much consideration of their value to humans. Costanza et al. valued ecosystem services provided by natural processes to be between $16 and $54 trillion dollars per year; roughly 1 to three times the global GDP (1997).
Despite, “major theoretical problems with this exercise” the paper brought large amounts of media attention to the concept and practice of ecosystem services (Salzman, 2011).
The idea that ecosystems provide services to humans is not a new one. It is visible in the writings of “Plato, and more recently through the writings of George Perkins Marsh, the father of modern-day ecology, and observations of famed environmental writer, Aldo Leopold” The recent attention of ecosystem services can be traced back to the release of Nature Services by
Gretchen Daily in 1997, which placed monetary values on ecosystem services based on the cost of replacing them with modern technology (Rhul and Salzman, 2007).
In 1998, another influential paper was released by Graciela Chilchinisky and Geoffrey Heal. The pair detailed the investment of New York City in the Catskill Mountains, which houses the city’s watershed. The city of New York forced into action by the EPA which determined it was out of compliance with Clean Water Act, had to act to increase the quality of water it supplied to its residence. New York City determined that it was more cost effective to invest between $1 and
$1.5 billion in natural capital and restore the watershed that provides it with its water than to invest between $6 and $8 billion in physical capital to build a water treatment plant and pay yearly operating costs (Chilchinisky and Heal, 1998). This example helped reinforce the important role of ecosystem services in day to day human activities, as well as, provide the benefits of investing in natural capital versus physical capital.
Millennium Ecosystem Assessment
The attention ecosystem services received in the late 1990’s led to the establishment of the
United Nation’s Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MA). Kofi Annan called for the MA in
2000 in his report to the United Nations General Assembly. Following three international conventions (the Convention on Biodiversity, the Convention to Combat Desertification, and the
Ramsart Convention on Wetlands) the MA was initiated in June, 2001 (Millennium Ecosystem
Assessment Programme, 2005). The United Nations was the first to global assessment of ecosystems in terms of the services they provide to humans.
The MA uses the works of two prominent authors of ecosystem service papers to define ecosystem services. “The MA definition follows Costanza and his colleagues in including both natural and human-modified ecosystems as sources of ecosystem services, and it follows Daily in using the term “services” to encompass both the tangible and the intangible benefits humans obtain from ecosystems, which are sometimes separated into “goods” and “services” respectively”(Millennium Ecosystem Assessment Program, 2004). From this broadened definition the MA developed an ecosystem services classification system that is widely accepted.
Figure1 : displays the relationships between human well-being and ecosystem services. (2004 Millennium

Ecosystem Assessment Program)
The MA classification system divides ecosystem services into four categories as seen in figure 1.
The four categories are supporting, cultural, provisioning and regulating. Supporting services are services that are not directly consumed or utilized by humans, but are necessary to facilitate services that humans benefit from. Cultural services are “non-material benefits obtained from ecosystems” (Millennium Ecosystem Assessment Program, 2004).This includes intrinsic values, spirituality, and recreation. Regulatedservices are the services that regulate ecosystems including climate regulation, and air purification. Lastly, provisioning services are “products obtained from ecosystems” (Millennium Ecosystem Assessment Program, 2004). Products that people obtain from ecosystems include human necessities, such as, energy, food and water.
Hydrologic Services
The provisioning of hydrological services is tied directly to the hydrologic cycle. The hydrologic cycle is the movement of water from oceans to terrestrial biomes and back to oceans. During this movement water takes on different physical states including time spent as a gas, liquid and solid.
Figure 2 provided by the United States Geological Service displays a graphical image of the hydrologic cycle.
Figure 2
The hydrologic cycle is distinct in that it can be classified in all four categories outlined within
MA at different times during the cycle. Hydrologic services include provisioning of water, regulation of water quality, cultural activities including recreation and supporting services including water for agriculture among other things that may support other services.
The ecohydrological processes governed by ecosystems can be categorized into four attributes that are of importance to the supply of hydrologic services to mankind. Braumen and colleagues defined these attributes as quantity, quality, timing of flow and location (Braumen et al., 2009).
Figure 3 displays the linkage between ecohydrologic services, hydrologic attributes and services which benefit humans.
Assessing Ecosystem Service Provisioning incorporate river Ecosystem Health Assessment, sou
Incorporate appropriate scope for hydrologic services, PES paper
Incorporate the following steps regarding ES
1. identification of ecosystem service providers – species or populations that provide specific ecosystem services – and characterization of their functional roles and relationships;

2. determination of community structure aspects that influence how ESPs function in their , such as compensatory responses that stabilize function and non-random extinction sequences which can erode it;
3. assessment of key environmental factors influencing the provision of services;
4. measurement of the spatial and temporal scales ESPs and their services operate on.
In order to manage lands to better provide hydrological services the elements that affect the attributes of these services defined by Braumen must be identified. Identifying the attributes described by Braumen establishes the link between ecohydrological processes that land manager may or may not have some degree of influences over and the characteristics or attributes that compose different hydrological services. This can be accomplished through the use of watershed assessment techniques. Watershed assessment techniques are useful in identifying sources of watershed problems, sources of uncertainty and possible negative impacts on restoration activities (Pess et al. 2003). All of the above are considered important information for watershed managers.
The goal of many watershed assessments is to identify disrupted processes, and the location and timing of land-use decisions on those processes (Pess et al., 2003). The data from assessments is useful in determining the drivers of an ecosystem or watershed, which can be either natural or human—induced (Millennium Ecosystem Assessment Board, 2003). The Millennium
Assessment has divided drivers into two categories direct and indirect. Direct drivers explicitly influence ecosystem processes and can be identified and measured (Millennium Ecosystem
Assessment Board, 2003). Whereas, indirect drivers operate more often by altering one or more direct drivers and its influence can be understood by defining its effect on direct drivers
(Millennium Ecosystem Assessment Board, 2003).
The information from watershed assessments is generally useful for land managers. However, for watershed assessments to be useful in the ecosystem services model they need to incorporate two items into assessments. The first is assessing watersheds and determining which drivers of ecosystem services can be controlled by decision makers (endogenous drivers) and those drivers which cannot be controlled by decision makers (exogenous drivers) (Millennium Ecosystem
Assessment Board, 2003). This information can narrow down the scope of ecosystem services related restoration or conservation projects to focus solely on drivers that management activities affect. The second item that needs to be incorporated into watershed assessments for ecosystem services is an economic valuation of ecosystem services within a project area. Economic valuation needs to be incorporated into assessment techniques gathering data for ecosystem service projects, because assigning monetary value is the key premise behind the ecosystem services concept. Additionally, it allows land managers to prioritize restoration and conservation efforts to be focused on the largest ecosystem services that a watershed provides.
Protecting Ecosystem Services
Ecosystems provide mankind with numerous benefits. Unfortunately, many of the services provided from ecosystems remain unprotected and are subject to degradation. This is largely because many economic marketplaces fail to internalize the damage done to ecosystems and their services through such activities as deforestation of watersheds, pollution of waterways, and alteration of natural flow regimes. These damages or side effects caused by market driven actions are collectively known as externalities. The different frameworks used to internalize market externalities are best categorized in the works of Salzman and Thompson. The pair

categorizes management policies of environmental protection into a “regulatory toolkit”
(Salzman and Thomson, 2010). The toolkit defines five regulatory frameworks: prescriptive regulation, property rights, persuasion, penalties and payments (Salzman and Thomson, 2010).
 o Prescriptive regulation: also called command and control regulation.
CWA,CAA,CERCLA, ESA
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Difficult to get multinational cooperation. o o ie. UNFCCC o Property rights: recognition of property rights is difficult because o o o ecosystem services are viewed as public goods o Persuasion: educational activities o Penalties: fines/disincentives o Payments: incentives, the most popular method for protecting ecosystem services.
Of the five tools defined by the pair payments has gained prominence amongst river and watershed restoration activities. Payments as the name suggests provide monetary incentives to those who protect the environment.
Payments for Ecosystem Services
Payments for ecosystem services (PES) have become a popular method for promoting restoration and conservation efforts. In order to establish a PES program a market must be created.
Establishing a market for watershed services necessitates linking willing buyers with willing sellers, assessing the value of the service provided, identifying the appropriate scale and creating a payment scheme (Smith et al., 2006).
Identifying and creating a partnership between willing buyers and sellers is fundamental to establish a market, without either a market will fail to materialize. Linking willing buyers and sellers of watershed services first involves identifying stakeholders capable of impacting watershed services (sellers) and stakeholders that can benefit from watershed services (buyers)
(Smith et al., 2006). Connecting upstream watershed users with users downstream is of particular importance, because the water and land management practices upstream disproportionately affect those downstream. In watershed services stakeholders located higher in the watershed are the sellers and those located lower are the buyers. Establishing a market for a PES program may also require shifting sellers of a good into suppliers of a service (Smith et al., 2006). Take for example a logger. Loggers are sellers of a product, wood. In order to establish a PES system the loggers would have to shift to suppliers of a service. In a catchment the services to be supplied would include water quantity, clean water, species habitat (biodiversity) and carbon sequestration.
Assessing the value of ecosystem services is important to establishing a market. It provides investors information needed to make a sound judgment (Smith et al., 2006). The value of services can be derived by using a utilitarian approach. This approach assigns a monetary value based upon the usefulness of the service to members of society (Millennium Ecosystem
Assessment Board, 2003). One of the drawbacks to this approach is it may fail to recognize the

values of non-use services, including biodiversity and cultural values. It is for this reason that
PES programs use Total Economic Value or TEV, which incorporates both use and non-use values (Smith et al., 2006). Use and non-use can further be broken down into smaller units as seen in figure 4.
Figure 4. TEV and its components (Smith et al., 2006)
  what is the appropriate scope for hydrologic PES?
o o
Most agree watershed is proper size o Cultural and ethical considerations
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Values differ with cultures
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Ethical consideration of developed countries continuing to use
 resources from developing countries o Case Study
 o The working for water programme (Turpie, 2005)
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South Africa
 Removes invasive alien plants
 o Restore natural fire regime, increase
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 productive potential of land, biodiversity, hydrologic functioning
Funded as a poverty relief program
 o Moneys also come from sale of water
Provide quantitative and qualitative information about o program success
 o Water utilities have contacted WfW about restoring their watershed
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Has been successful in employing previously unemployed individuals to complete restoration
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 o Conservation of biodiversity o Klamath Basin
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Establishment of Ecosystem Services
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Key issues
Needed shift in landscape scale management (shift status
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Quo)
Endangered Species, Coho Salmon habitat
 Agricultural Use
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emphasis on lost ecosystem services reflects the rise of biodiversity as an organizing concept for a variety of uncoordinated resource management objectives.
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Biodiversity conservation requires that ecosystems be viewed as a functioning unit rather than a discrete collection of species.

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Does ecosystem service provision offer positive advantages in areas such as the Klamath com-pared to the current litigation-regulation strategies that are being followed
 Use of ecosystem services, appealing approach, utilitarian
 Barriers to ES in the Klamath
 o
Property rights- western natural resource laws
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Indian water rights
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Conclusion on feasibility of PES in the Klamath