69 Multi-Benefit Resources

What’s getting in the way of a “One Water” approach to water services planning and management?

Author: Mukheibir, Howe, & Gallet, (2014)
Geography: Global
Level of Detail: Qualitative description

Water Management Strategies: Centralized Stormwater Infrastructure, Desalination, Distributed Stormwater Infrastructure, Environmental Remediation, Flood Control, Land Management, Wastewater Treatment, Water Conservation and Efficiency, Water Reuse

Specific Benefits or Trade-offs: Energy, Flooding, Land and environment, People and Community, Risk and Resilience, Water quality, Water Supply

What’s Getting in the way of ‘One Water’ approach to water services planning and management? presents findings of research on the barriers and challenges encountered by water agencies and institutions on adopting a ‘One Water’ approach to water services planning and management. It categorizes the drivers and challenges into three groups: the “push of the present,” the “pull of the future,” and the “weight of the past.” Five key areas that presented challenges were identified through a literature review; these included legislation and regulations, economics and finance, planning and collaboration, culture and capacity, and citizen engagement.

Greenprint Resource Hub

Author: The Nature Conservancy, The Conservation Fund, The Trust for Public Land (N/A)
Geography: Global
Level of Detail: Decision support tool

Availability: Publicly Available

Water Management Strategies: Conservation design, Distributed Stormwater Infrastructure, Land Management, Low impact landscaping

Specific Benefits or Trade-offs: Energy, Flooding, Land and environment, People and Community, Risk and Resilience, Water quality, Water Supply

Greenprint Resource Hub, developed by the Nature Conservancy, is a resource designed to assist managers, policy-makers, and communities on utilizing greenprint in their conservation planning projects. Greenprint is a conservation strategy or tool that addresses economic, environmental, and social benefits of habitats (i.e., grasslands, shrublands, streams, forests, estuaries, wetlands), parks and open spaces (i.e., local parks, state parks, regional trails), complete communities (i.e., healthy residents, green infrastructure), and working lands (i.e., farmlands, grazing lands, timberlands). The resource includes greenprint case studies, a review of best practices, and relevant funding and policies.

Integrated Urban Water Model (IUWM)

Author: One Water Solutions Institute, Colorado State University (N/A)
Geography: Global
Level of Detail: Decision support tool

Availability: Publicly Available

Water Management Strategies: On site nonpotable reuse, Urban and industrial nonpotable reuse, Urban indoor efficiency, Urban outdoor efficiency, Water Conservation and Efficiency, Water Reuse

Specific Benefits or Trade-offs: Demand reduction, Water Supply

Integrated Urban Water Model (IUWM) is a planning tool for urban planners and water managers considering water savings from indoor and outdoor conservation through utilization of alternative water sources including greywater, stormwater, and reclaimed water. The tool utilizes lot size, land use designations, climate information, and soil characteristics to evaluate the impact of land use configurations, climate changes, conservation programs, and alternative water sources on water demands.

Global Review of Physical and Biological Effectiveness of Stream Habitat Rehabilitation

Author: Roni, Hanson, & Beechie, (2008)
Geography: Global
Level of Detail: Qualitative description

Availability: Paywall

Water Management Strategies: Dam removals, Floodplain connectivity and rehabilitation, Land Management, Riparian buffers, Sediment addition, Stream protection and restoration

Specific Benefits or Trade-offs: Ambient water quality, Habitat and biodiversity, Land and environment, Water quality

Global Review of Physical and Biological Effectiveness of Stream Habitat Rehabilitation is a literature review that assesses 345 studies of inland freshwater habitat restoration projects throughout the world. The case studies include projects such as road improvements, riparian restoration, floodplain connectivity restoration, instream habitat improvement, and nutrient addition, as well as many more. For each case study, an analysis was conducted on the techniques used, project outcomes, and overall effectiveness in improving habitat and water quality, and increasing fish production. The report concludes that reconnection of isolated habitats, instream habitat improvement, and floodplain restoration have been proven to be effective in improving habitats and increasing fish production.

Water Reuse: An International Survey of Current Practice, Issues and Needs

Author: Jiménez & Asano, (2008)
Geography: Global
Level of Detail: Qualitative description

Availability: Paywall

Water Management Strategies: Agricultural nonpotable reuse, Agricultural reuse, Commercial or industrial reuse, Indirect potable reuse, On site nonpotable reuse, Urban and industrial nonpotable reuse, Water Reuse

Specific Benefits or Trade-offs: Ambient water quality, Demand reduction, Drinking water quality, Supply augmentation, Water quality, Water Supply

Water Reuse: An International Survey of Current Practice, Issues and Needs presents an in-depth review of water reuse practices from across the globe. The main objective is to show how wastewater reuse is conceived and practiced differently around the world. The sections in the book focus on different aspects of water reuse, including but not limited to, water reuse by end-use type, climate and social/economic similarities, emerging controversial topics in the field, and contrasting case studies. The book is written for all stakeholders involved in wastewater reuse applications.

Assessing Location and Scale of Urban Nonpotable Water Reuse Systems for Life-Cycle Energy Consumption and Greenhouse Gas Emissions

Author: Kavvada et al., University of California, Berkeley ReNUWIt (2016)
Geography: Global
Level of Detail: Decision support tool, Quantitative benefits

Availability: Paywall

Water Management Strategies: On site nonpotable reuse, Water Reuse

Specific Benefits or Trade-offs: Air quality, Demand reduction, Energy, Energy for treatment, Energy for wastewater, GHG emissions, Land and environment, Supply augmentation, Water Supply

Assessing Location and Scale of Urban Nonpotable Water Reuse Systems for Life-Cycle Energy Consumption and Greenhouse Gas Emissions examines nonpotable water reuse at different scales to compare centralized and decentralized systems for energy use and greenhouse gas emissions. The article presents a planning and support tool for determining the optimal scale and treatment technology for reuse in different locations and elevations.

Greenhouse Gas and Energy Co-Benefits of Water Conservation

Author: Maas, Polis Project (2009)
Geography: Global
Level of Detail: Decision support tool, Quantitative benefits

Availability: Publicly Available

Water Management Strategies: Urban indoor efficiency, Urban outdoor efficiency, Water Conservation and Efficiency

Specific Benefits or Trade-offs: Demand reduction, End use energy, Energy, Energy for wastewater, Energy for water extraction, Energy for water treatment, GHG emissions, Water Supply

Greenhouse Gas and Energy Co-Benefits of Water Conservation examines the multiple benefits that are produced from the “water-energy nexus”. The benefits include indirect energy savings from municipal water and wastewater provision, indirect and direct energy use, and embedded energy for chemical manufacturing. The report includes example case studies conducted on various scales (program, municipal, provincial, and community levels), as well as provides methodologies for the quantification of the cited energy benefits.

Techno-economic assessment and environmental impacts of desalination technologies

Author: Mezher et al., (2011)
Geography: Global
Level of Detail: Qualitative description

Availability: Paywall

Water Management Strategies: Brackish desalination, Desalination, Seawater desalination

Specific Benefits or Trade-offs: Air quality, Ambient water quality, Energy, Energy for wastewater, Land and environment, Supply augmentation, Water quality, Water Supply

Techno-economic assessment and environmental impacts of desalination technologies provides a review of desalination technologies, including energy requirements, water production costs, technological growth trends, environmental impacts, and possible technological improvements. The report also provides desalination policies from major desalination users, including Saudi Arabia, United States, Spain, China, Kuwait, and United Arab Emirates.

N/A

Author: The Natural Capital Project (N/A)
Geography: Global
Level of Detail: Decision support tool

Availability: Publicly Available

Water Management Strategies: Land Management

Specific Benefits or Trade-offs: Energy, Flooding, Land and environment, People and Community, Risk and Resilience, Water quality, Water Supply

The Natural Capital Project is a coalition of academic and non-profit organizations, including Stanford University, the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the University of Minnesota, the Nature Conservancy, and the World Wildlife Fund. The Natural Capital Project works towards integrating the costs and benefits of nature into decision making in order to encourage investments in natural capital. The team primarily conducts research and develops open-source software tools.

Envision V3 User Manual

Author: Institute for Sustainable Infrastructure (2017)
Geography: Global
Level of Detail: Decision support tool

Availability: Publicly Available

Water Management Strategies: Centralized Stormwater Infrastructure, Distributed Stormwater Infrastructure; Wastewater Treatment, Flood Control

Specific Benefits or Trade-offs: Agriculture, Air quality, Ambient water quality, Carbon sequestration, Community resilience, Demand reduction, Drinking water quality, End use energy, Energy, Energy for wastewater, Energy for water extraction, Energy for water treatment, Flooding, Habitat and biodiversity, Health and safety, Land and environment, Local economy, Peak flood volume, People and Community, Recreation, Soil health, System resilience, Total flood volume, Water quality, Water Supply, Water supply reliability

The Envision V3 (Draft Credits for Public Review and Comment) user manual outlines additions to the Envision framework, a sustainability framework that aims to analyze infrastructure projects and promote collaboration on multi-benefit projects in order to improve system synergy. The framework defines co-benefits as services not directly related to the project’s primary function, and identifies five benefit categories: 1) quality of life, 2) leadership, 3) resource allocation, 4) natural world, and 5) climate and risk. Envision V3, launched in late 2017, modifies the final category, instead calling it ‘risk and resilience’.

Envision Framework

Author: Institute for Sustainable Infrastructure (N/A)
Geography: Global
Level of Detail: Decision support tool

Availability: Publicly Available

Water Management Strategies: Centralized Stormwater Infrastructure, Distributed Stormwater Infrastructure; Wastewater Treatment, Flood Control

Envision is a framework that provides the guidance needed to initiate this systemic change in the planning, design and delivery of sustainable and resilient infrastructure. Envision is a decision-making guide, not a set of prescriptive measures. Envision provides industry-wide sustainability metrics for all types and sizes of infrastructure to help users assess and measure the extent to which their project contributes to conditions of sustainability across the full range of social, economic, and environmental indicators.

Quantifying Watershed Restoration Benefits in Community Water Partnership Projects

Author: LimnoTech, Global Environment & Technology Foundation (GETF) (2015)
Geography: Global
Level of Detail: Decision support tool, Quantitative benefits

Availability: Publicly Available

Water Management Strategies: Agricultural land management, Delivery system efficiency, Floodplain connectivity and rehabilitation, Land Management, On site nonpotable reuse, Reforestation and forest conservation, Riparian buffers, Stream protection and restoration, Urban and industrial nonpotable reuse, Water Conservation and Efficiency, Water Reuse, Wetland protection and restoration

Specific Benefits or Trade-offs: Ambient water quality, Carbon sequestration, Drinking water quality, Habitat and biodiversity, Land and environment, Supply augmentation, Water quality, Water Supply

Quantifying Watershed Restoration Benefits in Community Water Partnership Projects is a report that aims to quantify water-related benefits of Coca-Cola Company watershed protection, water for productive use, and water access projects. The report identifies nine categories of watershed restoration actions, including agricultural land practice changes, stormwater management, land use/land cover alterations, hydraulic/hydrologic waterbody alterations, recaptured leakage from water systems, wastewater treatment, biologic management, water reuse, and rainwater harvesting and aquifer recharge. The benefits quantified within this report include water quantity and water quality (i.e., sediment reduction), and the benefits not quantified include habitat improvement, biodiversity, and carbon sequestration.

Impacts of forest restoration on water yield: A systematic review

Author: Filoso et al., (2017)
Geography: Global
Level of Detail: Qualitative description

Availability: Publicly Available

Water Management Strategies: Land Management, Reforestation and forest conservation

Specific Benefits or Trade-offs: Ambient water quality, Flooding, In stream flows, Land and environment, Peak flood volume, Soil health, Supply augmentation, Total flood volume, Water quality, Water Supply

Impacts of forest restoration on water yield: A systematic review provides an academic review of 666 journals and studies conducted on the impact of forest restoration on water yields. From the works reviewed, forest restoration generally led to decreases in water yields, baseflow, and groundwater temporarily. The report suggests that green water may increase from reforestation, but there is little evidence to suggest that blue water will increase from reforestation.

The Value of Green Infrastructure for Urban Climate Adaptation

Author: Foster, Lowe, & Winkelman, Center for Clean Air Policy (2011)
Geography: Global
Level of Detail: Decision support tool, Economic valuation

Availability: Publicly Available

Water Management Strategies: Conservation design, Distributed Stormwater Infrastructure, Infiltration or filtration, Low impact landscaping, Runoff conveyance, Runoff storage

Specific Benefits or Trade-offs: Aesthetics, Ambient water quality, Community resilience, Demand reduction, End use energy, Energy, Extreme events, Flooding, Peak flood volume, People and Community, Risk and Resilience, System resilience, Total flood volume, Water quality, Water Supply, Water supply reliability

The Value of Green Infrastructure for Urban Climate Adaptation provides a methodology for calculating the costs and benefits of green infrastructure, with particular focus on urban climate adaptation. Benefits of green infrastructure include land value, quality of life, public health, hazard mitigation, and regulatory compliance. In the report, economic analyses are provided for “Eco-Roofs,” Green Alleys and Streets, and Urban Forestry with several case study examples provided.

Freshwater Health Index

Author: Freshwater Health Index (N/A)
Geography: Global
Level of Detail: Decision support tool

Availability: Publicly Available

Water Management Strategies: Land Management

Specific Benefits or Trade-offs: Ambient water quality, Demand reduction, Habitat and biodiversity, Land and environment, People and Community, Recreation, Supply augmentation, Water quality, Water Supply

The Freshwater Health Index provides policy-makers and resource managers with a tool to evaluate policies, management options, and tradeoffs, as well as communicate basin health to the public. The Freshwater Health Index defines freshwater health as the ability to deliver water-related ecosystem services, sustainably and equitably, at the drainage basin scale. Within the Freshwater Health Index, the three components of ecosystem health include ecosystem vitality (i.e., water quantity, water quality, basin condition, and biodiversity), ecosystem services (i.e., provisioning, regulation and support, and cultural), and governance & stakeholders (i.e., enabling environment, stakeholder management, vision and adaptive governance, and effectiveness).

Water-use efficiency and productivity: rethinking the basin approach

Author: Gleick, Smith, & Cooley, (2011)
Geography: Global
Level of Detail: Qualitative description

Availability: Paywall

Water Management Strategies: Agricultural efficiency, Delivery system efficiency, Urban indoor efficiency, Urban outdoor efficiency, Water Conservation and Efficiency

Specific Benefits or Trade-offs: Ambient water quality, Demand reduction, Drinking water quality, End use energy, Energy, Risk and Resilience, Water quality, Water Supply, Water supply reliability

Water-use efficiency and productivity: rethinking the basin approach is a response to a paper in Water International. The paper highlights major components of inefficient water use that were ignored, examines water productivity rather than just water efficiency, and discusses co-benefits. The co-benefits of water-use efficiency examined are improved water quality, increased production, improved water supply reliability, decreased energy demands, and reduced or delayed infrastructure investments.

Green infrastructure and its catchment-scale effects: An emerging science

Author: Golden & Hoghooghi, (2017)
Geography: Global
Level of Detail: Qualitative description

Availability: Publicly Available

Water Management Strategies: Distributed Stormwater Infrastructure

Specific Benefits or Trade-offs: Ambient water quality, Demand reduction, Flooding, Peak flood volume, Supply augmentation, Total flood volume, Water quality, Water Supply

Green infrastructure and its catchment-scale effects: An emerging science provides an overview of past research conducted on the impacts of green infrastructure (GI) and low-impact development (LID) on water quality (i.e. runoff and discharge) and water quantity at localized scales. The report also presents considerations for scaling GI and LID research to the catchment-scale, advances and findings in scaling efforts, and the use of models as tools for scaling.

Beyond the Source: The environmental, economic and community benefits of source water protection

Author: Abell et al., The Nature Conservancy (2017)
Geography: Global
Level of Detail: Decision support tool, Quantitative benefits

Availability: Publicly Available

Water Management Strategies: Agricultural land management, Centralized Stormwater Infrastructure, Constructed stormwater wetlands, Distributed Stormwater Infrastructure, Flood Control, Land Management, Reforestation and forest conservation, Riparian buffers, Wetland protection

Specific Benefits or Trade-offs: Aesthetics, Agriculture, Air quality, Ambient water quality, Carbon sequestration, Community resilience, Extreme events, Habitat and biodiversity, Health and safety, Land and environment, People and Community, Resource recovery, Risk and Resilience, Soil health, System resilience, Water quality, Water supply reliability

Beyond the Source is an in-depth, global study conducted by the Nature Conservancy on source water protection projects. In the report these projects are described as “nature-based solutions” that can improve water quality and quantity. Projects include targeted land protection, revegetation, riparian restoration, agricultural best management practices, ranching best management practices, fire risk management, wetland restoration and creation, and road management. The report provides a qualitative framework as well as quantitative guidance for calculating the multiple benefits.

Using economic valuation techniques to inform water resources management: A survey and critical appraisal of available techniques and an application

Author: Birol, Karousakis, & Koundouri, (2006)
Geography: Global
Level of Detail: Decision support tool, Economic valuation

Availability: Paywall

Water Management Strategies: Land Management

Specific Benefits or Trade-offs: Aesthetics, Ambient water quality, Habitat and biodiversity, In stream flows, Land and environment, Local economy, People and Community, Recreation, Risk and Resilience, Supply augmentation, System resilience, Water quality, Water Supply

Using economic valuation techniques to inform water resources management presents a non-technical introduction to the economic valuation techniques of changes in the quantity and quality of environmental resources, with a specific focus on water. This report includes dozens of relevant articles that provide cost and benefit estimates of various aspects of water resources (e.g. environmental services). It also provides a case study applying the economic valuation techniques to the Cheimaditida wetland in Greece.