A Statistical Outlook for the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill

A review of methodologies and success indicators for coastal wetland restoration

“…The US government enforced the regulatory policy of 'no net loss' of wetlands, combined with a focus on wetlands banking to ensure minimum impacts on wetlands. The importance of this issue is exemplified by the fact that coastal wetlands restoration is regarded as part of British Petroleum's (BP) obligation due to the regulations of the Oil Pollution Act of 1990 (Barbier, 2011). Coastal wetland restoration and creation have also been listed as important themes in recent international wetlands and ecological conferences (MEA, 2005).…”

Valuing Ecosystem Services for Coastal Wetland Protection and Restoration: Progress and Challenges

“…This method is frequently used in circumstances where an ecological service is unique to a specific ecosystem and is difficult to value, so that the cost of replacing the service or treating the damages arising from the loss of the service is estimated instead. However, economists urge caution in using the replacement cost approach as it has a tendency to overestimate values [16][17][18]23,56]. This method can provide a reliable valuation estimation for an ecological service, but only if the following conditions are met: (1) the considered alternative provides the same services; (2) the considered alternative is the least-cost alternative; (3) there is substantial evidence that society would demand the service if the least-cost alternative provides it [56].…”

“…Barbier [23] discusses the pros and cons of HEA from both an ecological and economic perspective. The HEA approach places restoration at the beginning of the NRDA process, which may expedite both restoration and compensation and avoids protracted and costly litigation as well as the need for expensive valuation studies.…”

“…These historic trends in Gulf Coast wetlands result from flooding from storms in the Gulf, sea level rise, flooding from rivers, natural land subsidence, and human-related activities, such as drainage, filling, canal dredging for navigation, construction of levees and other flood control structures, and coastal development [23,24].…”

“…Since Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005, ambitious plans have been put forward for restoring wetlands along the U.S. Gulf Coast as natural protection barriers against future hurricane damages [23,24,[26][27][28]. For example, the President's Gulf Coast Ecosystem Restoration Task Force recommends extensive wetland restoration, given that the "Gulf's wetlands provide a natural flood attenuation function, which may reduce the impacts of flooding associated with storms" [28].…”