More green infrastructure is required to maintain ecosystem services under current trends in land-use change in Europe

Abstract

Green infrastructure (GI), a network of nature, semi-natural areas and green space, delivers essential ecosystem services which underpin human well-being and quality of life. Maintaining ecosystem services through the development of GI is therefore increasingly recognized by policies as a strategy to cope with potentially changing conditions in the future. This paper assessed how current trends of land-use change have an impact on the aggregated provision of eight ecosystem services at the regional scale of the European Union, measured by the Total Ecosystem Services Index (TESI8). Moreover, the paper reports how further implementation of GI across Europe can help maintain ecosystem services at baseline levels. Current demographic, economic and agricultural trends, which affect land use, were derived from the so called Reference Scenario. This scenario is established by the European Commission to assess the impact of energy and climate policy up to 2050. Under the Reference Scenario, economic growth, coupled with the total population, stimulates increasing urban and industrial expansion. TESI8 is expected to decrease across Europe between 0 and 5 % by 2020 and between 10 and 15 % by 2050 relative to the base year 2010. Based on regression analysis, we estimated that every additional percent increase of the proportion of artificial land needs to be compensated with an increase of 2.2 % of land that qualifies as green infrastructure in order to maintain ecosystem services at 2010 levels.

Bundles of ecosystem (dis)services and multifunctionality across European landscapes

“…The number, types and spatial distribution of ES bundles are sensitive to the individual ES selected and the input data available to define these services. Outcomes from our assessment converge with Maes et al (2015) for the high multifunctionality in forested regions (e.g.…”

“…Ruijs et al, 2013;Crouzat et al 2015) scale. Even fewer have mapped the supply (actual or potential) of multiple ES across land use types over large geographic scales (but see Maes et al, 2015, Stoll et al, 2015. To our knowledge to date no study has attempted to identify the drivers of ES bundles at these scales, and specifically in the EU.…”

Combining the Conservation of Biodiversity with the Provision of Ecosystem Services in Urban Green Infrastructure Planning: Critical Features Arising from a Case Study in the Metropolitan Area of Rome

“…One of the main concerns regarding the persistence of urban biodiversity is the reduction, fragmentation and isolation of natural habitats and communities [73][74][75]. The effects of such pressure are usually recognized through structural connectivity measures that consider the spatial arrangement of remaining natural ecosystems in a transformed landscape mosaic [76,77].…”

Categorização da infraestrutura verde do município de Sorocaba (SP) para criação de um sistema municipal integrando espaços livres e áreas protegidas

“…Uma estratégia para a promoção da expansão de áreas protegidas e áreas verdes é a integração com a implantação de corredores ecológicos. Segundo Maes et al (2015), a conexão de áreas protegidas urbanas por meio de um modelo integrado é essencial para a manutenção da biodiversidade e de serviços fundamentais do ecossistema. Os autores destacam ainda que a IVU das cidades está vinculada à saúde humana por meio dos serviços ecossistêmicos que são prestados por parques urbanos, cinturões verdes periurbanos, ou florestas e áreas semi-naturais que cercam as cidades.…”