ULTRA-Ex: Collaborative Research: Reconciling Human and Natural Systems for the Equitable Provision of Ecosystem Services in the Triangle of North Carolina

人类福祉与生态系统服务的提供密不可分，生态系统服务提供了人与自然系统之间的关键联系。城市人口同时增加了对自然系统提供有价值的生态系统服务的需求，同时也降低了提供有价值的生态系统服务的能力，因此迫切需要地方和区域的政策和管理解决方案走在科学研究的前列。然而，人类机构的边界很少与自然边界重合，这使得管理耦合的人类和自然系统成为一个挑战。这两个系统的规模也不同：人类机构往往做出“快速和本地”的决定。而这些决定的环境后果往往是地区性的和长期的。这一合作研究项目的总体目标是开始调和人类与自然系统之间的空间和时间差异，重点关注在市场和政策工具控制生态系统服务的供需时出现的社会和环境公平问题。该项目将重点放在北卡罗来纳州的三角地区，该地区有45个市和7个县政府，并有协作管理的体制机制。该区域正在经历人口的高速增长，这对生态系统服务以及负责管理其供应和分配的人类机构的需求越来越大。研究人员将使用一个由三部分组成的框架，解决(1)生态系统生产生态系统服务；(2)人类对生态系统服务的估值和货币化；以及(3)公平支付和分配这些好处的政策的设计、实施和评估。项目目标是与州和地方政府机构合作，将这一框架应用于清洁水生产的生态系统服务的案例研究；通过一系列侧重于生态、经济、政策和综合主题的四个社区研讨会，进一步发展合作伙伴网络；并开发一个综合数据平台，将服务于研究人员、政府机构，并最终服务于广大公众。研究人员将使用基于经验和过程的建模、野外采样、遥感、地理信息系统、社会调查和地理人口分析来实现他们的目标。该项目预计将有助于更丰富地理解生态系统服务的生产作为空间整合的建筑和自然环境的功能，并为专注于管理人与自然耦合系统的多学科和政策相关项目奠定基础。关于土地利用和水质的初步案例研究将涵盖当今城市生态中的许多核心挑战，包括规模、空间过程和系统级反馈问题。从长远来看，将生态系统服务的流动从生产地映射到消费地的努力，将为空间上明确的估值设定一个新的标准。该项目将有助于解决城市系统空间结构环境中人类行为与机构和生态系统过程之间的反馈问题。在该项目过程中产生的信息将帮助土地使用规划者和政策制定者确定最适当的土地使用控制区域，以保护水质，更公平地分配生产清洁水的成本，并制定政策，支持公平分配清洁水的成本和收益。总体而言，项目成果将有助于为生态系统服务的新兴政策工具和市场提供科学基础，并有助于指导三角区域的土地利用规划决策。该奖项是由美国国家科学基金会和美国农业部林业局联合支持的一项特别竞赛的结果，作为城市长期研究区域探索(ULTRA-EX)奖的资助。

Human well-being is tied inextricably to the delivery of ecosystem services, which provide a key connection between human and natural systems. Urban populations are simultaneously increasing demand on and reducing the capacity of natural systems to provide valued ecosystem services, contributing to an urgent call for local and regional policy and management solutions to be at the forefront of scientific investigation. The boundaries of human institutions rarely coincide with natural boundaries, however, making the management of coupled human and natural systems a challenge. These two systems also are scaled differently: human institutions tend to make decisions that are "fast and local,"? while the environmental consequences of these decisions tend to be regional and long-term. The overarching goal of this collaborative research project is to begin to reconcile the spatial and temporal disparities between human and natural systems, with a focus on social and environmental equity issues that arise when markets and policy instruments control the supply and demand of ecosystem services. This project will focus on the Triangle Region of North Carolina, which has 45 municipal and 7 county governments with an institutional mechanism for collaborative management. The region is experiencing high population growth, putting increasing demands on ecosystem services and the human institutions responsible for managing their supply and distribution. The investigators will use a three-part framework that addresses (1) the production of ecosystem services by ecological systems; (2) their valuation and monetization by people; and (3) the design, implementation, and evaluation of policies to pay for and allocate these benefits equitably. Project objectives are to apply this framework in a case study of the ecosystem service of clean water production in collaboration with state and local government agencies; to further develop a network of collaborators through a series of four community workshops focused on ecological, economic, policy, and synthesis topics; and to develop an integrated data platform that will serve researchers, government agencies, and ultimately the public at large. The investigators will employ empirical and process-based modeling, field sampling, remote sensing, geographic information systems, social surveys, and geo-demographic analyses to achieve their objectives.This project is expected to contribute to a richer understanding of the production of ecosystem services as a function of spatially integrated built and natural environments and to set the foundation for a multi-disciplinary and policy-relevant program focused on managing coupled human and natural systems. The initial case study on land use and water quality will embrace many of the central challenges in urban ecology today, including issues of scale, spatial processes, and system-level feedbacks. Over the longer term, the effort to map the flow of ecosystem services from where they are produced to where they are consumed will set a new standard for spatially explicit valuation. This project will help resolve questions about feedbacks between human behavior and institutions and ecosystem processes in the spatially structured environment of urban systems. The information produced during the course of this project will help land-use planners and policy makers to identify the most appropriate areas for land-use controls aimed at protecting water quality, to more equitably distribute the costs of producing clean water, and to create policy to support the equitable distribution of the costs and benefits of clean water. Overall, project results will help provide the scientific basis for emerging policy instruments and markets for ecosystem services and to help guide land-use planning decisions in the Triangle Region. This award was funded as an Urban Long-Term Research Area Exploratory (ULTRA-Ex) award as the result of a special competition jointly supported by the National Science Foundation and the U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest Service.