1453 Accounting for Urban Trees
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1453 Accounting for urban trees Revising the VAT03 compensation value model Laura Lauwers David N. Barton Stefan Blumentrath Anders Often Megan Nowell NINA Publications NINA Report (NINA Rapport) This is NINA’s ordinary form of reporting completed research, monitoring or review work to clients. In addition, the series will include much of the institute’s other reporting, for example from seminars and conferences, results of internal research and review work and literature studies, etc. NINA Re- port may also be issued in a second language where appropriate. NINA Special Report (NINA Temahefte) As the name suggests, special reports deal with special subjects. Special reports are produced as required and the series ranges widely: from systematic identification keys to information on im- portant problem areas in society. NINA special reports are usually given a popular scientific form with more weight on illustrations than a NINA Report. NINA Factsheet (NINA Fakta) Factsheets have as their goal to make NINA’s research results quickly and easily accessible to the general public. Fact sheets give a short presentation of some of our most important research themes. Other publishing In addition to reporting in NINA’s own series, the institute’s employees publish a large proportion of their scientific results in international journals, popular science books and magazines. Accounting for urban trees Revising the VAT03 compensation value model Laura Lauwers David N. Barton Stefan Blumentrath Anders Often Megan Nowell Norwegian Institute for Nature Research NINA Report 1453 Lauwers, L., Barton, D.N., Blumentrath, S. & Often, A. 2017. Accounting for urban trees. Updating the VAT03 compensation value model. NINA Report 1453. Norwegian Institute for Nature Research. Oslo, December, 2017 ISSN: 1504-3312 ISBN: 978-82-426-3184-8 COPYRIGHT © Norwegian Institute for Nature Research The publication may be freely cited where the source is acknowledged AVAILABILITY Open PUBLICATION TYPE Digital document (pdf) EDITION 1st QUALITY CONTROLLED BY Erik Framstad SIGNATURE OF RESPONSIBLE PERSON Research Director Erik Framstad (sign.) CLIENT(S)/SUBSCRIBER(S) Research Council of Norway CLIENT(S) REFERENCE(S) This research was carried out by L. Lauwers with support by MILJØFORSK programme, The Re- search Council of Norway, contract #255156 (URBAN EEA). D.N. Barton acknowledges support from the project ENABLE, funded through the 2015–2016 BiodivERsA COFUND call for research proposals, with the national funders The Swedish Research Council for Environment, Agricultural Sciences, and Spatial Planning, Swedish Environmental Protection Agency, German Aeronautics and Space Research Centre, National Science Centre (Poland), The Research Council of Norway (contract #268742) and the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness. CLIENTS/SUBSCRIBER CONTACT PERSON(S) Jonas Enge (URBAN EEA) and Mari S. Sollerød (ENABLE), Research Council of Norway COVER PICTURE Sculpture: Frondi tenere e bella (2015) Artist: Fredrik Raddum Oslo Kommunes Kunstsamling object number OKK.01304 Photo: David N. Barton KEY WORDS - Experimental ecosystem accounting - Economic valuation - Compensation value - Replacement value - Urban ecosystem services - City trees Økosystemregnskap NØKKELORD - Økonomisk verdsetting - Urbane økosystemtjenester - Kompensasjonsverdi - Erstatningsverdi - Bytrær CONTACT DETAILS NINA head office NINA Oslo NINA Tromsø NINA Lillehammer NINA Bergen: P.O.Box 5685 Torgarden Gaustadalléen 21 P.O.Box 6606 Langnes Vormstuguvegen 40 Thormøhlensgate 55 NO-7485 Trondheim NO-0349 Oslo NO-9296 Tromsø NO-2624 Lillehammer NO-5006 Bergen. Norway Norway Norway Norway Norway P: +47 73 80 14 00 P: +47 73 80 14 P: +47 77 75 04 00 P: +47 73 80 14 00 P: +47 73 80 14 00 00 www.nina.no 2 NINA Report 1453 Abstract Lauwers, L., Barton, D.N., Blumentrath, S. & Often, A. 2017. Accounting for urban trees. Updating the VAT03 compensation value model. NINA Report 1453. Norwegian Institute for Nature Re- search. Urban trees provide a range of cultural, provisioning, regulating and supporting ecosystem ser- vices. Despite trees’ important role in the urban environment, Norway lacks a system to value urban trees that is adapted to conditions in cities in Norway. Currently the VAT03 valuation system, de- veloped by Randrup et al. (2003) in Denmark, is used without adjustment by tree appraisers in Norway. VAT03 is used to estimate a monetary compensation value for trees damaged or killed on both municipal and private land. Nevertheless, the method’s application in Norway to date has lacked a standard for appraisal and calibration across valuation cases. In this report we test the VAT03 method in Oslo and propose and test a more detailed documenta- tion of tree characteristics. We evaluate the effect of adding more information about trees using uncertainty analysis. We demonstrate how VAT03 can be used for accounting of the total compen- sation value of trees at street, district and citywide level. We applied the VAT03 model to a random selection of 82 trees in the greenest streets of each city district in Oslo, Norway. The greenest streets were identified using Lidar scanning data of tree point densities. The greenest streets in each city district were chosen with an awareness raising purpose in mind. We used the modelling tool Bayesian Belief Networks (BBN) to replicate the VAT03 formula struc- ture as a network model. BBNs make it possible to carry out advanced uncertainty analysis on models with a hierarchical structure – such as VAT03 – and to assess the relative information value of different variables. The appraisal of the different variables in the VAT03 model and the proposal for a more detailed approach to documentation contribute to the process of revising the VAT sys- tem, adapting it to conditions in Norwegian cities. Laura M. Lauwers, Scheldestraat 23, 9040 Gent (Belgium), [email protected] David N. Barton, [email protected] Stefan Blumentrath, [email protected] Anders Often, [email protected] Megan Nowell, [email protected] 3 NINA Report 1453 Sammendrag Lauwers, L., Barton, D.N., Blumentrath, S. & Often, A. 2017. Accounting for urban trees. Updating the VAT03 compensation value model. NINA Report 1453. Norsk Institutt for Naturforskning Bytrær gir en rekke økosystem-tjenester til byens befolkning, deriblant regulerende tjenester som luftrensing og vannhåndtering; de utgjør habitat for et mangfold av arter, som igjen er viktig for opplevelse av livskraftige grønne byrom. På tross av bytrærenes viktige rolle som grønn infrastruk- tur, mangler Norge et system for verdisetting av bytrær som er tilpasset lokale forhold i våre byer. I dag brukes systemet “verdsetting av trær’ fra 2003 – kjent som VAT03 – som er utviklet av Randrup et al. (2003) i Danmark. VAT03 brukes til å beregne en kompensasjonsverdi for trær som ødelegges både på private og kommunal grunn. VAT03 brukes i dag av arborister uten tilpasninger til forhold i våre byer. Metoden mangler et system for dokumentasjon og kalibrering av ekspert- skjønnet som utøves, basert på en sammenligning på tvers av et større erfaringsgrunnlag. Her rapporterer vi en test av VAT03 i Oslo. Vi tester en mer detaljert dokumentasjon av tre-egen- skaper som er grunnlag for verdivurderingene. Vi vurderer effekten av å legge mer detaljert infor- masjonen til VAT03 modellen ved hjelp av usikkerhetsanalyse. Vi demonstrerer hvordan VAT03 kan brukes i et grønt byregnskap og til formidling om verdien av bytrær på gateplan, per bydel og for byen som helhet. Vi har teste VAT03 på et tilfeldig utvalg på 82 trær i de grønneste gatene i Oslo. De grønneste gatene i Oslo ble definert som gatene med høyeste tetthet av gatetrær (utenom byens parker). De grønneste gatene ble valgt for å øke oppmerksomheten om bytrær og deres verdi i Oslo. Vi brukte et modell verktøy – Bayesianske sannsynlighetsnettverk (BBN) – til å reprodusere forme- len til VAT03 som et nettverk. Sannsynlighetsmodellen brukes til å utføre usikkerhetsanalyse på VAT03 for å vurdere informasjonsinnholdet i hver av variablene i forhold til verdien som beregnes. Usikkerhetsanalyse kan brukes som grunnlag for å revidere modellstrukturen. Forslaget vårt til mer detaljert dokumentasjon kan være grunnlag for arbeid med standardisering av VAT03 for norske byer. Laura M. Lauwers, Scheldestraat 23, 9040 Gent (Belgium), [email protected] David N. Barton, [email protected] Stefan Blumentrath, [email protected] Anders Often, [email protected] Megan Nowell, [email protected] 4 NINA Report 1453 Contents Abstract .......................................................................................................................................3 Sammendrag ...............................................................................................................................4 Contents ......................................................................................................................................5 Foreword .....................................................................................................................................6 1 Introduction ............................................................................................................................ 7 2 Guidelines ............................................................................................................................ 10 2.1 Revised field evaluation form .......................................................................................