Protecting local water quality has global benefits
John A Downing1,2,3, Stephen Polasky4,5, Sheila M Olmstead6,7
1Minnesota Sea Grant, University of Minnesota, Duluth, MN, 55812-1198, USA. downing@umn.edu.
Nature Communications
|May 12, 2021
Summary
Protecting surface water quality offers significant global benefits. Eutrophication-driven methane emissions from lakes carry a global social cost of $7.5-$81 trillion, far exceeding local recreational values.
Area of Science:
- Environmental Science
- Climate Science
- Water Resource Management
Background:
- Surface water is a critical resource, yet cost-benefit analyses often undervalue water quality protection.
- Existing studies frequently overlook the global climate impacts of water pollution, particularly methane emissions.
- Human-induced nutrient enrichment (eutrophication) in lakes is a significant, yet under-quantified, source of greenhouse gases.
Purpose of the Study:
- To quantify the global social cost of methane emissions from eutrophic lakes.
- To compare the global climate benefits of mitigating lake eutrophication with local economic benefits.
- To highlight the importance of considering global externalities in water quality assessments.
Main Methods:
- Utilized recent advances in global water science to calculate methane emissions from lakes due to eutrophication.
- Estimated the present value of global social costs of these emissions from 2015 to 2050.
- Conducted a case study on Lake Erie to compare global climate benefits with local use values.
Main Results:
- The global social cost of eutrophication-driven methane emissions from lakes is estimated between $7.5 and $81 trillion (2015 $US).
- For Lake Erie, the global value of avoiding eutrophication was found to be 10 times greater than local benefits from beach use or sport fishing.
- This indicates substantial underestimation of water quality protection benefits in traditional economic assessments.
Conclusions:
- Failure to account for global climate damages from water pollution leads to paradoxical benefit-cost analyses.
- Mitigating lake eutrophication provides substantial global climate benefits that significantly outweigh local economic values.
- Incorporating global externalities is crucial for accurate water resource management and policy decisions.
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