Every hectare of intact ecosystem quietly delivers real economic value — pollination, flood buffering, water filtration — that land-use decisions routinely ignore.
service_value(t+1) = value(t) + recovery*investment - land_use_pressure
- Grid resolution — land parcels each scored for ecosystem-service output.
- Conservation investment — share of the landscape actively protected or restored.
- Land-use pressure — rate of conversion to intensive agriculture, mining or urban use.
- Service recovery rate — how fast a protected parcel's service value rebounds.
Natural-capital accounting now lets cities put a real dollar value on the water filtration a wetland provides — often cheaper than building equivalent treatment infrastructure.