Envisioning Skagit Alternative Futures

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Envisioning Skagit Alternative Futures
John Bolte Biological and Ecological Engineering
Department Oregon State University
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Alternative Futures Projects

• Examine multiple scenarios of trends and
  assumptions about future conditions, generally
  using one or more models of change,
• Assist in incorporating stakeholder interactions
  to define goals, constraints, trajectories,
  drivers, outcomes
• Allow visualization of the results in a variety
  of types and formats
• Ultimately are intended to assist in improving
  land management decision-making and informing
  choices

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An Approach to Projecting Alternative Future
Landscapes

• Based on modeling behavior and actions of
  individual land owners/land managers (actors)
• Our approach spatially explicit, represents land
  management decisions of those with authority over
  parcels of land
• Actor decisions implemented through policies that
  guide constrain potential actions
• Autonomous processes (e.g. succession)
  simultaneously modeled

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Envision Conceptual Structure
Actors Decision-makers managing the landscape by
selecting policies responsive to their objectives
Landscape Production Models Generating Landscape
Metrics Reflecting Ecosystem Service Productions
LandscapeFeedbacks
Landscape Spatial Container in
which landscape
changes, ES Metrics are
depicted
Multiagent Decision-making Select policies and
generate land management decision affecting
landscape pattern
Scenario Definition
LandscapeFeedbacks
Policies Fundamental Descriptors of constraints
and actions defining land use management
decisionmaking
Autonomous Change Processes Models of
Non-anthropogenic Landscape Change
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ENVISION Triad of Relationships
Goals
Actors
Policies
Values
Intentions

• Economic Services
• Ecosystem Services
• Socio-cultural Services

Provide a common frame of reference for actors,
policies and landscape productions
Landscapes
Metrics of Production
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Policy Definition

• Landscape policies are decisions or plans of
  action for accomplishing desired outcomes.
•  from
• Lackey, R.T. 2006. Axioms of ecological policy.
  Fisheries. 31(6) 286-290. 

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Policies in ENVISION

• Policies are a decision or plan of action for
  accomplishing a desired outcome they are a
  fundamental unit of computation in Evoland
• Describe actions available to actors
• Primary Characteristics
• Applicable Site Attributes (Spatial Query)
• Effectiveness of the Policy (determined by
  evaluative models)
• Outcomes (possible multiple) associated with the
  selection and application of the Policy
• Example Purchase conservations easement to
  allow revegetation of degraded riparian areas in
  areas with no built structures and high channel
  migration capacity when native fish habitat
  becomes scarce

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Models in ENVISION

• Models are plug-ins of two types
• Autonomous Processes Represent processes
  causing landscape changes independent of human
  decision-making e.g. climate change, vegetative
  succession, forest growth, fire, flooding, ???
• Evaluative Models Generate production
  statistics and report back how well the landscape
  is doing a producing metrics of interest e.g.
  carbon sequestration, habitat production, land
  availability, risk, ???

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Models in ENVISION

• A well-defined, relatively simple, yet robust
  interface specification is defined for both
  Autonomous Processes and Evaluative Models.
• Models can expose input and output variables
• Models have full access to the underlying spatial
  representation, policy sets, exposed variables,
  actor representation, and spatial engine
• Models can make changes to the underlying
  landscape representation
• Envision automatically manages all exposed model
  data

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ENVISION FrameworkAndrews Application
Data Sources
Evaluative Models
Parcels (IDUs)
Mean Age at Harvest
Policy Set(s)
Carbon Sequestration
Agent Descriptors
Forest Products Extraction
ENVISION
Autonomous Process Models
Harvested Acreage
Rural Residential Expansion
Fish Habitat (IBI)
Vegetative Succession
Resource Lands Protection
Climate Change
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Envision Andrews Study Area
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Envision Andrews - Scenarios

• Conservation - no Climate Change
• Development - no Climate Change
• Conservation - with Climate Change
• Development - with Climate Change

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Demonstration

• Envision

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Scenario Results Forest Carbon
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Scenario Results Forest Product Extraction
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Scenario Results Fish IBI
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A possible approach for the Skagit

• Use a mixture of parcel-level data, land use/land
  cover, and zoning to establish decision units
  (IDU coverage)
• Develop sets of policy alternatives, focusing on
  those landscape areas of primary interest to the
  project, and addressing land management
  alternatives that represents a range of possible
  management approaches
• Define several scenarios reflecting 1) plan trend
  , and 2) scenarios addressing key stakeholder
  alternatives in terms of alternative policy sets
• Evaluate the resulting landscape trajectories
  with defensible models of key metrics relevant to
  stakeholder goals.