Estimating willingness-to-pay for adaptations to climate change in water resources projects: demonstration for Lesotho irrigation investment
A broad set of tools, frameworks, and guidance documents are available for water resources project planning, design, evaluation, and implementation in an ever-evolving world. The principles underlying most of these resources aim to advance the practice of water systems engineering under uncertainty,...
Saved in:
Main Authors: | , , , , , , , , , , |
---|---|
Format: | Article |
Language: | English |
Published: |
Frontiers Media S.A.
2024-12-01
|
Series: | Frontiers in Water |
Subjects: | |
Online Access: | https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/frwa.2024.1442023/full |
Tags: |
Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
|
_version_ | 1846128062640422912 |
---|---|
author | Tolulope Odunola Benjamin Bryant Petrina Rowcroft Samson Zhilyaev Jeremy Richardson Brent Boehlert Diego Castillo Kenneth Strzepek Ethan Myer Casey Brown Patrick Ray |
author_facet | Tolulope Odunola Benjamin Bryant Petrina Rowcroft Samson Zhilyaev Jeremy Richardson Brent Boehlert Diego Castillo Kenneth Strzepek Ethan Myer Casey Brown Patrick Ray |
author_sort | Tolulope Odunola |
collection | DOAJ |
description | A broad set of tools, frameworks, and guidance documents are available for water resources project planning, design, evaluation, and implementation in an ever-evolving world. The principles underlying most of these resources aim to advance the practice of water systems engineering under uncertainty, preserve and enhance project benefits, and achieve investment goals. Approaches to financial and economic evaluation under climate uncertainty in civil infrastructure investments, in particular, are currently being reviewed by academics and practitioners in the field to assess their ability to deliver resilience, sustainability, and equity. In climate-sensitive projects, adaptation measures that help mitigate the adverse effects of climate change and preserve project benefits are required, and stakeholder willingness-to-pay (WTP) for these must be assessed. Typically, stakeholders and decision-makers utilize the outcomes of economic assessment methods such as cost–benefit analysis (CBA) to justify large capital investments. Synthesizing previous advancements in water resources planning and evaluation, this study illustrates how a CBA framework can be augmented by applying a Climate-informed Robustness Index (CRI). The analytics underpinning the CRI, as well as the summary metric itself, help characterize project climate vulnerability, while conducting CBA with and without potential adaptation measures can be used to estimate WTP of investors for adaptation to the identified climate vulnerabilities. The case study of a planned irrigated agriculture project in Lesotho highlights critical climate conditions for which adaptation measures such as integrated catchment management (ICM) plans can be introduced to safeguard project robustness. |
format | Article |
id | doaj-art-cb9fcd61adf54bb38a28b31d75f9f4f6 |
institution | Kabale University |
issn | 2624-9375 |
language | English |
publishDate | 2024-12-01 |
publisher | Frontiers Media S.A. |
record_format | Article |
series | Frontiers in Water |
spelling | doaj-art-cb9fcd61adf54bb38a28b31d75f9f4f62024-12-11T06:44:43ZengFrontiers Media S.A.Frontiers in Water2624-93752024-12-01610.3389/frwa.2024.14420231442023Estimating willingness-to-pay for adaptations to climate change in water resources projects: demonstration for Lesotho irrigation investmentTolulope Odunola0Benjamin Bryant1Petrina Rowcroft2Samson Zhilyaev3Jeremy Richardson4Brent Boehlert5Diego Castillo6Kenneth Strzepek7Ethan Myer8Casey Brown9Patrick Ray10Department of Chemical and Environmental Engineering, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, OH, United StatesMillennium Challenge Corporation, Washington, DC, United StatesPegasys, London, United KingdomDepartment of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA, United StatesPegasys, London, United KingdomIndustrial Economics, Incorporated (IEc), Cambridge, MA, United StatesIndustrial Economics, Incorporated (IEc), Cambridge, MA, United StatesIndustrial Economics, Incorporated (IEc), Cambridge, MA, United StatesMillennium Challenge Corporation, Washington, DC, United StatesDepartment of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA, United StatesDepartment of Chemical and Environmental Engineering, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, OH, United StatesA broad set of tools, frameworks, and guidance documents are available for water resources project planning, design, evaluation, and implementation in an ever-evolving world. The principles underlying most of these resources aim to advance the practice of water systems engineering under uncertainty, preserve and enhance project benefits, and achieve investment goals. Approaches to financial and economic evaluation under climate uncertainty in civil infrastructure investments, in particular, are currently being reviewed by academics and practitioners in the field to assess their ability to deliver resilience, sustainability, and equity. In climate-sensitive projects, adaptation measures that help mitigate the adverse effects of climate change and preserve project benefits are required, and stakeholder willingness-to-pay (WTP) for these must be assessed. Typically, stakeholders and decision-makers utilize the outcomes of economic assessment methods such as cost–benefit analysis (CBA) to justify large capital investments. Synthesizing previous advancements in water resources planning and evaluation, this study illustrates how a CBA framework can be augmented by applying a Climate-informed Robustness Index (CRI). The analytics underpinning the CRI, as well as the summary metric itself, help characterize project climate vulnerability, while conducting CBA with and without potential adaptation measures can be used to estimate WTP of investors for adaptation to the identified climate vulnerabilities. The case study of a planned irrigated agriculture project in Lesotho highlights critical climate conditions for which adaptation measures such as integrated catchment management (ICM) plans can be introduced to safeguard project robustness.https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/frwa.2024.1442023/fullwillingness-to-payadaptationsLesotho irrigationclimate change uncertaintyrobust water investmentscost benefit analysis |
spellingShingle | Tolulope Odunola Benjamin Bryant Petrina Rowcroft Samson Zhilyaev Jeremy Richardson Brent Boehlert Diego Castillo Kenneth Strzepek Ethan Myer Casey Brown Patrick Ray Estimating willingness-to-pay for adaptations to climate change in water resources projects: demonstration for Lesotho irrigation investment Frontiers in Water willingness-to-pay adaptations Lesotho irrigation climate change uncertainty robust water investments cost benefit analysis |
title | Estimating willingness-to-pay for adaptations to climate change in water resources projects: demonstration for Lesotho irrigation investment |
title_full | Estimating willingness-to-pay for adaptations to climate change in water resources projects: demonstration for Lesotho irrigation investment |
title_fullStr | Estimating willingness-to-pay for adaptations to climate change in water resources projects: demonstration for Lesotho irrigation investment |
title_full_unstemmed | Estimating willingness-to-pay for adaptations to climate change in water resources projects: demonstration for Lesotho irrigation investment |
title_short | Estimating willingness-to-pay for adaptations to climate change in water resources projects: demonstration for Lesotho irrigation investment |
title_sort | estimating willingness to pay for adaptations to climate change in water resources projects demonstration for lesotho irrigation investment |
topic | willingness-to-pay adaptations Lesotho irrigation climate change uncertainty robust water investments cost benefit analysis |
url | https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/frwa.2024.1442023/full |
work_keys_str_mv | AT tolulopeodunola estimatingwillingnesstopayforadaptationstoclimatechangeinwaterresourcesprojectsdemonstrationforlesothoirrigationinvestment AT benjaminbryant estimatingwillingnesstopayforadaptationstoclimatechangeinwaterresourcesprojectsdemonstrationforlesothoirrigationinvestment AT petrinarowcroft estimatingwillingnesstopayforadaptationstoclimatechangeinwaterresourcesprojectsdemonstrationforlesothoirrigationinvestment AT samsonzhilyaev estimatingwillingnesstopayforadaptationstoclimatechangeinwaterresourcesprojectsdemonstrationforlesothoirrigationinvestment AT jeremyrichardson estimatingwillingnesstopayforadaptationstoclimatechangeinwaterresourcesprojectsdemonstrationforlesothoirrigationinvestment AT brentboehlert estimatingwillingnesstopayforadaptationstoclimatechangeinwaterresourcesprojectsdemonstrationforlesothoirrigationinvestment AT diegocastillo estimatingwillingnesstopayforadaptationstoclimatechangeinwaterresourcesprojectsdemonstrationforlesothoirrigationinvestment AT kennethstrzepek estimatingwillingnesstopayforadaptationstoclimatechangeinwaterresourcesprojectsdemonstrationforlesothoirrigationinvestment AT ethanmyer estimatingwillingnesstopayforadaptationstoclimatechangeinwaterresourcesprojectsdemonstrationforlesothoirrigationinvestment AT caseybrown estimatingwillingnesstopayforadaptationstoclimatechangeinwaterresourcesprojectsdemonstrationforlesothoirrigationinvestment AT patrickray estimatingwillingnesstopayforadaptationstoclimatechangeinwaterresourcesprojectsdemonstrationforlesothoirrigationinvestment |