Our Current Projects
Development of a national Seagrass Policy for Belize
This project, funded by WWF Mesoamerica aims to inform seagrass management in Belize through four objectives: (1) collaborate with local stakeholders; (2) assess and map seagrass distribution, condition, risks, and human dimensions; (3) prioritize areas for seagrass protection including consideration of land-based impacts, and (4) co-develop a seagrass management policy that incorporates monitoring and evaluation of implementation success. The approach integrates local stakeholder guidance and information with existing high quality spatial data products on seagrass distributions, ecological connectivity, development risk to habitats, degradation, as well as the importance of existing and emerging conservation measures such as marine protected areas. The prioritization analysis updates previous InVEST model implementation in Belize to map seagrass habitat risk (HRA), and ecosystem service benefits as quantified by the Caribbean spiny lobster production, Tourism, and Coastal Vulnerability models.
Assessment of Biological Carrying Capacity in the Pūpūkea MLCD
Marine protected areas (MPAs) provide a range of benefits to humans, including providing recreational and tourism opportunities. However, like other human activities, tourism can have environmental impacts.
Damage to corals and other species from divers and snorkelers are among a range of tourism impacts documented in MPAs worldwide. Mitigating these impacts is a key aspect of MPA management and the key is assessing the number of tourists and other visitors an MPA can support – it’s carrying capacity. The number of people an area can support without unacceptable impacts to the environment. Under too much pressure from visitors, the ecosystem and/or physical attributes of a site can degrade making it less attractive to tourists.
Mālama Pūpūkea-Waimea (MPW,) a marine stewardship non-profit, was established by community members in 2005 to provide outreach and education and care for the marine life of the MLCD. Since 2012, MPW has commissioned and collaborated on a number of scientific and citizen science surveys to better understand the status and threats to the area’s marine life and recently drafted the first management plan for the area. Informed by this experience and data and in response to increasing visitation and a continued decline in marine life abundance and health, MPW commissioned Kosta Stamoulis (Seascape Solutions) in 2022 to conduct a study to investigate biological carrying capacity in the Kapoʻo area of the Pūpūkea MLCD.
In parallel with this study, MPW was successful in passing legislation (Hawaii state Act 31) to fund a pilot program to assess biological carrying capacity. The pilot program is currently underway and builds on the approach and findings of this research and Kosta continues to contribute as a technical advisor.
Strong Coast Project
Coastal zones provide key services to local communities but also carry significant risks from the land and ocean including threats from waves, storm surges, floods, and sea level rise, all of which are increasing with climate change. Protecting and restoring coastal ecosystems such as coral reefs and mangroves can help mitigate these threats while also supporting local economies and societal resilience.
This project explores risks and benefits to communities in tropical coral reef-dependent communities where replenishing coral reef and mangrove ecosystems has been piloted and can be scaled up to regional and national management levels as Nature-based Solutions (NBS).
This project is co-creating new knowledge with coastal communities in Florida, the US Virgin Islands, and Belize on how NBS can help address climate risk and provide equitable cobenefits.
The team's complementary expertise in engineering, ecology, and social sciences, linking seven academic institutions, multiple local partners, and cross-regional organizations, expands the scope of potential research outcomes to the entire US and ultimately to global tropical coastlines beyond the three focus regions. This convergence research approach advances the quantitative, data-driven evaluation of NBS for hazard risk reduction through the assessment of ecosystem social and economic co-benefits. Project results support the development of effective policy changes, community engagement, engineering guidance, and incentives and innovative financing for NBS.
The research is standardizing monitoring and analysis methods to allow for effective mainstreaming of active coastal sustainability management solutions.
The expanded and standardized use of NBS also opens the opportunity to broaden participation of diverse stakeholders in the climate adaptation process.
(more info here)
People, Planet, Prosperity Project
Despite growing recognition that healthy, functioning ecosystems are fundamental to achieving food and water security, poverty reduction, and sustainable development, the values provided by nature are not widely integrated into policy and investment decisions.
In response, the Natural Capital Project, the Asian Development Bank, and the Inter-American Development Bank are working with 10 pilot countries (Armenia, Belize, Chile, China, Colombia, Cook Islands, Ecuador, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, and Uruguay) to co-develop rapid natural capital approaches that directly inform policy and investment decisions for development and conservation goals, with the goal of scaling up these approaches around the world.
The project team is co-developing natural capital approaches in each pilot country – along with local government partners and local experts – in order to inform priority policy or finance decisions.
To help scale and mainstream these approaches, the project team is developing a standardized framework, training curricula and customizable tools for global application of rapid natural capital approaches, demonstrating and sharing different pathways for policy and finance interventions.
(more info here)
Addressing land-based source pollution on the north shore of Kaua‘i
Water pollution from cesspools threatens the health, economy, and quality of life of residents of Hanalei and nearby communities. Cesspools, a type of antiquated wastewater treatment system where untreated sewage is discharged directly into the ground with minimal filtration, are still used across the Hawaiian Islands and Hanalei is home to over 150 cesspools. We partnered with the Hanalei Initiative to create a web map of existing wastewater systems in the region and rank their relative risk to the environment and human health. Click on the image to the left to view the map. This information is a resource for the community and will be used to prioritize cesspools for upgrades to more environmentally friendly systems.
Building off this work, Seascape Solutions in partnership with the Hanalei Initiative was successful in obtaining funding from the USDA to develop and implement a science-based, spatiallyexplicit evaluation of alternative wastewater treatment scenarios that consider future climate impacts and provide outreach and training to homeowners and other stakeholder groups in Hanalei. In collaboration with community members, County officials, and other stakeholders, we will develop a portfolio of mapped wastewater treatment scenarios for Hanalei. The focus will be on Hawaii Department of Health-approved (permitted) technologies ranging from individual systems to community sewer. Scenario planning will be informed by groundwater elevation monitoring, all relevant and available spatial datasets, future sea-level rise and rainfall predictions, and expert inputs.
A cost-benefit analysis will then be carried out to compare each wastewater treatment scenario in terms of capital costs of planning, equipment, installation, maintenance, etc., and benefits in terms of estimated reductions in wastewater pollutants. Geographic information systems (GIS) will be applied to compile and analyze all relevant spatial data to inform cost estimates and modeling of environmental impacts in terms of pollutant export (fecal indicator bacteria (FIBs) and nutrients) by watershed and community. The environmental benefits of each scenario will be calculated as the reduction of pollutants compared to current or baseline conditions while considering the effects of climate change.
Training and outreach to homeowners and other stakeholder groups will be conducted in parallel with the cost-benefit analysis. This will include training for homeowners on individual wastewater system maintenance and government funding opportunities for wastewater system upgrades, training for builders/contractors on best practices for system installation to minimize environmental impacts as well as several demonstration events targeted at these groups as well as local and County engineers. Finally, the results of the cost-benefit analysis will be presented to the communities in the service area as well as Kauai County officials and other stakeholders.