Bringing Beauty to Account in the Environmental Impact Statement: The Contingent Valuation of Landscape Aesthetics

Abstract

Landscape aesthetic values can easily be overlooked or undervalued in the environmental impact statement (EIS) process. Public sector projects may underestimate the aesthetic damage they cause, which, if fully considered, could alter the types of projects undertaken or the form those projects take. This article seeks to more persuasively represent the aesthetic damage wrought by a public project by attaching to it a dollar figure. Cost-benefit analysis is often incorporated into the EIS, but for cost-benefit analysis to be valid, all costs and benefits must be fairly represented. To exclude aesthetic value from the analysis on the basis that beauty is intangible or priceless is to assign it a de facto value of zero in cost-benefit calculations. The monetizing of aesthetics is approached by integrating the methods of economic contingent valuation with landscape aesthetic assessment. Economic values and aesthetic values can be reconciled; a demonstration of the integration of methods is provided.