Freshwater Services Research Articles

Urbanization shifts freshwater service flows in the highly urbanized watersheds of Dongjiang River, China

Freshwater ecosystem services supply and demand are important for achieving Sustainable Development Goal 6 of clean water. Urbanization has significantly impacted the supply, demand, and flow of freshwater ecosystem services due to various human activities. However, the changes in freshwater ecosystem service flow (FESF) under the influence of urbanization were still unclear. This study examines the highly urbanized Dongjiang River as an example and maps the supply-flow-demand network of freshwater services based on social-ecological network analysis. The results indicate that freshwater supply has increased by 0.21 billion m3 per year, while there is a decreasing trend of 0.17 billion m3 per year in demand. The FESF approach reveals that 42%–60% of imbalanced sub-watersheds rely on artificial water diversion projects to alleviate water deficits under dynamic flow conditions. Approximately 15.6% of the region experiences water insecurity, driven by urbanization-induced demand for water diversion. This increased demand puts stress on downstream sub-watershed water supply and elevates the risk of flow reduction in the main stream. The study highlights the need for sustainable water management strategies to ensure freshwater security in large river basins within urbanized areas worldwide and to address the challenges posed by uncertain urban expansion.

Leading the path toward sustainable freshwater management: Reconciling challenges and opportunities in historical, hybrid, and novel ecosystem types

AbstractDue to their importance for human development and well‐being, freshwater ecosystems are among the most threatened and modified in the world; a situation that is expected to intensify in the future. Freshwaters convey a mix of novel, historical, and hybrid systems, each with different values and opportunities for biodiversity conservation and ecosystem services provision. We argue that securing future access to freshwater services, while halting aquatic biodiversity loss, requires an evaluation of the opportunities offered and challenges imposed by each of these types of systems. Such an inventory can then build the basis to systematically plan restoration, conservation and management actions with the goal of harmonizing the multiplicity of co‐occurring freshwater‐related interests. Developing river basin management plans that integrate these multiple, often conflicting interests poses complex challenges, including (1) the current ecosystem condition that defines to a large extent what type of objectives can realistically be aimed at, (2) socioeconomic needs that limit our capacity to modify current conditions, for example, drinking water and energy provided by large dams, and (3) governance constraints related to managing large, often transboundary, river basins. Multi‐objective management planning rooted in systematic conservation planning can help overcome these challenges. Consequently, we argue that adequate planning must play a key role when designing river basin management plans to make the most of the opportunities associated with local freshwater ecosystem types. We call for governments to embrace and promote a systematic approach to river basin management planning to create the urgently needed pan‐global shift toward a sustainable biodiverse freshwater future.This article is categorized under:Water and Life > Conservation, Management, and AwarenessWater and Life > MethodsEngineering Water > Planning Water

A framework of freshwater services flow model into assessment on water security and quantification of transboundary flow: A case study in northeast China

Ecosystem service flow dynamics which establish the linkage between human and nature is essential in an ecosystem service assessment. This study constructed an ecosystem service flow model of freshwater flow then utilized it to assess the water-related ecosystem services in northeast China. We included the provision, consumption, and spatial flow of freshwater services in an index to assess the water security condition and quantified the services trans-boundary flow from the northeast forest belt (NFB) in northeast China. Our results showed that large areas (50.54%, 55.10% and 52.90%, respectively) of northeast China received upstream freshwater service in three years. The water security condition of northeast China deteriorated from 2005 to 2015 with the change of water security index considering water flow (WSIflow), mainly influenced by precipitation and agriculture water consumption. Approximately 4.16 billion m3 of freshwater service were delivered from NFB to surrounding regions demonstrating the importance of NFB in terms of ecosystem service provision. In addition, 73 key watersheds (4.71% of total area) within NFB that significantly affect the trans-boundary flow were further identified. We suggested that local government should advocate develop water-saving agriculture and livestock water quotas. Moreover, priorities should be given to protect the key watersheds within NFB in order to maintain the supply of freshwater service. This study provided a framework for exploring suitable strategies for managing water resources and laid a foundation for promoting the ecological compensation in the future.

Optimizing invasive species management using mathematical programming to support stewardship of water and carbon-based ecosystem services

Invasive species alter hydrologic processes at watershed scales, with impacts to biodiversity and the supporting ecosystem services. This effect is aggravated by climate change. Here, we integrated modelled hydrologic data, remote sensing products, climate data, and linear mixed integer optimization (MIP) to identify stewardship actions across space and time that can reduce the impact of invasive species. The study area is the windward coast of Hawai'i Island (USA) across which non-native strawberry guava occurrence varies from extremely dense stands in lower watershed reaches, to low densities in upper watershed forests. We focused on the removal of strawberry guava, an invader that exerts significant impacts on watershed condition. MIP analyses spatially optimized the assignment of effective management actions to increase water yield, generate revenue from enhanced freshwater services, and income from removed biomass. The hydrological benefit of removing guava, often marginal when considered in isolation, was financially quantified, and single- and multiobjective MIP formulations were then developed over a 10-year planning horizon. Optimization resulted in $2.27 million USD benefit over the planning horizon using a payment-for-ecosystem-services scheme. That value jumped to $4.67 million when allowing work schedules with overnight camping to reduce costs. Pareto frontiers of weighted pairs of management goals showed the benefit of clustering treatments over space and time to improve financial efficiency. Values of improved land-water natural capital using payment-for-ecosystem-services schemes are provided for several combinations of spatial, temporal, economical, and ecosystem services flows.

Analisis Kinerja Pelayanan Air Bersih PDAM Tirta Daroy Kota Banda Aceh

Perusahaan Daerah Air Minum (PDAM) is a business entitiy owned by the Aceh government which has business scope in managing drinking water and managing fresh water facilities to improve the welfare of the city citizens.. PDAM Tirta Daroy is an agency that serves the drinking and fresh water distribution for Banda Aceh city, in the 2017 PDAM Tirta Daroy has achieved “Health” status woth value 3,11 which is ranked 130 out of 378 PDAM assessed throughout Indonesia. Even though PDAM Tirta Daroy has achieved health status there are still customers who complaint receiving distribution of fresh water with very disssapointing quality so that the analyses study of fresh water is needed for the PDAM Tirta Daroy in 2018. The problem in this study is how the performance of PDAM Tirta Daroy fresh water services in 2018. The purpose of this study is to determine the performance of PDAM Tirta Daroy against the fresh water supply system in Banda aceh city and PDAM Tirta Daroy strategy in improving performance related to the current fresh water services. The research methodology initially began with the collecting the primary and secondary data, the interviews results are written descriptively in accordance with the activities that occur. After conducting primary and secondary data in 2018 data then processed using Balance Scorecard and SWOT analysis. The results of this study is to find out the value of PDAM performance based on the 4 aspects of Balanced Scorecard which are financial aspects, services, operational, and Human resources aspects, and the PDAM Tirta Daroy strategy in an effort to improve the problems of fresh water services in Banda Aceh city.

A network perspective for mapping freshwater service flows at the watershed scale

Spatial mismatch often occurs between high-supply and high-demand regions of ecosystem services (ES), as human dwellings and workplaces are usually distant from natural ecosystems. In this regard, studies have increasingly focused on ecosystem service flows (ESF) from ecosystems to humans. However, current mapping methods for ESF are rarely able to visually display the flow relationships between supply and demand regions. Network models that commonly used for dealing with relational data show great potential in mapping ESF. Here, we demonstrated the effectiveness of the network model in mapping ESF by constructing a freshwater service flow network for the Yanhe watershed in China. We concluded that from 2000 to 2015 freshwater demand was approaching the limit of freshwater supply in the Yanhe watershed, with the freshwater demand continuously increasing. Due to the shortage of freshwater service, the deficit nodes and stop-flowing edges in the freshwater service flow network increased, and the network density decreased. These results can provide useful information to guide watershed freshwater resource management (e.g. optimizing the allocation of freshwater resources across the watershed and designing payment schemes for freshwater service) in the Yanhe watershed, particularly in a time of population growth, climate change, and threats of water scarcity. Finally, we pointed out that applications of the network model in ESF deserves more attention and further study and analyzed the wide applicability of the network model in mapping ESF and the possible future efforts in this field.

Valuating service loss of snow cover in Irtysh River Basin

Snow cover provides essential resources and services for human well-being and socioeconomic development in arid areas. With the change in snow cover resulting from climate change that causes concerns about its consequences, there is a pressing need to analyze and understand its impact on the benefits that people has been enjoying from snow cover. These can be derived from the variation in economic value of snow services, that are demanded to meet socioeconomic activities. Based on the average decline mass of snow cover from 1979 to 2016 in Irtysh River Basin, we use the approach by applying economic evaluation to estimate the annual value loss of snow services. Considering the decreasing trend of snow cover mass at rates of −10.2 Mt per year (p < 0.05) or 0.3% per year, the annual service loss in Irtysh River Basin is currently worth up to CN¥196 million. Within it, the service loss of climate regulation contributes the most, or about CN¥84.7 million. The loss of freshwater service contributes only about 19%, implying that there would be a significant underestimation of service loss if only water supply would be considered. This may cause biased decision-making when we are facing the challenges of declining services as a result of climate change, impacting on the balancing of socioeconomic development and environment conservation for the sustainability over a long term.

Mechanisms and indicators for assessing the impact of biofuel feedstock production on ecosystem services

Biofuel feedstock production can be a significant driver of landscape modification, ecosystem change and biodiversity loss. There is growing body of literature that shows how biofuel landscapes provide various ecosystem services (e.g., feedstock for fuel, carbon sequestration) and compromise other ecosystem services (e.g., food, freshwater services). These effects are context-specific and depend largely on prior land use conditions and feedstock production practices. Changes in the flow of ecosystem services due to the conversion of natural and agricultural areas can have ripple effects on human wellbeing. Despite some recent attempts to apply to biofuel settings concepts and methods rooted in the ecosystem services literature, this is the exception rather than the rule within both the biofuel and the ecosystem services research communities. This paper synthesizes the current knowledge about the impact of biofuels on ecosystem services. It focuses especially on the feedstock production phase and outlines the main mechanisms through which landscape conversion affects the provisions of ecosystem services. It proposes conceptually coherent indicators to reflect these mechanisms and offers a critical discussion of key issues at the interface of biofuels and ecosystem services.

The Great Lapse: Climate Change, Water Resources and Economic Risks in the Great Lakes

The striking vastness of the world’s largest surface freshwater resource, the Laurentian Great Lakes, has generated the fallacy that they are not highly vulnerable to climate change. This fallacy has created a great lapse in our research and understanding of the effects of climate change on the Great Lakes, which are approaching critical environmental thresholds and jeopardizing ecosystem services. This article takes the novel approach of correcting the disconnect between the perception of vastness and the reality of vulnerability to climate change in the Great Lakes, and takes an additional novel step to link the water risks with the economic risks. The primary purpose is to demonstrate the interdependence of the freshwater ecosystem services affected by climate change with the economies that are highly dependent on those freshwater services in the Great Lakes region. Although many believe that environmental science or ethical arguments should be sufficient to warrant action on climate change, evidence shows that policy-makers are not compelled to generate advances unless there are strong economic components. This article highlights the leading edge of climate science for the Great Lakes, having conducted 32 in depth interviews with experts in microbiology, ecology, and limnology, among others, but it also adds substantively to previous work by providing economic evidence of water risks in the agricultural sector and energy sector, which constitute over $6 trillion in value and jobs that are specifically dependent on lakes waters. The article concludes by articulating three specific conclusions: the economic viability of the agricultural sector and the energy sector are jeopardized by loss of federal funding for climate change adaptation in the water sector; the existing policies such as between sectors such as the Farm Bill and Energy Future Bill are mal-aligned and should be aligned with the water sector; and negative environmental externalities including factors that exacerbate climate change should be incorporated into the true cost of water so we can more accurately conduct ecosystem valuation and, thus, address the true economic and environmental cost of climate change on the Great Lakes and our greatest water resources. This paper has not previously been published.

Evaluating regional water security through a freshwater ecosystem service flow model: A case study in Beijing-Tianjian-Hebei region, China

Freshwater ecosystem service is essential to human’s survival and development. Many studies have documented the spatial differences in the supply and demand of ecosystem services and proposed the concept of ecosystem services flows. However, few studies characterize freshwater ecosystem service flow quantitatively. Therefore, our paper aims to quantify the effects of freshwater ecosystem service flow on downstream areas. We developed a freshwater ecosystem service flow model and applied it in the Beijing–Tianjin–Hebei (BTH) region, China, for the year of 2000, 2005, and 2010. We assessed the regional water security with an improved freshwater security index by integrating freshwater service provision, consumption and flow; and found that most areas of the BTH region (69.2%) were affected by upstream freshwater flows. The areas achieving water security in the region also expanded to 66.9%, 66.1%, and 71.3%, which were 6.4%, 6.8% and 5.7% increments compared to no-flow situation, in 2000, 2005 and 2010, respectively. Setting quota for human water consumption is suggested to further improve water security. These results highlight the need to fully understand the connections between distant freshwater ecosystem service provision and local freshwater ecosystem service consumption. This approach may also help managers to choose more sustainable strategies for critical freshwater resource management across different regions.

Assessing and Managing the Current and Future Pest Risk from Water Hyacinth, (Eichhornia crassipes), an Invasive Aquatic Plant Threatening the Environment and Water Security.

Understanding and managing the biological invasion threats posed by aquatic plants under current and future climates is a growing challenge for biosecurity and land management agencies worldwide. Eichhornia crassipes is one of the world’s worst aquatic weeds. Presently, it threatens aquatic ecosystems, and hinders the management and delivery of freshwater services in both developed and developing parts of the world. A niche model was fitted using CLIMEX, to estimate the potential distribution of E. crassipes under historical and future climate scenarios. Under two future greenhouse gas emission scenarios for 2080 simulated with three Global Climate Models, the area with a favourable temperature regime appears set to shift polewards. The greatest potential for future range expansion lies in Europe. Elsewhere in the northern hemisphere temperature gradients are too steep for significant geographical range expansion under the climate scenarios explored here. In the Southern Hemisphere, the southern range boundary for E. crassipes is set to expand southwards in Argentina, Australia and New Zealand; under current climate conditions it is already able to invade the southern limits of Africa. The opportunity exists to prevent its spread into the islands of Tasmania in Australia and the South Island of New Zealand, both of which depend upon hydroelectric facilities that would be threatened by the presence of E. crassipes. In Europe, efforts to slow or stop the spread of E. crassipes will face the challenge of limited internal biosecurity capacity. The modelling technique demonstrated here is the first application of niche modelling for an aquatic weed under historical and projected future climates. It provides biosecurity agencies with a spatial tool to foresee and manage the emerging invasion threats in a manner that can be included in the international standard for pest risk assessments. It should also support more detailed local and regional management.

Linking key environmental stressors with the delivery of provisioning ecosystem services in the freshwaters of southern Africa

Societies' growing global footprint is causing a rapid increase in the demand for natural resources (i.e. ecosystem services), while also reducing the capacity of ecosystems to provide them. Freshwater ecosystems contribute disproportionately to ecosystem services but are also particularly vulnerable to global environmental change. The provisioning of freshwater services, such as water and food production, is especially important in developing countries. Here, we review the evidence which demonstrates the impacts of key environmental stressors on these two important provisioning services in southern Africa. Land use change, species invasions and climate change can all be linked to a loss of the provisioning services provided by freshwater ecosystems in southern Africa. Water resources for drinking, agriculture, sanitation and power are expected to decline as a result of both climate and land use change. Fish production may be negatively or positively affected by the different stressors, highlighting the high context‐dependency associated with their impacts. Evidence also suggests that these stressors can interact to alter one another's impacts or promote the proliferation of further stressors. For instance, land use change can promote aquatic plant invasions and, subsequently, the stressors may interact synergistically to cause fish kills. Stressors may also interact to mitigate one another's impact, for instance fish invasions may enhance total fish catch following a pollution event. Since stressors are unlikely to occur in isolation and multiple stressors frequently result in complex ‘ecological surprises’, it is urgent that we increase research effort on the links between multiple stressors and the loss of ecosystem services. Future research should, therefore, focus on the combined impacts of multiple environmental, social, and economic stressors on natural resources and provisioning ecosystem services in southern Africa.

Mapping potential freshwater services, and their representation within Protected Areas (PAs), under conditions of sparse data. Pilot implementation for Cambodia

Freshwater is arguably one of Earth’s most threatened natural resources, on which more than 7 billion people depend. Pressures on freshwater resources from infrastructure, resource development, agricultural pollution and deforestation are mounting, particularly in developing countries. To date, conservation responses such as Protected Areas (PAs) have not typically targeted freshwater ecosystems and their services, and thus little is known about the effectiveness of these efforts in protecting them. This paper proposes and pilots an innovative freshwater services metrics framework to quantify the representation of potential freshwater services in PAs under conditions of scarce data, with a pilot application for Cambodia. Our results indicate that conservation actions have more effectively represented potential freshwater regulation services than potential freshwater provisioning services, with major rivers remaining generally unprotected. Results from the framework are then used to propose a series of context and region specific management options to improve the conservation of freshwater services in Cambodia. There is an acute need for such management options, as the country’s food security depends largely on important freshwater ecosystems such as the Tonle Sap Lake and the deep water pools systems of the Mekong River. The framework proposed can be applied in other countries or large river basins to explore the degree of representation of freshwater services within PAs systems, under conditions of sparse data.

The role of protected areas for freshwater biodiversity conservation: challenges and opportunities in a rapidly changing world

Abstract1. Declaring protected areas (PAs) stands out as one of the main conservation strategies worldwide and there are clear commitments to expand their extent under the auspices of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD; Aichi targets for 2020). This conservation strategy has also received increasing attention in a freshwater context in the last two decades.2. Despite increasing conservation efforts, the effectiveness of PAs for freshwater purposes is questioned and freshwater biodiversity continues to decline. There are many reasons for this poor effectiveness: a lack of consideration of freshwater needs when designing and declaring protected areas, fewer resources devoted to freshwater conservation management than to other actions, and poor understanding of complex management problems beyond the limits of the protected area.3. This supplement compiles some examples from around the world on implementing and managing PAs, assessing their effectiveness, and demonstrating their important role not only in preserving biodiversity but also human well‐being and in meeting future challenges to achieve the CBD targets for freshwater biodiversity.4. Here the challenges of establishing effective PAs for freshwater biodiversity in a rapidly changing world are reviewed. We advocate better monitoring programmes to assess the effectiveness of PAs for freshwater biodiversity, in which the unique characteristics of freshwater systems, such as the important role of connectivity and the close links with the rest of the landscape they drain, are considered.5. There are new conservation opportunities to enhance the value of PAs for freshwater biodiversity under the new conservation paradigm of ‘people and nature’. The imperative of finding solutions that generate co‐benefits alongside biodiversity conservation, and the clear reliance of human communities on freshwater services, has created an environment that may be more favourable to PAs focused in whole or part on fresh waters. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley &amp; Sons, Ltd.

Spatial interactions among ecosystem services in an urbanizing agricultural watershed.

Understanding spatial distributions, synergies, and tradeoffs of multiple ecosystem services (benefits people derive from ecosystems) remains challenging. We analyzed the supply of 10 ecosystem services for 2006 across a large urbanizing agricultural watershed in the Upper Midwest of the United States, and asked the following: (i) Where are areas of high and low supply of individual ecosystem services, and are these areas spatially concordant across services? (ii) Where on the landscape are the strongest tradeoffs and synergies among ecosystem services located? (iii) For ecosystem service pairs that experience tradeoffs, what distinguishes locations that are "win-win" exceptions from other locations? Spatial patterns of high supply for multiple ecosystem services often were not coincident; locations where six or more services were produced at high levels (upper 20th percentile) occupied only 3.3% of the landscape. Most relationships among ecosystem services were synergies, but tradeoffs occurred between crop production and water quality. Ecosystem services related to water quality and quantity separated into three different groups, indicating that management to sustain freshwater services along with other ecosystem services will not be simple. Despite overall tradeoffs between crop production and water quality, some locations were positive for both, suggesting that tradeoffs are not inevitable everywhere and might be ameliorated in some locations. Overall, we found that different areas of the landscape supplied different suites of ecosystem services, and their lack of spatial concordance suggests the importance of managing over large areas to sustain multiple ecosystem services.

Impact of multiple interacting financial incentives on land use change and the supply of ecosystem services

Multiple financial incentives are increasingly common for managing agro-ecosystems. We explored the impact of incentive interactions across multiple ecosystem services through their influence on land use change potential. Taking a spatial approach, we quantified the economic potential for land use change from agriculture to carbon monocultures and environmental plantings. We assessed 1875 scenarios—exhaustive combinations of five incentive price levels for four services (food and fiber, fresh water, carbon sequestration and habitat), and three cost settings. Incentive interactions had complex effects—characterized by synergies and tensions, non-linearity, dependencies, and thresholds. Tensions occurred between commodity price and carbon price in supplying food and fiber, carbon sequestration, fresh water, and indirectly, habitat services. Water price displayed synergies with commodity price, and tensions with carbon price in supplying fresh water services. For the supply of habitat services, a biodiversity price depended on either high carbon prices or low commodity prices. Interaction effects may reduce policy efficiency wherever multiple incentives encourage the supply of services from agro-ecosystems.

Scale and ecological dependence of ecosystem services evaluation: Spatial extension and economic value of freshwater ecosystems in Italy

Using land cover datasets derived from satellite imagery as a proxy for ecosystem services (ES) mapping and evaluation generates a series of technical problems mainly related to the resolution at which spatial data are acquired. Small sized and highly fragmented ecosystems such as wetlands, streams and rivers are particularly underestimated when coarse resolution land cover datasets are used. However, even at finer resolution, a large fraction of the economic value provided by freshwater ecosystems may not be adequately captured by remote sensed data because, other than technical and methodological problems, the provision of many freshwater services is strictly dependent on the interactions and contacts of these ecosystems with contiguous environments. The paper analyzes and discusses the effectiveness of the CORINE land cover (CLC) dataset to represent the spatial extension and, indirectly, the economic value of freshwater biomes in Italy, with emphasis on rivers and streams. Using a georeferenced national hydrographic network database and applying a stream buffer of variable width to more than 20,000 water courses, we demonstrated that less than 10% of the estimated surface is captured by the CLC dataset with heavy negative consequences on the overall evaluation of ES at local, regional and national scale. Our approach, easily applicable also to other geographical and spatial contexts, may contribute to improve proxy-based methodologies in ES mapping/evaluation and may help to limit errors in the estimation of freshwater services.

Conserving critical sites for biodiversity provides disproportionate benefits to people.

Protecting natural habitats in priority areas is essential to halt the loss of biodiversity. Yet whether these benefits for biodiversity also yield benefits for human well-being remains controversial. Here we assess the potential human well-being benefits of safeguarding a global network of sites identified as top priorities for the conservation of threatened species. Conserving these sites would yield benefits – in terms of a) climate change mitigation through avoidance of CO2 emissions from deforestation; b) freshwater services to downstream human populations; c) retention of option value; and d) benefits to maintenance of human cultural diversity – significantly exceeding those anticipated from randomly selected sites within the same countries and ecoregions. Results suggest that safeguarding sites important for biodiversity conservation provides substantial benefits to human well-being.

Spatial covariation between freshwater and terrestrial ecosystem services

To inform the design and implementation of land-use policies that consider the variety of goods and services people derive from ecosystems, it is essential to understand spatial patterns of individual services, how multiple services relate to each other, and how these relationships vary across spatial scales and localities. Despite the importance of freshwater as a determinant of regional economic and human demographic patterns, there are surprisingly few studies that map the provision of a range of services associated with the quality of the aquatic environment. Here we examine relationships between indicators of riverine water and associated habitat quality, freshwater biodiversity, three terrestrial ecosystem services, and terrestrial biodiversity across England and Wales. The results indicate strong associations between our indicators of freshwater services. However, a comparison of these indicators of freshwater services with other ecosystem services (carbon storage, agricultural production, recreation) and biodiversity of species of conservation concern in the surrounding terrestrial landscape shows no clear relationships. While there are potential policy "win-wins" for the protection of multiple services shown by associations between indicators of freshwater services and carbon storage in upland areas of Britain, the other ecosystem services showed either negative or no relationships with the indicators of freshwater services. We also consider the influence that spatial scale has on these relationships using River Basin Districts. Our results indicate that relationships between indicators of services can change dramatically depending on the societal pressures and other regional conditions. Thus, the delivery of multiple ecosystem services requires the development of regional strategies, or of national strategies that take account of regional variation.

Global priorities for conservation of threatened species, carbon storage, and freshwater services: scope for synergy?

The potential of global biodiversity conservation efforts to also deliver critical benefits, such as carbon storage and freshwater services, is still unclear. Using spatially explicit data on 3,500 range-restricted threatened species, carbon storage, and freshwater provision to people, we conducted tradeoff analyses, explicitly addressing both biodiversity and ecosystem services in selection of priority areas, to explore the potential for aligning these objectives. These analyses revealed a promising scope for aligning objectives, in particular for biodiversity and freshwater, which is not evident from previous studies that merely analyzed overlap of biodiversity and ecosystem services derived for each objective independently. However, this alignment is not complete. By revealing important synergies and tradeoffs among services, these analyzes suggest particular regions and service combinations for which spatial planning and appropriate conservation mechanisms (e.g., payments for ecosystem services) can be used to realize synergies and mitigate tradeoffs.