Sustainable Biosphere Initiative Research Articles

Resolution of Respect: Paul Risser, 1939–2014

Resolution of Respect: Paul Risser, 1939–2014

Symposium 10: Planetary Stewardship and the Millennium Assessment of Human Behavior (MAHB)

Symposium 10: Planetary Stewardship and the Millennium Assessment of Human Behavior (MAHB)

A vision for ecology's future: where are we today?

Two years ago, the Ecological Society of America's (ESA) EcoVisions Project (Palmer et al. 2004, Science 304: 1251–52) set forth an ambitious agenda for ecology that built upon the nearly 15-year tradition of the Sustainable Biosphere Initiative (SBI). The ESA Board then considered the EcoVisions recommendations in the context of ESA's Strategic Plan, and selected four for immediate action: (1) establish Rapid Response Teams (RRTs), composed of ESA members, to interact with Congress on ecological issues ranging from climate change to invasive species; (2) explore ways to effectively communicate our science and its implications for sustainability to a large audience; (3) increase the Society's efforts in education, especially for under-represented groups; and (4) promote international activities across the Americas and beyond. In the fall of 2004, eleven RRTs were established. These teams have already provided timely scientific advice to Congress about the Endangered Species Act, Hurricane Katrina, and the ecosystem services provided by wetlands (see http://esa.org/experts). In an effort to reach policy makers outside of Washington, DC, the ESA is also developing plans to add a regional component to informing policy with ecological knowledge. This effort is motivated by the observation that local-to-regional decision making often has a greater impact on critical environmental issues than does national policy. Two study committees are working to shape this initiative; one takes a broad view on regional issues across the nation, while the other will be involved in rebuilding Gulf Coast landscapes. The ESA continues to expand its commitment to ecological educational programs. Teaching Issues and Experiments in Ecology, the society's web-based undergraduate education tool, and EcoEdNet, a digital library of ecological education resources, have both been greatly expanded. Our efforts to educate young scholars from under-represented groups continue to grow through the Strategies for Ecology Education, Development, and Sustainability (SEEDS) program. About 25 SEEDS students participate in semi-annual field trips; in early March, 12 current and former fellows, together with six faculty members and staff, attended a leadership workshop in Phoenix, AZ, and 16 students traveled to Mérida, Mexico, for the ESA's meeting, “Ecology in an Era of Globalization”. An international extension to the SEEDS program is also in the planning stages. The ESA is partnering with ecologists from other countries to build a forward-looking, international science. Our colleagues from the Federation of the Ecological Societies of the Americas were active participants in the Mérida meeting. On behalf of the Federation, the ESA has translated six Issues in Ecology into Spanish. The relationship between ESA and the Ecological Society of China has recently been strengthened by our support of two international conferences on sustainability, both held in China. In the fall of 2005, ESA signed an agreement with the Chinese Government, to make its publications available online to 401 institutions across China. In order to launch and carry out all of these new initiatives, the ESA Governing Board approved the hiring of a development specialist to assist in raising the necessary funds. As a result, Director of Development Fran Day began work in February and looks forward to your help in building ESA's programs. Since the 1991 publication of the SBI, the ESA has promoted activities that build capacity for research and education in support of sustainability goals. The EcoVisions Report called for a continuation of capacity building in a number of ways, including designing, building, and using new instrumentation; fostering data sharing; and promoting interdisciplinary research. Now, the Society is turning its attention to these challenges. For example, ESA leadership recently approved a data registry for studies published in its journals, and is working to promote the goal of free and open data access for all environmental sciences. In addition, ESA staff and membership have actively participated in development of the National Ecological Observatory Network and parallel, community-based plans for ecological research integrated with social science (led by the Long-Term Ecological Research [LTER] network). Finally, building community is perhaps the most fundamental – and challenging – issue that we need to confront. A coherent ecological research and education community is one that builds upon excellent individual and collaborative science, as well as having a unique and recognizable set of scientific goals, a clear identity with respect to the larger scientific world, and a contribution to make to society. Working as a group, ecologists have already seen success in creating the National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis and the LTER program. These are examples of how a community can conceive, design, and support projects that go beyond what can be accomplished by individuals or smaller groups. Yet much remains to be done. With the help of an active and involved membership, the ESA leadership stands ready to foster a more integrated and effective community for ecological science. Nancy Grimm, ESA President Alan Covich, ESA President Elect Jerry Melillo, ESA Past President

Ecology and the transition to sustainability

Ecological knowledge is essential for a successful transition to sustainability – a transition to a world in which hunger and poverty are reduced, while the Earth's life support system, thebiosphere, is conserved. The Ecological Society of America (ESA) has been working working to promote a change to sustainability for over a decade. In 1991, the Society launched its Sustainable Biosphere Initiative (SBI), which has had many successes. The initiative stimulated new ecological research and advanced ecological knowledge in the service of society. In addition, it has fostered communication of that knowledge to our nation's leaders, to help them make informed decisions about the complex challenges of protecting and improving the environment while maintaining economic prosperity. Despite more than a decade of effort, our work on the move to sustainability is in its early stages. This task is complicated by the fact that we are seeking sustainability in a changing world that is putting ever more pressure on the biosphere. Since the initiation of the SBI, the human population has grown beyond 6 billion. Across the globe, people are abandoning rural areas for cities; these human-designed environments, when poorly conceived, degrade the ecosystems that supply essential services such as cleansing of air and water and stabilizing landscapes against erosion by wind and water. Essential ecosystem services are also being compromised by the introduction of alien species of plants and animals into ecosystems, either purposefully or inadvertently. Regional air and water pollution have become the unwanted companions of economic growth in much of the developing world, and this pollution is taking a toll on human health as well as reducing yields of the food and fiber that are so desperately needed by a growing world population. Greenhouse gases from fossil fuel burning and deforestation continue to accumulate in the atmosphere and are causing climate change. Overfishing, especially of the high tropic levels, is impoverishing the world's oceans. The list goes on. As the threats to the world's transition to sustainability continue to mount, ESA has taken a fresh look at this critical issue and the future of ecological science in general. In 2002, the Society's Governing Board charged a committee to prepare an action plan that would accelerate our progress in addressing the major environmental issues of the new century. Over a 2-year period, what has come to be known as the “Visions Committee” consulted our membership as well as many organizations and individuals outside ESA. They articulated their core position as follows: “Ecological knowledge can and must play a central role in helping achieve a world in which human populations exist with sustainable ecological systems.” The action plan focuses on three areas: building an informed public, advancing innovative, anticipatory research, and stimulating cultural changes that foster a forward-looking and international ecology. The Visions Committee has proposed 26 specific actions, designed to cover these focus areas. Some require modest investments of time and money, while others require major commitments of resources. An example of the latter is the call for a major information campaign to bring issues of ecological sustainability before the general public. The Governing Board of the Society is working to prioritize the list of actions and to move forward rapidly. On behalf of the Society's membership, we thank the Visions Committee for a job well done. This issue of Frontiers begins with an overview paper by the Visions Committee that summarizes its recommended actions. The remaining papers address some of the main ecological issues that must be dealt with if society is to make progress towards a more sustainable future. Jerry M Melillo (President) Nancy B Grimm (President-elect) William H Schlesinger (Past President)

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Why Regional Coastal Monitoring for Assessment of Ecosystem Health?

ABSTRACT During recent years, the public and the scientific communities have signaled concern over growing degradation of ecosystem health, depleted fisheries, pollution, and habitat loss. Public concern has been registered in newspapers, electronic media, and congressional actions. Scientific concern has moved from the pages of journals to the actions of professional societies, as for example the Sustainable Biosphere Initiative of the Ecological Society of America (Lubchenco et al. 1991). Responsive actions at the national and international levels have resulted in Conventions and Protocols on Climate Change, Biodiversity, Ozone, and internationally recognized declarations for sustaining marine fisheries.

Tinker, tailor, scientist, advocate!

A new initiative by the Ecological Society of America (ESA), the Aldo Leopold Leadership Program, is designed to train environmental scientists to be effective communicators of their research in the public and political arena. Each cohort of 20 Aldo Leopold leadership fellows meets twice in their first year. Over the next five years, the program is designed to train an initial group of 60 ecologists, and environmental and conservation biologists. The roots of the program go back to the ESAs Sustainable Biosphere Initiative (SBI)4xThe sustainable biosphere initiative (an ecological research agenda) . Lubchenco, J. et al. Ecology. 1991; 72: 371–412CrossrefSee all References4. During the development of the SBI, Jane Lubchenco (Oregon State University, Corvallis, USA) and Hal Mooney (Stanford University, CA, USA) realized there was a major need to train ecologists in the skills they would need to communicate with the press, their local and national politicians, and above all the public.A primary goal of the Aldo Leopold Leadership Program is to expand the communication skills of its fellows and raise the intellectual standard of the public dialogue on the environment. The fellows will be taught how to work with politicians, industrialists and the media, to develop environmental policies that are good for both the environment and long-term economic health.The Aldo Leopold Leadership Program was initiated by a ‘Pew Conservation Scholars Award’ to Jane Lubchenco. The full program is administered by ESA with a generous $1.5 million grant from the David and Lucile Packard Foundation. Complete details of the program can be obtained at their website (www.leopold.orst.edu). At the first meeting in June 1999 the fellows were introduced to techniques to expand their communication repertoire, were taught how to develop connections with other communities and were given inside glimpses of other intellectual cultures (e.g. journalists and the media). In September 1999, the first cohort of fellows assembled in Washington, and spent a week learning and absorbing the process of policy making. Breakout sessions at both meetings allowed them to examine ways in which they can polish their leadership and communication skills, while also providing practical guidance on career juggling.The founders of the Aldo Leopold Leadership Program hope that the training provided to the fellows will not only thicken their skins, but will also provide them with a podium to amplify their voices in the public and political arena. It is an imaginative and much needed initiative that deserves to be widely emulated.

LONG-TERM ENVIRONMENTAL MONITORING: SOME PERSPECTIVES FROM LAKES

As part of a workshop sponsored by the Sustainable Biosphere Initiative on Change and Trend Detection, we have reviewed some general considerations pertinent to establishing long-term monitoring programs. A general goal of most long-term monitoring is to assign causality and establish mechanisms for patterns in observed data. However, mechanistic inference can be difficult in complex, often uncontrolled, natural systems. We present examples from three lakes representing (1) highly manipulated, intensively monitored systems, (2) management situations where many simultaneous manipulations may be occurring, and (3) at-large surveillance programs with no deliberate manipulations. We show that at one end of this continuum, in controlled, intensively monitored lakes, delayed and counterintuitive responses can make mechanistic inference difficult. At the other end of the continuum, where no management or experimental manipulations are underway, it is still possible to ascertain mechanism in the presence of apparently conflicting data, given sufficient information about the system. Management situations are often difficult to decipher; many simultaneous manipulations often confound mechanistic interpretations, although patterns in the data are readily apparent.

Long-Term Environmental Monitoring: Some Perspectives from Lakes

As part of a workshop sponsored by the Sustainable Biosphere Initiative on Change and Trend Detection, we have reviewed some general considerations pertinent to establishing long-term monitoring programs. A general goal of most long-term monitoring is to assign causality and establish mechanisms for patterns in observed data. However, mechanistic inference can be difficult in complex, often uncontrolled, natural systems. We present examples from three lakes representing (1) highly manipulated, intensively monitored systems, (2) management situations where many simultaneous manipulations may be occurring, and (3) at-large surveillance programs with no deliberate manipulations. We show that at one end of this continuum, in controlled, intensively monitored lakes, delayed and counterintuitive responses can make mechanistic inference difficult. At the other end of the continuum, where no management or experimental manipulations are underway, it is still possible to ascertain mechanism in the presence of apparently conflicting data, given sufficient information about the system. Management situations are often difficult to decipher; many simultaneous manipulations often confound mechanistic interpretations, although patterns in the data are readily apparent.

ESA's Sustainable Biosphere Initiative

The Bulletin of the Ecological Society of AmericaVolume 78, Issue 1 p. 78-79 Public Affairs PerspectiveFree Access ESA's Sustainable Biosphere Initiative First published: 01 January 1997 https://doi.org/10.2307/20168116AboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditWechat No abstract is available for this article. Volume78, Issue11 January 1997Pages 78-79 RelatedInformation

Reintroduction: challenges and lessons for basic ecology

Ecology is a subject where theoretical predictions are often difficult to test experimentally in the field. To address this challenge, the Ecological Society of America suggested exploiting large-scale environmental management decisions in a scientific way. This ‘adaptive management’ constitutes one of the purposes of the Sustainable Biosphere Initiative. Meanwhile, in the current context of the biodiversity crisis, translocations and particularly reintroductions of threatened species are becoming more numerous. It is time for ecologists and wildlife managers to collaborate on these unique opportunities for large-scale studies.

ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT VS. SUSTAINABLE SOCIETIES: Reflections on the Players in a Crucial Contest

ness and romanticism than do many social scientists and humanists. The most exciting students of Earth's biophysical status learn from one another. Biologists (particularly ecologists), atmospheric specialists, and experts in public health should make their knowledge accessible and useful in local and state forums. Scientists must cease hiding behind walls of objectivity and become advocates of policies that remain consistent with their scientific knowl­ edge. Some (e.g. Ehrlich and Wilson) have been involved for decades, but mostly in national and international arenas. Communities, counties, and states-·perhaps less alluring stages-urgently need good applied science to defend their environments. The science departments of major state universities REFLECTIONS ON SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT 237 could fonn ad hoc oversight teams to scrutinize actions of state environ­ mental agencies and to offer constructive criticism. For decades, ecologists such as Holdgate, Kassas & White (69) have pre­ sented scholarly warnings of intensifying global environmental deterioration. . Malone (97), in 1976, described scientists as linking humanity to natural biosphere. Scientists, well aware of steady contamination of air, water, and soils, must become sophisticated about such critical social issues as population, food security, and access to natural resources. Malone urged scientists to illuminate issues relevant to environmental policy. He praised scientists who preferred the advocacy (97, p. 87). Slobodkin (130) warned that ecology will lose its relevance unless its research is driven by practical questions. Frustrated by failure of politicians to act with common sense on basis . of best available data, Myers (102) asserted that biologists were as com­ petent as economists to engage in policy making. But nonnal science, conducted by thoroughly institutionalized practitioners in laboratories of government, corporations, and universities, emphasizes uncertainty and, therefore, need for more research money. Two decades ago, Dasman (46, p. vii) suggested that need for effective application of ecological principles exceeded need for more research. The values and strategies enunciated by two recent and influential statements on role of science in protecting planet diverge dramatically from arguments of scientists (12, 13, 46, 100-102) who assert that current knowledge is capable of retarding, if not reversing, further deterioration of soils, water, and forests. The Ecological Society of America (ESA) (49) and US National Re­ search Council ( 140) both fashioned powerful cases for massive infusions of research money. ESA's Sustainable Biosphere initiative, launched in 1988, accepted as articles of faith reliance on investigator-initiated research and retention of disciplinary integrity, each of which confonns to research structure of universities. Complexities and uncertainties, rather than avail­ ability of data useful now in defending biosphere, were stressed to justify funding aimed at global change, biological diversity, and sustainable ecological systems (49). Congruent with ESA message were urgent calls by Wilson (150, 151), Holloway (71, p. 12), Resser, Lubchenko & Levin (120), and US National Research Council (140, pp. 37-40) for emergency recruitment of systema­ tists to conduct national inventories of species, especially in remaining tropical rain forests. Ludwig and coauthors (90, pp. 17-18) objected to simplistic assumptions that ignorance is problem (19, pp. 640-42) and that more of such research would yield remedies to resource exploitation. The wild species of Brazil's Pantanal and Atlantic rain forests are plundered and destroyed by squatters and poachers who seek survival and by ranchers, resort developers,

Atmospheric Emission Reduction and Abatement Costs in Regional Environmental Planning

Atmospheric pollutant emissions caused by anthropic activities are becoming one of the main problems in environmental research. The question of assessing their impact on the global and on the local scale, and of reducing their amount, represent one of the main objectives in environmental projects such as the Sustainable Biosphere Initiative (SBI). We analyse the Basilicata energy system to investigate the possibility of reducing atmospheric pollutant emissions by the cost minimizing allocation of technologies and fuels. We focus our attention on SO 2 and NO x emissions, the most interesting pollutants in a regional analysis. We deal also with CO 2 emission reduction, to bring out the relationships with the other two pollutants. Energy system analysis is performed with the MARKAL linear programming model. We calculate the minimum total system cost at different levels of emission reduction, for each of the investigated pollutants. The tradeoff curves show graphically the reduction cost vs emission reduction. We analysed also the main components of the total energy system cost, in order to point out the factors which have the greatest influence in determining the abatement costs.

Prospects of Köprülü Kanyon National Park for meeting both conservation targets and people's need for development

Köprülü Kanyon National Park is one of the largest National Parks in Turkey. Besides Olympos and Termessos National Park which are not documented at all with a distinct scientific resolution, the reference area is the only park in the East Mediterranean. Through the activities of the UNESCO concept for biosphere reserves it might be possible to match the world interest with local peoples needs. The Köprülü Kanyon National Park comprises the whole range of vegetational zones from thermo-Mediterranean to alpine environments; it also includes a well balanced proportion of natural and manmade ecosystem fragments with transient gradients, i.e. a variety of agro-silvo-pastoral subsystems. The paper discusses options for development of the area focussing on different scales, interests and addresses. Worldwide interest is to be expected for the idea of making Köprülü Kanyon National Park part of a biosphere reserve network along a transect from the Mediterranean to Inner Anatolia which necessarily must have impact on the International Geosphere Biosphere Programme and on the International Sustainable Biosphere Initiative, as it would be difficult to find better reference areas than here. Furthermore local and regional development concepts are discussed which include a local horticulture industry, a regional botanic garden, medicinal plants production and a regional research centre. All these options are intended to give prospects for those people living in the National Park and those living in the developed world heavily depending on the bioresources of the lesser developed world though this relation is only occasionally realised as such.

La gestión ecológico-cultural en el paisaje de montaña

The author, after a brief revision of his ideas on the plant communities dynamism —connected with behavioural gregarism and cultural evolution in the N Spain mountains—, explain two furthest types of gestion: 1) The external or distant one, producing a banalization or ruderalization of landscapes, and 2) The internally active type in every system, always improving adaptation of communities to the environment (geophysical, biotic and also social) of their own valley or country. On cultural aspects —mainly in some mountains—, models will be necessary to understanding the different homeostatic mechanisms in every cultural action, the automatic ones. Ecological research must be made together with pasturage activities, artisanats, and mainly an integrated tourism embodied in the country. Biological and cultural diversifications would be also maintained in the more human and alive mountains. We also need to combine our regional activities with the more general project SBI (Sustainable Biosphere Initiative) of the Ecological Society of America.

The Sustainable Biosphere Initiative: A Commentary from the U. S. Soil Ecology Society

The Bulletin of the Ecological Society of AmericaVolume 73, Issue 4 p. 223-228 CommentaryFree Access The Sustainable Biosphere Initiative: A Commentary from the U. S. Soil Ecology Society First published: 01 December 1992 https://doi.org/10.2307/20167377AboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditWechat Volume73, Issue41 December 1992Pages 223-228 RelatedInformation

Idealism to Realism: Applying Ecological Science to Society's Environmental Problems: The Sustainable Biosphere Initiative Project Office Creates Implementation Plan

Idealism to Realism: Applying Ecological Science to Society's Environmental Problems: The Sustainable Biosphere Initiative Project Office Creates Implementation Plan

Reform in the Commonwealth of Independent States: A Program That Advances the Objectives of the Sustainable Biosphere Initiative

The Bulletin of the Ecological Society of AmericaVolume 73, Issue 3 p. 170-171 CommentaryFree Access Reform in the Commonwealth of Independent States: A Program That Advances the Objectives of the Sustainable Biosphere Initiative First published: 01 September 1992 https://doi.org/10.2307/20167359AboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditWechat No abstract is available for this article. Volume73, Issue31 September 1992Pages 170-171 RelatedInformation

The Sustainable Biosphere Initiative and the Federal Agencies

The Bulletin of the Ecological Society of AmericaVolume 73, Issue 1 p. 25-28 CommentaryFree Access The Sustainable Biosphere Initiative and the Federal Agencies First published: 01 March 1992 https://doi.org/10.2307/20167320AboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditWechat Volume73, Issue1March 1992Pages 25-28 RelatedInformation

The Sustainable Biosphere Initiative: A Student Critique and Call to Action

The Bulletin of the Ecological Society of AmericaVolume 73, Issue 1 p. 23-25 CommentaryFree Access The Sustainable Biosphere Initiative: A Student Critique and Call to Action First published: 01 March 1992 https://doi.org/10.2307/20167319AboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditWechat Volume73, Issue1March 1992Pages 23-25 RelatedInformation