Environmental Impact On Environmental Effects On 280 Hectares Forest Habitat

amount with 16.6% of total wetland area. The Canaan Valley National Wildlife Refuge kept the

Conservation banking was modeled after the U.S. wetland mitigation banking system and the two programs share many similarities. However, unlike the wetland mitigation system, conservation offsets do not have a stated ‘no net loss’ goal, but instead have a species recovery goal. Both conservation and wetlands mitigation banks are privately or publicly owned lands which are protected and managed for its ecological value. By doing this, the bank sponsor generates habitat or wetland or stream credits to sell to developers or transportation departments who need to offset their impacts and comply with the legal requirements for the permitting of development or roadway projects. Both types of banks offer benefits to both the landowner that owns

The lumber, agriculture, and mining industries are major impacts on the tropical rainforest. They all require large areas of forest to be cleared so that they can take place. In mining, large areas of forest are cleared, and roads are built to access the mines. This greatly affects the diversity in the area because of the loud construction noises as well as pollution. The lumber and agriculture industries also have a very adverse affect on tropical rainforests. This is chiefly due to the fact that the soil fertility is only good enough to grow crops for a few years after it has been cleared. This leads to farmers clearing more and more forest each year to satisfy the needs of

There is a need for comprehensive assessment approaches that evaluate a range of wetland functions (Kusler, 1986). The need is critical as resource agencies begin managing the environment at watershed and basin scales (Hruby, 1999). Only 4% of the wetlands in the U.S. have been monitored for condition and only 10 states provided information on the support of designated uses for 1.8 million acres of wetlands assessed in their 2004 reports (USEPA, 2009b). The small percentage of wetlands being assessed did not go unnoticed by EPA. In 2011, attention was directed to monitor and assess the ecological condition of the nation’s wetlands (USEPA, 2011). The wetland component of the national aquatic resource survey is the national wetland conditional assessment (NWCA). EPA states three goals of the NWCA, 1) Produce a national report of the quality of the nation’s wetlands; 2) Help States and Tribes implement wetland monitoring and assessment programs to guide policy development and project decision making; and 3) advance the science of wetlands monitoring and assessment (USEPA,

The concept of sustainability in relation to ecosystem management states basically that “a natural resource should not be managed primarily to satisfy human economic interests nor valued mostly in dollar terms.” (Rosenbaum 25) In respects to lakes, rivers, wetlands and other natural resources this means that they should be managed to protect all their natural benefits such as supplying clean drinking water to communities, providing a habitat for local wildlife and a use for recreational human uses. Another assertion of ecosystem management is that endangered natural systems “should be restored or protected as a whole” (Rosenbaum 25) meaning the same organization should manage the entire system to avoid different groups controlling it with

Forests are home to about 80% of the world’s biodiversity and cover around 31% of Earth’s surface. The biodiversity that exists in all forests include; ecosystem diversity, genetic diversity, and species diversity. Each and every forest consists of many different habitats for animals, plants, and even insects. They also consist of different climates based on which type of forest it is. There are many different types of forests found all over the world but can be classified into 5 categories. The categories include; tropical rainforests, coniferous forests, deciduous forest, mediterranean forest, and mixed forests. The biodiversities in all these forests have learned to adapt to their surroundings and climates. That being said not every animal, plant, or insect found in one type of a forest can live and survive in any other. Forests supply the oxygen we need to survive on this planet, but forests around the world are threatened because of mankind. According to WorldWildLife.org, 58 thousand square miles of forest are lost each year. That is equivalent to 48 football fields a minute. Every single day people are contributing to the loss of our habitats by buying, selling, and supporting the men and women in which cut down, pollute, and destroy our forests. Forests are the main reason why our species, humans, can live and survive on Earth so why are we ignoring the fact that WE are destroying them?

Deforestation is the action of clearing a wide area of trees. Twenty percent of the world's rainforest has been destroyed because of deforestation. Forests cover about 30% of the planet. Deforestation is clearing forests on a massive scale. National geographic stated that “The world’s rainforest could completely vanish in a hundred years at the current rate of deforestation.” (NG 2015)

Mitigation, to the dismay of some, has become publicly synonymous with notions of preservation and conservation. Mitigation is neither the ‘preservation’ nor is it the ‘conservation’ of habitat. Mitigation is the creation of new habitat, or the guarding of an existing habitat to "make up" for the destruction of similar habitat somewhere else. It was the infamous environmental buzz word of the nineties, notorious for its criticism and praise by developers. Criticism because mitigation delays and obstructs their progress, and praise by those who take advantage of loopholes within the guidelines. All the while ecologists are accepting the mitigations like ill tasting medicine

The use of inverse spatial conservation prioritization is used to avoid biological diversity loss outside of protected areas, it is used to identify areas that have the highest economic value but also the lowest ecological value. The reason why we are looking for alternative ways to protect unprotected areas is because there are not enough resources to protect entire landscapes and not every area that has ecological value can be protected. We cannot protect all areas and have none for humans to harvest resources. Therefore, the implementation of inverse spatial design to identify the areas that are most suitable for the monetary development while also limiting the environmental and ecological effects in the landscape, instead of a simple

Due to population growth, much pressure has been placed on natural resources and the ecosystem services that are essential to human life (Franks et al. 2012). Rapid changes to the environment such as climate change and the use of natural resources affect the resilience of natural systems. Therefore, appropriate management and assessment of cumulative impacts on the terrestrial and marine environment from anthropogenic activities is crucial, albeit difficult, as impacts often extend outside of the geographic location of a development. Further, impacts from an action can have a compounding effect on outside systems already under stress from unrelated activities. Although much legislation has been enacted in attempt to buffer stressors caused by anthropogenic land use, environmental impact assessment and management approaches are often reactive, and consider mainly the impacts of individual activities and how to mitigate them (Dales, J 2011, Sonter et al. 2013). Therefore, a more integrated, proactive and holistic approach needs to be applied when it comes to the assessment and management cumulative impacts.

Wetlands are a critical component of our environment and are thought off as being among the most productive ecosystems in the world. Wetlands are defined as geographical areas where water covers or overly saturates the soil during the majority of growing seasons (CZM). They vary based on their appearances and locations which are greatly influenced by regional and soil divergence such as topography, climate, water chemistry, vegetation as well as human degradation (CZM).

Presently, there is a continual annual loss of an estimated value between 0.7 to 7.0% of areas that store blue carbon (Costanza et al 1997; Duarte et al 2005; FAO 2007; Spalding et al 2010), the loss of more than half of wetlands in the United States (Dahl 1990) has also led to loss of blue carbon to the atmosphere (Armentano and Menges 1986), consequently, this loss leads to their reduce ability to store carbon, thus producing different implications affecting man and the environment (Spalding 2010).

Funds available for biodiversity conservation are not able to cover and assist conservation projects for all species under threat. It is estimated that 44% of plants and 35% of animals are concentrated in just 25 focal regions, which represent only 1.4% of the land surface on Earth (Myers 2000). A study by Rands et al. shows that biodiversity is crucial for the optimal functioning of ecosystems and to ensure the sustainable supply of ecosystem services. The planet is undergoing a continuous and increasing loss of biodiversity, and national and international institutions are implementing various projects around the world in order to prevent further losses. The lack of adequate funding, especially in developing nations, is becoming a major concern, due to the fact that biodiversity loss is even greater in these areas (Rands et al. 2010).

Wetlands are one of the most biologically diverse and productive ecosystems on the earth. While they only occupy a very small percentage of land area, wetlands can be located all over the planet, ranging from near the northern and southern poles all the way to the tropics. Many biological, chemical and physical properties of wetlands allow them to provide various functions to surrounding ecosystems, and humans have found personal value from several of these ecological functions. Unfortunately, a history of exploitation of wetland services has led to their destruction and degradation. The loss of wetland area has consequences for many aspects of the environment that are tied closely with the functions of wetlands. However, the values of wetlands are now being recognized worldwide, and have led to the installment and enforcement of wetland conservation, protection laws, regulations, and management plans [Mitsch and Gosselink, 2007].

15.9 is ideal but it’s difficult to measure how much of biodiversity and ecosystem values are integrated into planning. The target is measurable but not specific enough.