Biodiversity Impacts and Offsetting Costs of Nitrogen Deposition

Abstract

Biodiversity loss is currently one of the most important environmental issues worldwide, alongside and interlinked with climate change. Nitrogen (N) deposition is forecasted to be in the top three drivers for change in global biodiversity by the year 2100, together with land use and climate change. Creating a practical tool that enables businesses to identify their main impacts on biodiversity is a major challenge. In this study, a protocol was developed to assess the impacts on biodiversity as a result of N deposition caused by business activities. More specifically, the impact at habitat types and species in Natura 2000 sites is reviewed. The protocol takes into account the exceedance of the critical deposition load by the background deposition, as well as the share for which the company is responsible. Furthermore, a method is proposed to capitalize biodiversity offsetting measures, based on the costs that would be associated with the construction of new nature. This way, a budget can be defined that should be deployed in a cost-effective way to reduce the negative biodiversity impacts from N deposition. The protocol was tested by applying it to N emissions from four electricity and heat producing power plants, operated by Eneco. Eneco was found to be responsible for a total of 23 ha at which species and habitats were negatively impacted in 2015. These hectares are distributed over many different types of habitats throughout the Netherlands. The biodiversity offsetting costs of N deposition from electricity and heat production by Eneco were found to be € 60,662 for 2015.