Ecosystem Services

Plan Design Enable

Food

Lowland river and floodplainKey ecosystem services

HealthWater quality & resources

Pollination

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We help clients take robust decisions in the face of uncertainty.

Atkins is one of the world’s leading engineering and design consultancies. We have the breadth and depth of expertise to respond to the most challenging and time critical projects.

Our skills in environmental issues that include dealing with biodiversity and ecosystem services add to our engineering, planning and design capabilities.

Whether it’s the creation of a strategic land use planning system, protecting communities from flooding or the improvement of a management process, we plan, design and enable solutions. This breadth of experience means that our environmental advice is innovative and pragmatic. We help clients find practical solutions to complex issues.

How we can help

Plan From cost and risk planning, feasibility studies and logistics to impact assessments and stakeholder engagement activity, we plan every aspect of our clients’ projects. We can help answer questions such as what are the social and economic benefits of green infrastructure?

Design Atkins designs intellectual capital such as policy, management plans, and systems and business processes. We also design masterplans and physical structures such as reservoirs, bridges, highways, flood and coastal erosion management schemes.

Enable Our clients entrust us with the management of projects, people and issues – ensuring that deadlines are met, costs are controlled and success is delivered. We can help demonstrate to shareholders and to the public how environmental business risks are being managed.

There are significant regulatory and business drivers that are making governments and businesses recognise and understand the linkages between the economy and the environment. ‘Ecosystem services’ offers a new approach to explicitly understanding how the economy and society are affected by both detrimental environmental impacts and positive environmental improvements.

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add urban image

Water quality & resources

Aesthetic & recreation

Health Carbon storage

Urban parklandKey ecosystem services

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Atkins skills and servicesWe use the experience that we have gained working on projects across the UK and worldwide, and the thought leadership of our technical staff, to deliver integrated environmental management and assessments of ecosystem services.

We have the necessary breadth of technical skills for allowing meaningful engagement with the implications of complex environmental change.

We work with external partners including universities, think tanks and specialist consultancies to ensure we are drawing on the latest thinking and unique expertise that these partners can provide.

EconomicDevelopment

Financial Analysis

Water Resources

Corporate Sustainability

Ecology

Environmental Science

Masterplanning& Landscape

Design

Measure Model

Communicate

EnvironmentalEconomics

Policy Analysis

Industrial Processes

Resource & Land Use Planning

"There are both serious risks to business, as well as significant opportunities, associated with biodiversity loss and ecosystem degradation. There is also a need for business to quantify and value its impacts on biodiversity and ecosystems, in order to manage these risks and opportunities and enable a better futures for all." Pavan Sukhdev, The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity (TEEB)

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Janet Miller – DirectorJanet addresses the social issues of change and development, understanding constraints and driving opportunities posed by critical social resources such as heritage assets, traditional culture and tourist resources.

Our peopleWe are a true people business. The collective expertise of our rich mix of talented people is our real asset.

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Natalyn Ala – DirectorNatalyn manages a team of scientists and engineers focusing on the ground engineering and

contamination aspects of hydrogeology. She is currently leading collaboration between Atkins, Imperial College, industrial stakeholders and the Environment Agency in evaluating the economic

value of UK groundwater.

Nathan Richardson – DirectorNathan has a background in sustainable water management including the areas of water availability and scarcity, efficient water use and the interface between water management and the wider natural, built and human environment. He is currently looking at the implications of the Water White Paper for the sector.

John Box – DirectorJohn is responsible for furthering technical excellence and

ecological capabilities within Atkins. He is developing Atkins’ responses to drivers such as ecosystem services and ‘no net

loss’ of biodiversity policies.

Claire Wansbury – Associate DirectorClaire is one of Atkins’ UK ecology leaders. She leads on the integration of ecosystem services into policy and project decisions, working closely with environmental economists.

Richard Coburn– Associate DirectorRichard is Head of Economics and has a background in strategic economic policy, spatial planning, investment appraisal, economic impact assessment and policy impact assessment. He also has directed many environmental economics and coastal and marine economic studies including those for the Department of Transport, Defra and the Marine Management Organisation.

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Jon Swan – Director Jon is an engineer with a background in waste

PFI. Jon is looking at the best means to value waste as a resource to meet the future energy

challenges for industry.

Roger Savage – DirectorRoger has a background in urban planning in the UK and internationally, with

experience embracing all aspects of the development and management of cities. He is currently helping to lead Atkins’s work on Liveable Cities, including

managing a number of projects on low carbon cities in India and internationally.

Dr. Paul Munday – Environmental ConsultantPaul works in the SAM team (Peterborough) where he specialises in GIS, catchment management and environmental impact assessment. He worked on the UK NEA.

Sean Lockie – DirectorSean is head of Faithful+Gould’s Sustainability and Carbon Management service. He manages a national team providing Sustainability and Carbon Management services.

Arthur Thornton – Principal ConsultantArthur is responsible for leading the Regulatory Compliance

and Research and has recently also been appointed as the Research and Innovation Manager for Water and Environment.

Nikki Van Dijk – Senior ConsultantNikki works in climate change adaptation. She is currently using scenario planning to develop robust strategies in the water industry but has experience across a range of sectors including

flood risk management, spatial planning and the natural environment.

Richard Alvey – DirectorRichard is responsible for driving our global agenda on Cities, drawing on masterplanning,

infrastructure and embedding sustainability and carbon critical design. He has delivered sustainable masterplans for projects in cities across the Middle East, China, India and Europe.

Nick Godfrey – Principal EconomistNick has a background in economic development, climate change, and resource scarcities in emerging and developing economies. He is currently looking at the

future of cities and the challenges of transitioning to lower carbon, climate, and resource resilient urban development paths.

Geoff Darch – Principal Geoff leads climate change impact assessment and the development of

adaptation strategies. Current work includes advice on global water resources, assessment of impacts on transport infrastructure in the Balkans, and the

development of monitoring programmes in the UK.

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Our experience

Atkins has extensive experience of planning, assessing, designing and implementing projects and policies across a wide range of sectors. Here we showcase selected projects that have incorporated an ecosystem approach to environmental management and an understanding of ecosystem services.

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Applying an Ecosystem Services Framework to Transport Appraisal (Department for Transport)United Kingdom

In light of new supplementary HMT Green Book guidance on accounting for environmental impacts, Atkins, in partnership with Metroeconomica, undertook a review of DfT’s transport appraisal guidance (WebTAG). The review, involving a number of Atkins transport and environment specialists, provided an understanding of the web of impact pathways that are associated with the impacts of transport projects on ecosystem services. It demonstrated the extent to which certain ecosystem services are typically already captured in a WebTAG appraisal, and where there are notable gaps. Two core sets of recommendations were established to guide DfT’s ecosystem services research agenda and guidance development. Firstly, recommendations on the options for establishing a screening exercise for ecosystem services in WebTAG. Secondly, advice was provided on the extent to which existing valuation literature may be used in future transport appraisals. Recommendations for further work included building on the existing literature on the social benefits of open space, carbon segmentation and landscape. The All Party Parliamentary Group on Biodiversity discussed this project as one of the examples of the UK government’s commitment to bringing an Ecosystems approach to all government assessment systems.

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Be it corporate policy or public policy, issues of climate change, biodiversity loss and sustainability are right at the top of the agenda. But the links between our policies, our actions and our impacts are complicated. So can policy development take account of ecosystem services, and will this result in better policies?

From integrated river basin management, to marine spatial planning, Atkins is working with policy makers to incorporate an Ecosystem Approach. This is helping to shed light on the more complex interactions between people and the environment and providing managers and policy makers with a holistic understanding of our interaction with the environment. This is helping to provide new ways of looking at the big issues of climate change, biodiversity loss and sustainable development.

In Europe and the UK, Governments are responding to concerns about declines in biodiversity. Regulation and consenting procedures will increasingly require proper accounting for environmental assets and ecosystem services in, for example, planning permissions, emissions and discharge consents or resource utilisation licences. Unlike some other environmental impacts, measuring biodiversity loss and associated changes in ecosystem services is far from straightforward.

Biodiversity offsetting aims to compensate for unavoidable losses occurring from residual impacts and is being explored at the European and UK level as an approach for achieving ‘no net loss’ of biodiversity as a result of development. Atkins is currently working with Defra on one of a small number of projects to understand the potential role of biodiversity offsetting and how it can be used most effectively. We are reanalysing past projects to understand how outcomes may have differed if a biodiversity offsetting approach had been used. Such research places Atkins at the forefront of the development of biodiversity offsetting policy in the UK.

Risks to corporate reputation from environmental impacts and the resultant community and social costs can be critical to future business performance and need to be taken into account. The key issue is how businesses can really understand their potential impacts sufficiently so that such risks can be mitigated through corporate policy and planning.

Policy development

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Atkins showcased their thought leadership on ecosystem services in August 2013 in a joint workshop with Chartered Institute of Ecology and Environmental Management (CIEEM) at the annual International Congress of Ecology (Intecol) in London.

In front of a packed audience, Professor Andrew Watkinson (University of East Anglia, and the Living with Environmental Change partnership), Nikki van Dijk (senior environmental consultant, Atkins) and Professor David Raffaelli (University of York, and the Biodiversity and Ecosystem Service Sustainability NERC research programme) gave presentations on the interface between business, industry and decision makers, and ecologists. Talks also covered the challenges of communicating clearly and effectively, all themed around ecosystem services. Claire Wansbury of Atkins led an exercise where the audience explored how they communicated key messages about biodiversity and ecosystem services.

IntecolLondon

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Compilation of information on tourism relevant to marine planning in the South Inshore and Offshore Marine Plan areaUnited Kingdom

This project provided a review of how tourism data and information could be used to inform an ecosystem approach for marine planning, identifying evidence gaps and ongoing relevant ecosystem services research programmes. Atkins is a member of the Marine Management Organisation’s (MMO) four year ‘economic and social science research’ framework panel. Through this framework, Atkins, in partnership with The Tourism Company, undertook a project to inform the first phase of the MMO’s marine spatial planning process off southern England.

A review of tourism information of relevance to the plan area was undertaken through a combined approach of literature searches and consultation, and a data catalogue with supporting commentary provided. In addition, the project undertook a review of how tourism can deliver UK sustainable development objectives in the South Marine Plan area and assessed the suitability of tourism data for designing indicators to test the success of marine plan policies in relation to tourism.

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Birmingham: Places for the FutureUnited Kingdom

Birmingham City Council are working on a Natural Capital City Tool. This follows their work on embedding sustainability within their Core Strategy. Atkins prepared an Supplementary Planning Document (SPD) on sustainable development for Birmingham City Council. This is a high priority for the Council as they seek to create ‘Places for the Future’ that can respond to the challenges of climate change, provide a great place to live, learn work and visit, and develop a thriving economy. The SPD seeks to embed within the planning process, the sustainable development objectives set out in the Council’s Core Strategy. To assist with the implementation of sustainable development , Atkins prepared a checklist that developers and council planners can use throughout the planning process, from the early design stages to project completion. The SPD provides detailed guidance on: sustainable communities; green infrastructure and climate change adaptation; sustainable transport; sustainable construction and waste; low and zero carbon buildings. Alongside the SPD, Atkins tested the viability of the Council’s policy on carbon reduction, and provided a detailed evidence base that has been used to refine the policy approach that will be taken forward in the Core Strategy.

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Environmental Impact Assessments (EIAs) and Environmental and Social Impact Assessments (ESIAs) are a well-established part of the planning process both in the UK and internationally. Such assessments have traditionally considered environmental, social and economic issues in isolation from each other. But can a more integrated approach to assessment help us understand the impacts of human activities on natural capital, biodiversity and, ultimately, ecosystem services better? And how might this enable project design and impact mitigation to be better designed so as not only to minimise the costs, but to maximise the benefits?

There are a number of international initiatives which seek to promote an integrated approach to impact assessment that include consideration of the impacts and interdependencies of businesses and projects with ecosystem services. Most notably updates in 2012 to the Performance Standards of the World Bank Group’s International Finance Corporation (IFC) now require the explicit consideration of potential risks and impacts through an ecosystem services framework. Indeed, assessments of ecosystem services are being discussed through a full range of assessment tools – from cost- benefit analysis to strategic assessments. In the UK this includes the HM Treasury Green Book, which guides policy appraisal.

Atkins has a long history of providing project assessment services and helping companies through the development planning process. Atkins provided advice to Defra to help incorporate an understanding of ecosystem service benefits into the Government’s impact assessment of proposed Marine Conservation Zones. We’ve been working with companies to ensure that project assessments meet the necessary standards and incorporate the latest best practice.

The ecosystem services provide an opportunity to understand and mitigate negative impacts and to demonstrate the potential scale of beneficial impacts. We believe that this can result in better outcomes for the environment, for society and for business.

Understanding how complex environmental change can affect the availability of the ecosystem services that companies may depend on is fundamental to managing long-term risks to business and project performance.

The extent of potential environmental change over the medium to long-term as a result of climate change could have significant implications on these ecosystem services. Risks to corporate reputation from environmental impacts and the resultant community and social costs can be critical to future business performance and need to be taken into account.

We have worked with a number of clients to help understand their key dependencies and impacts in relation to ecosystem services – such as the availability of cooling water for power stations, adequate flow for hydropower projects, or the capacity of rivers to assimilate pollution.

The incorporation of ecosystem services is such work is helping to provide a greater understanding of the action required to ensure future corporate and project resilience. We have recently been working with a number of major food and drink producers to understand and rationalise potential supply chain issues and to future proof supplier policies and business planning.

Assessment

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Finding Sanctuary Marine Conservation Zone ProjectUnited Kingdom

Finding Sanctuary was one of four regional projects set up by Natural England and JNCC on behalf of Defra under the Marine Conservation Zone (MCZ) Project. The aim of the project was to recommend MCZs that, when combined with other types of marine protected area (MPA), will form an ecologically coherent network of MPAs that will help ensure the ongoing health of our marine environment. Atkins seconded two economists to the project to contribute economic expertise to the stakeholder-led planning process, and to carry out an Impact Assessment of the recommended MCZs.

The economists led a number of work streams, including: development of a model to map and value commercial fishing activity ( a proxy for fish as a provisioning service); identifying potential management responses to activity-environment pressures; and assessment of the potential impacts of MCZs on ecosystem services as part of a peer reviewed Impact Assessment.

Atkins is currently providing ongoing advisory services to Defra to

develop the assessment of ecosystem service benefits of MCZs.

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European Aquaculture AssessmentEuropean Union

Provisioning services through natural and farmed fisheries are a key ecosystems service of the oceans. Atkins created a picture of all aquaculture activities in the European Union in five years time. Our work helped to inform the European Commission on any gaps in environmental legislation and helped them assess the impact of aquaculture if EU waters achieved ‘good ecological status.’ The benefit of this has been to clarify parameters where aquacultural development should take place. The study showed that various pressure categories can be exerted on the marine environment from different aquacultural production systems. The Marine Strategy Framework Directive is asking Member States to now take these findings into consideration.

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Character Area Climate Change ProjectUnited Kingdom

The natural environment is changing, particularly as a consequence of human-induced land use and climate change. Natural England therefore needs to look ahead to secure the future of the natural environment and the ecosystem services it provides. Through the Character Area Climate Change Project, Atkins assisted Natural England in planning to deliver a natural environment that is healthy now and in the future, enjoyed by people and used sustainably. Atkins developed a methodology for assessing the vulnerability of ecosystem services to the impacts of climate change in a number of National Character Areas (NCAs) across the country. The method identifies features of the natural environment which contribute to provisioning, regulating, supporting and cultural services within an NCA and assesses their exposure and sensitivity to the impacts of climate change, and their adaptive capacity. This is used to produce a qualitative vulnerability rating for features of the natural environment. Through consultation with local stakeholders, potential adaptation actions were identified which aimed to reduce the vulnerability of ecosystem services to the impacts of climate change, and to maximize opportunities.

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Enhancing the biodiversity of towns and cities is a necessity for human beings living and working in urban areas. People need a daily dose of nature to ensure our physical and mental health and wellbeing, and there is good medical evidence for this. Using an Ecosystem Approach to guide the integrated design of green infrastructure and masterplans can help to maximise such benefits.

The regulatory framework for urban areas in the UK is starting to change - for example, from just mitigating biodiversity losses to wanting demonstrable biodiversity gains. The Stern review for HM Treasury in 2006 on the economics of climate change recognised the need to reduce habitat fragmentation and encourage movement and migration of species by making use of wildlife corridors. The National Planning Policy Framework in England proposes that the planning system should minimise impacts on biodiversity and establish coherent ecological networks that are more resilient to current and future pressures on biodiversity. The European Union is moving towards a policy of ‘no net loss’ of biodiversity and ecosystem services through its Biodiversity Strategy to 2020.

An Ecosystem Approach accords with key planning principles such as contributing to the transition to a low carbon future in a changing climate, taking full account of issues such as flood risk and coastal change, and encouraging the reuse of existing resources.

Atkins has been incorporating ecosystem service thinking to help tackle the policy challenges of future proofing cities in the face of multiple future environmental risks.

How can planners and designers really integrate green infrastructure, design and urban and strategic planning in a way that results in tangible on-the-ground benefits from ecosystem services?

A green infrastructure network is more than a collection of isolated parks and public open spaces. Well-designed green infrastructure networks operate at a range of scales and provide strategic networks of multifunctional spaces.

At Atkins, we’ve worked with our partners and clients to develop innovative ways through which green infrastructure can be incorporated into urban planning and masterplanning in ways that maximise ecosystem service benefits. Solutions can be proposed for specific issues such as the use of ‘green bridges’ across roads and railway lines at key locations in order to reduce habitat fragmentation.

Our work on the Greenwich Peninsula in London won a Civic Trust Award. This included the overall green infrastructure design that included an Ecology Park to provided multiple ecosystem service benefits including recreation and flood management. Atkins is helping to deliver pragmatic deliverable solutions for sustainable development.

Green infrastructure and masterplanning

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Greenwich Peninsula Ecology ParkUnited Kingdom

The creation of parks, public spaces, riverside walkways and ecological terraces played an important part in Atkins’ wider work across Greenwich Peninsula that won a Civic Trust Award. The cultural ecosystem services of education, recreation and aesthetic value were key to this project. The southern site park was designed to create a natural, forested area – in keeping with the holistic, sustainable approach taken where buildings and urban space appear to be carved out of their setting. A central element is an ecology park created around two lakes and a village green, which was designed to act as a haven for wildlife, creating new habitats for birds, insects and other wildlife and maximising ecological benefits.

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Cottham HallUnited Kingdom

Atkins in partnership with Jon Rowlands Urban Design were commissioned by the Housing Communities Agency to prepare a comprehensive masterplan for Cottam Hall, Lancashire on the north western edge of Preston. Cottam Hall was initiated by the Commission for the New Towns in 1990 and to date, 14 sites have been developed providing approximately 960 dwellings. The remaining site of approximately 36 hectares was highlighted for residential development capable of accommodating around 1000 dwellings.

Atkins worked closely with Jon Rowlands Urban Design and provided: Masterplanning, Planning, Landscape Architecture, Ecology, Project Management, Engineering and Highways. A high quality sustainable solution was created, which incorporated 70% of existing mature vegetation and significant new areas of green open space to accommodate leisure, recreation, pedestrian and cycle friendly transport options as well as key habitat requirements.

The resulting masterplan combined the complex requirements of multiple constraints into an integrated proposal. This embraced green infrastructure and the maximisation of ecosystem service provision into a holistic design, creating a vibrant new place for a new community.

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Lincolnshire Coastal StudyUnited Kingdom

The Lincolnshire Coastal Study, conducted by Atkins, was the first comprehensive undertaking of its kind. The study identified and assessed a huge range of environmental, social and economic drivers such as rising sea levels, coastal flooding, economic regeneration and agriculture that affect the current and future needs of the area.

Atkins used a scenario-based approach to consider potential changes in tidal flood hazard due to climate change and socio-economic attitudes within the coastal zone. Scenarios and hazard maps were used with stakeholders to explore how the planning system could fuse and protect existing ecosystem services to support sustainable development. Technical and non-technical stakeholders, including elected members, local authority officers, the Lincolnshire Forum for Agriculture and Horticulture, the NFU, the Country Land and Business Association and the drainage boards were all involved in developing principles for sustainable spatial development which are now being used to develop local planning policy.

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London 2012 Olympics and ParalympicsUnited Kingdom

Atkins was the river-edge engineer involved with one of the biggest urban wetland habitat creation schemes in the UK. For the London 2012 Olympics and Paralympics, wetlands were created along the River Lee that flows through the Olympic Park. Atkins utilized an ecosystem approach to help design and build a river-edge wetland that could maximise ecosystem service benefits, from wild species diversity to recreation and amenity, within a constrained urban area. The four year project involved hydraulic modelling, a landmark planting trial, and bioengineering of the river banks to create a series of online wetlands, ponds and wet woodlands with a profusion of native plants. The daily tidal fluctuations in the water levels of the river meant that ecologically appropriate plants were required and that these had to be planted in the right way to ensure their growth and development in readiness for The Games. A 12 month planting trial was undertaken along a stretch of the river that used different planting methods to determine the final plant selection and arrangement for plants such as common reed, sedges, yellow irises and purple loosestrife. Eventually over ¼ million wetland plants were grown in coir mats at UK nurseries. Those were transported to the site to be fitted with precision into the 18,000 m2 jigsaw of different plants for different locations on the river banks and wetlands.

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Creation of green infrastructure – London 2012 Olympic ParkKey ecosystem services

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The importance of water for sustaining life is universally recognised. However, water also provides many other valuable ecosystem services. The allure of waterbodies, rivers and wetlands to all of us is well known: local residents strolling by a river, anglers on a lake, or tourists watching game at an African waterhole. We recognise waterbodies and watercourses where contamination or nutrient enrichment has so altered the aquatic ecosystem that it no longer functions properly and the services it supplies to us all are diminished.

The use of the Ecosystem Approach and ecosystem services as a logical integrating concept can be easily seen when considering water resources. For example, the removal of dissolved and particulate substances from water occurs during its natural passage through wetlands and vegetation. This function underpins the use of reedswamp vegetation in mine-water treatment works. Rainwater run-off from vegetated catchments is known to be slower and more predictable than the fast, flashy run-off from poorly vegetated catchments which can be associated with unpredictable flooding events.

So how does implementing the Ecosystem Approach make a difference? Looking after ecosystems can reduce your operating costs. In Britain, the integrated river catchment management programmes, promoted by the Environment Agency, can reduce the costs for downstream water users by improving water quality.

Developers can reduce the costs of providing over-sized surface water systems with capacity for unpredictable storm events by installing green roofs and sustainable drainage systems (SUDS) which can include vegetation as a means of managing storm water discharges from development. Replenishment of groundwater resources by allowing rainwater to infiltrate can be used where the vegetation, soils and surface geology are appropriate.

Groundwater provides a range of ecosystem services - water for domestic use, agriculture and industry; the recharge of surface waters for tourism and biodiversity benefits. But the benefits provided by these services are often not fully appreciated and factored into groundwater management decisions.

Atkins, in collaboration with Imperial College and the Environment Agency, has been undertaking research on the value of UK groundwater to help bring awareness of the importance of this resource to stakeholders. Internationally, Atkins, in collaboration with Eftec, developed an ecosystem services based tool for valuing the benefits that groundwater provides at different scales across Southern African Development Community (SADC), to assist in groundwater management decisions.

Water resources

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Future Proofing the UK Water SectorUnited Kingdom

For our thinkers, engineers, designers and project managers, the future is not a vague time horizon that allows decisions to be deferred – it is the guiding principle which governs our thinking now. But, given the scale and pace of change we are facing, how do businesses make long term investment decisions that create value and provide services that are fit for the future? The answer lies in future proofing. For Atkins, this is not an abstract concept but an integrated approach. It is about utilising and developing the capabilities of organisations to respond to the drivers of change and their risks in order to position themselves for long term success and maximise social, environmental and economic benefits.

One technique for considering the future that we have used with success is scenario planning. Working with Decision Strategies International (DSI) we used scenario planning to investigate what the United Kingdom’s water industry could plausibly look like in 2050 and presented the results in a thought leadership report, Future Proofing the UK Water Sector.

The scenarios are bounded by two highly uncertain drivers that will have a significant impact on the water industry of the future: societal value placed on resources; and energy price and availability. Using the scenarios, we identified a range of challenges facing the UK water and wastewater sectors between now and 2050 and highlighted a number of no-regrets pathways that can be taken today to prepare for an uncertain tomorrow. These include data and knowledge management, customer engagement and understanding, focusing on skills and workforce and innovation.

We have also used the scenario planning approach to assist a client in the water sector develop its long term water and waste water strategy, highlighting no-regrets actions, and are looking at opportunities to work with others to use scenarios to develop tailored solutions to long term environmental, social and economic change.

Where sustainable, low-tech localism thrives

Where all stakeholders are squeezed between the demands of customers and the cost of living

ExpEnsivE, volatilE & scarcE EnErgy

A future dominated by the resurgence of traditional UK manufacturing

A high-tech future where the scientific innovator is king

low sociEtal valuE placEd on rEsourcEs

HigH sociEtal valuE placEd on rEsourcEs

cHEap, stablE & sEcurE EnErgy

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Bridgwater Sluice Economic Impact StudyUnited Kingdom

Atkins recently completed the economic and regeneration impact studies of the proposed Parrett Sluice at Bridgwater on behalf of Sedgemoor District Council.

This included an assessment of the wider economic benefits of higher water levels in the river, reflected through the development and values of new waterside developments as well as the tourism and recreation benefits of improving access to the Somerset waterways network. The study concluded that the Sluice would assist in supporting 2,300 additional jobs in the catchment area and provide a net economic benefit of around £270 million to the Bridgwater economy.

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Cost-benefit analysis is a valuable, quantitative method of assessing the likely impact of development and redevelopment proposals. This analysis method allows the direct assessment of a wide range of projected impacts against each other which, using alternative assessment methodologies, might not be possible.

A Social and Environmental Benefits Valuation of the cost of replacing and upgrading Thames Water’s mains network in central and outer London was conducted by Atkins as part of a business case presented at an OFWAT periodic review.

In order to consider investment in sewerage systems for communities not connected to the mains system, Atkins designed and implemented a Willingness To Pay survey of 500 households, assessing the value they placed on consequent environmental improvements.

These issues, along with other property, water, and bank- side-leisure impacts, were covered by a cost/benefits model we developed to prioritise more than 200 schemes for inclusion in a five-year programme.

Replacement and Upgrading of Thames Water’s Mains NetworkUnited Kingdom

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Claire Wansbury

Associate Director, Water & Environment

Euston Tower

286 Euston Road

London NW1 3AT

Telephone +44 (0)20 7121 2631

Mobile +44 (0)7802 486392

Email claire.wansbury@atkinsglobal.com

www.atkinsglobal.com

The Atkins logo, ‘Carbon Critical Design’ and the strapline ‘Plan Design Enable’ are trademarks of Atkins Ltd.© Atkins Ltd except where stated otherwise

John Box

Director, Water & Environment

The Axis

10 Holliday Street

Birmingham B1 1TF

Mobile +44 (0)7803 259863

Email john.box@atkinsglobal.com