GLIN==> Webinar: Return on Investment in Great Lakes Restoration in Muskegon Lake, Thursday, March 10 at 12 Noon EST

~~ Seminar and Webinar Announcement ~~

Return on Investment is Greater than the Cost of Great Lakes Restoration 

Economic Benefits of Restoration in the Muskegon Lake Area of Concern,
Muskegon, Mich.

The NOAA Restoration Center, Office of Habitat Conservation, is sponsoring a
seminar and webinar to present findings from a study of economic benefits
from restoration actions in Muskegon Lake, located in west Michigan on the
eastern shore of Lake Michigan. Muskegon Lake was designated as an Area of
Concern (AOC) under the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement and has
benefitted from numerous major restoration efforts, including a $10 million
habitat restoration project funded by NOAA under the ARRA and a major
contaminated sediment cleanup funded under the Great Lakes Legacy Act. As
part of the NOAA project, Grand Valley State University compared the
estimated benefits of Muskegon Lake restoration with the direct costs of the
remediation. The seminar and webinar will present the results of this study
(an abstract of the study is provided below).

Date: Thursday, March 10, 2011 at 12 noon EST

Speaker: Dr. Paul Isely, Assistant Professor, Economics, Grand Valley State
University

Registration: For remote access via webinar (unless specified otherwise
below), please fill out the registration form
<http://www.mymeetings.com/nc/join.php?sigKey=mymeetings&i=742656968&=brownb
ag&t=c>  a few minutes before the meeting is scheduled to begin. The Meeting
Number is 742656968; the Passcode is brownbag. For audio in the U.S. and
Canada, dial 866-833-7307. The participant passcode is 8986360.

General Information http://www.lib.noaa.gov/about/news/brownbagseminars.html
All Brown Bag Seminars (unless otherwise noted) are held from 12 noon - 1
p.m. in the NOAA Central Library, 2nd Floor, SSMC#3, 1315 East-West Highway,
Silver Spring.
Contact Mary Lou Cumberpatch <mailto:Mary.Lou.Cumberpatch at noaa.gov>
(301-713-2600 ext.140) or Albert (Skip) Theberge
<mailto:Albert.E.Theberge.Jr at noaa.gov>  (301-713-2600 ext. 115) for further
information or to set up a Brown Bag.

Study Abstract

The Great Lakes Commission and West Michigan Shoreline Regional Development
Commission, in collaboration with the Muskegon Lake Watershed Partnership,
received a $10 million NOAA Coastal and Marine Habitat Restoration/ARRA
grant to restore Great Lakes habitat along the southern shoreline of
Muskegon Lake, which includes the removal of hardened shoreline and historic
sawmill and industrial fill. The AOC has benefited from the NOAA habitat
restoration and from the remediation of contaminated sediment through an EPA
Great Lakes Legacy Act project. As part of the NOAA project, Grand Valley
State University compared the estimated benefits of Muskegon Lake
restoration with the direct costs of the remediation. Using travel cost
surveys, contingent valuation surveys, and hedonic valuation of residential
property, economists estimated the economic values of the ecosystem services
associated with the restoration of wetland habitat in this Great Lakes Area
of Concern. The travel cost survey uses a statistically random sample of
over 200 recreational users of Muskegon Lake at multiple recreational access
points before and during the remediation. The contingent valuation survey
samples a similarly sized random sample of Muskegon County residents via an
in person stated preference questionnaire as in Whitehead et al (2009). The
hedonic analysis uses proximity to the first and second closest shoreline
segments, and their associated lengths, to both natural and hardened
shoreline from each house before and after the restoration. The estimates
from all three methods are then used to find the economic impact on the
Muskegon region. Results find that the return on investment is greater than
the cost of remediation.


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