University of california santa cruz

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Other studies indicate that even views of greenery from a window can accelerate patient recovery times.

Those health-related benefits are one reason the report identifies health care providers and insurers as key stakeholders who have financial gains from healthier, greener environments.

"The health insurance industry is definitely a beneficiary of urban green space of urban forests, and so they're really important in this conversation.

For comparison, the combined financial value of California's highway infrastructure, buildings and other depreciable property in 2023 totaled $143.4 billion.

  • A study of 5 million Northern California residents found that those living in the greenest areas paid $374 less per year in adjusted health care costs, compared to those living in areas with fewer trees.
  • Planting, caring for and maintaining urban and community forests contributed $12.9 billion to California's economy in 2021, supporting 78,560 jobs.

    • According to Tallis, these numbers likely underestimate the true value of urban forests.

    "(These estimations) only capture a small subset of the things we have the methodologies to account for in current economics," Tallis noted.

    And that, the study's authors emphasize, is their most significant finding: that fishing fleets can serve as ecosystem sentinels.

    "We have so much data on fishing vessel activity," said Welch, an associate specialist at the Institute of Marine Sciences (IMS). The authors say that insights from fishing fleets as ecological sentinels may help accelerate management action to lessen the socio-economic and ecological harms of ocean warming.

    Albacore and bluefin, the species at the heart of this study, are migratory temperate tunas that are seasonally targeted by West Coast fishermen during the summer and fall.

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    We need different ways to respond to climate impacts as they happen, and we need different ways to fund responses."

    The economic value of urban trees

    The financial benefits identified in the study are significant:

    • California's 173.2 million urban trees represent a $181 billion asset, generating $8 billion in services per year.

      "Importantly, fishermen are conspicuous and their activities are actively monitored via several near real-time, high-resolution data streams including vessel tracking systems, satellite mapping, and shoreside landing receipts."

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      The researchers emphasize the need to better understand the costs counties face after climate-related disasters and determine what forms of coverage and payout thresholds would be most effective.

      Success, Tallis noted, would mean cities, counties, and stakeholders recognizing the benefits of nature and building the financial and governance structures needed to protect those assets.

      university of california santa cruz

      A single storm in 2023, for example, felled more than 1,000 trees in Sacramento.

      A proven model

      Storms—including atmospheric rivers and high-wind events—pose the most immediate threat to urban forests in California. Their partnership helped drive the development of the report, which highlights the ecological, social, and economic value of urban forests and frames them as long-term investments.

      Previous research by Tallis has also shown that access to green space can improve educational outcomes for elementary students in California.

    Ocean warming's toll on fisheries

    More precise ecosystem monitoring could also help avert fishery collapses that hurt local economies and communities.

    Their perspectives helped shape how an insurance policy could operate in practice.

    As Tallis explained, a forest insurance model would rely on stakeholders purchasing policies that would contribute to a pooled fund.

    "These data are traditionally used for surveillance, and it is exciting that they may also be useful for understanding ecosystem health."

    Human ecosystem sentinels

    The concept of "ecosystem sentinels" as living sensors of changing conditions in their surroundings has been gaining traction among researchers seeking to better understand the impact of humans and climate change on natural habitats that are difficult to directly observe.

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    Researchers at the University of California, Santa Cruz, have already leveraged the vast troves of geolocation data from vessel-tracking systems to pinpoint where whales and other large marine species are endangered by ship traffic and industrial fishing.

    Now, in a new study led by Heather Welch at UC Santa Cruz's Institute of Marine Sciences, researchers show how the geolocation data generated by satellites for the global Vessel Monitoring System (VMS) can reveal where marine heat waves are affecting the behavior of ecologically and economically valuable species.

    In a PNASarticle, the authors describe how tracking data on fishing reflected low albacore abundance in the North Pacific in 2023 due to a marine heat wave.

    The year 2023 is important because that was when unusually warm ocean temperatures dispersed albacore more widely and made them cost-prohibitive to target.

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    From offsetting higher temperatures as cities heat up and cultivating healthier communities, to contributing to local economies and delivering other critical services, the range of benefits of trees in urban settings are detailed in a new report co-authored by scientist Heather Tallis at UC Santa Cruz's Center for Coastal Climate Resilience (CCCR).

    The publication, "California Urban Forest Insurance," is a feasibility report that translates these benefits into monetary terms in order to make the business case for insuring these resources.