Validating Farmland Biodiversity Life Cycle Assessment at the Landscape Scale
A new study of Noëlle Klein evaluates the Swiss Agricultural Life Cycle Assessment for biodiversity SALCA-BD, which is used to compare the impact of different agricultural management options on different species groups.
For this purpose, diversity data of birds and butterflies were compared with the prediction of the model at field- and at landscape level. Furthermore, it was tested whether the integration of spatial landscape structure (via landscape metrics) can help to improve the prediction for the landscape level. The results show a high correlation of the diversity of both species groups with the prediction of the model, but better prediction for the field level. Landscape prediction can be improved through landscape structure, but only moderately and not for both species groups. This shows that the integration of spatial context can improve life cycle assessment analyses, but its relative benefit always depends on the conditions (species group, scale) of the assessment in question.
The publication can be read here: external page https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.est.2c09677