Natural capital assessments - a tool for holistic decision-making

What do we mean by the term ‘natural capital’? Read on to find out how we’re using natural capital assessments to ensure environmental benefits are recognised, valued, and safeguarded in long-term climate resilience planning.

Integrating natural capital into environmental planning

The natural environment provides vital goods and ecosystem services that benefit both people and wildlife. But what exactly do we mean by 'natural capital'?

Natural capital refers to the world’s stock of natural assets - including land, water, air, and all living organisms that collectively support life and economic activity.

A natural capital approach provides a structured framework for identifying, assessing, and valuing the benefits provided by nature. By recognising these services in decision-making, we can make more informed, evidence-based choices about how best to protect, enhance, and invest in the natural environment.

At JBA, we integrate natural capital approaches into our work to help clients manage flood risk, restore catchments, and deliver nature-based solutions that provide long-term environmental, social and economic benefits.

By embedding natural capital thinking into project design and policy support, we help ensure that investments in natural systems contribute to both climate adaptation and improved ecosystem health.

Our approach to natural capital assessments

We have extensive experience delivering natural capital assessments across various scales for a wide range of clients.

Site-specific ecosystem service assessments help us understand the different ecosystem services provided by a site, providing a means of quantifying their benefits and assigning a monetary value. They can guide management strategies to enhance ecosystem service delivery and help landowners better understand and articulate the value of a site.
Baseline natural capital assessments can describe the habitats across a study area, setting out their extent and condition and describing the ecosystem services they provide. They can help provide a benchmark and enable us to compare the study area in its current state against future options/scenarios.
Comparing a natural capital baseline against different options enables us to show improvements or deteriorations in natural capital. This assists in valuing the benefits of different options, estimating costs, and developing a benefit-to-cost ratio. Employing a natural capital approach during options appraisal can help to select the best option for both people and nature.
Applying natural capital assessments at a catchment scale aids strategic decision-making. Flood, water quality, and water resource modelling can be used to assess a catchment’s potential to deliver nature-based solutions. The outcomes of these models can be integrated with natural capital assessments to estimate the benefits and costs of different scenarios.
Embedding natural capital approaches into policy and strategy ensures that decisions maximise benefits for people and wildlife at the outset. We have worked with government clients to help integrate natural capital into tools, plans, policies and strategies.