Heritage, Natural Capital and Ecosystem Services: Historic Buildings and their Associated Boundaries. Project Report. Historic England, Portsmouth.

This project explores and tests how the cultural heritage values of buildings and structures can be incorporated into an ecosystem services framework, through considering them as both an integral part of their associated historic spaces and of their wider landscape settings. The project applies a methodology that identifies the ecosystem service outcomes from buildings, expressed in terms of flows of benefits over time, and attributes monetary values that are compatible with the ecosystem services approach. The method focuses on identifying and measuring the flow of ecosystem services over time arising from the current level of ‘natural capital’ (the stock), in a site or a defined area. The project team have developed and applied an environmental value accounting model that identifies the benefits and attributes the values associated with historic buildings and structures. The model is based on a ‘return-on-investment’ accounting framework that integrates historic function, character and significance of buildings (or other structures) with a range of agricultural, environmental, economic, and social functions to analyse the range of values generated. The cultural heritage (historic) value of buildings in the case study areas is assessed through the integration of three scored characteristics (time depth, inter-relationships, legibility). This desk-based identification of the extent to which the historic buildings and structures in an area contribute ecosystem services is aimed at enhancing understanding of the value of the annual flow of benefits generated by cultural heritage.