Creating a biodiversity scorecard for nature-positive infrastructure development
Project Overview
The ongoing biodiversity crisis necessitates a fundamental shift in how we manage resources and conduct economic development. While nature-based solutions are growing in popularity, we don’t have clear answers on how infrastructure development affects biodiversity. That’s where this team comes in.
An interdisciplinary collaboration stemming from the Network for Engineering With Nature (N-EWN) Biodiversity Working Group, this project aims to create “biodiversity scorecards” for use in infrastructure development and corporate operations management.

Meet the Team
This interdisciplinary group has come together from across academic, corporate, nonprofit and government sectors to advance the biodiversity- and nature-positive movement in infrastructure planning and economic growth. Learn more about their individual expertise below:


Charles van Rees, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor, Odum School of Ecology
charles.vanrees@uga.edu

Seth Wenger, Ph.D.
Director of Science, River Basin Center and Associate Professor, Odum School of Ecology
swenger@uga.edu
Suman Jumani, Ph.D.
Freshwater Protection Spatial Analyst, The Nature Conservancy
Kyle McKay, Ph.D.
Research Civil Engineer, Engineer Research & Development Center (ERDC), USACE
Liya Abera, Ph.D.
Water Resources Engineer, Engineer Research & Development Center (ERDC), USACE
Laura German, Ph.D.
Director, Center for Integrative Conservation Research, University of Georgia
Vratika Chaudhary, Ph.D.
Senior Scientist, Nature and Biodiversity, Procter & Gamble
Tim Dekker, Ph.D.
Water Resources Engineer, CEO, LimnoTech
why a biodiversity scorecard?

The Challenge
The Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD)’s Kunming-Montreal post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework calls for transformative societal change wherein biodiversity and ecosystems are considered throughout economic decision-making.
Biodiversity-positive infrastructure development, nature-based solutions, and corporate sustainability initiatives all demand robust frameworks for biodiversity accounting. Unless we can quantify and compare the impacts on and benefits to global biodiversity at both product and supply-chain scales, we can’t yet involve biodiversity in decision making for infrastructure projects.
the goal
We’re teaming up with infrastructure agencies, corporations, ecological consulting firms, conservation non-profits, and other academic partners through the Network for Engineering With Nature (N-EWN) to inform and develop biodiversity accounting frameworks for broad-scale use.
The long-term goal of this initiative is the development of core functionalities and systems that can manifest a variety of biodiversity scorecards for use in infrastructure development and corporate operations accounting.
