Environmental value concepts
RICS Insight Paper ‘Value of natural capital - the need for chartered surveyors’ published by the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors in 2017 defines a number of environmental value concepts:
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[edit] Altruistic value
‘The value we place on the knowledge that environmental resources are available for other beneficiaries even if no personal benefit is derived from them.’
[edit] Bequest value
‘The value we place on the knowledge that environmental resources will be available for future generations, even if no personal benefit is derived from them.’
[edit] Economic value
‘Worth to particular people or to society as a whole. Can mean the same as social value and societal value.’
[edit] Existence value
‘The value we place on the existence of environmental resources irrespective of human use or engagement with them.’
[edit] Non-use value
‘A collective term for altruistic, bequest and existence value.’
[edit] Option value
‘The value of knowing that resources will be available to us in future, even if we don’t use them now.’
[edit] Total economic value
‘Portmanteau phrase to characterise and value the benefits that people receive from the environment.’
[edit] Use value
‘The value of personal benefits from use of the natural environment. These personal benefits may be direct and indirect, they may be from present use and future use.’
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