La compensation écologique permet-elle vraiment de tendre vers l’absence de perte nette de biodiversité ?

Since 2016, French law has pursued the objective of no net loss of biodiversity by requiring projects with impacts on biodiversity to avoid, reduce, and then compensate for these impacts. Offset measures must generate sufficient ecological gains, which presupposes that they are carried out on sites...

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Main Authors: Brian Padilla, Salomée Gelot, Adrien Guette, Jonathan Carruthers-Jones
Format: Article
Language:deu
Published: Unité Mixte de Recherche 8504 Géographie-cités 2024-02-01
Series:Cybergeo
Subjects:
Online Access:https://journals.openedition.org/cybergeo/40826
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author Brian Padilla
Salomée Gelot
Adrien Guette
Jonathan Carruthers-Jones
author_facet Brian Padilla
Salomée Gelot
Adrien Guette
Jonathan Carruthers-Jones
author_sort Brian Padilla
collection DOAJ
description Since 2016, French law has pursued the objective of no net loss of biodiversity by requiring projects with impacts on biodiversity to avoid, reduce, and then compensate for these impacts. Offset measures must generate sufficient ecological gains, which presupposes that they are carried out on sites in poor ecological condition. This article analyzes the ecological context in which 1153 offset measures were implemented between 2017 and 2021 in France. Using data on the "potential wilderness of mainland France", we compare the biophysical integrity scores of the selected sites on the one hand and the ecological quality scores, including an index of landscape connectivity around the sites, on the other hand, in relation to national scores. Our results show that 64% of the area of offset sites is located in areas where the biophysical integrity score is above the French median, and 40% is located in spaces where it is above the last quartile. However, the majority of offset sites are found in landscapes with lower ecological quality than the mainland territory. These findings suggest that the strategy for locating compensatory measures does not primarily aim to generate significant ecological gains but rather responds to other economic and land constraints. This raises questions about the effectiveness of offsetting in moving towards no biodiversity net loss.
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spelling doaj.art-e5e03ba4e6604d4ea79da0413938623b2024-04-04T09:33:02ZdeuUnité Mixte de Recherche 8504 Géographie-citésCybergeo1278-33662024-02-0110.4000/cybergeo.40826La compensation écologique permet-elle vraiment de tendre vers l’absence de perte nette de biodiversité ?Brian PadillaSalomée GelotAdrien GuetteJonathan Carruthers-JonesSince 2016, French law has pursued the objective of no net loss of biodiversity by requiring projects with impacts on biodiversity to avoid, reduce, and then compensate for these impacts. Offset measures must generate sufficient ecological gains, which presupposes that they are carried out on sites in poor ecological condition. This article analyzes the ecological context in which 1153 offset measures were implemented between 2017 and 2021 in France. Using data on the "potential wilderness of mainland France", we compare the biophysical integrity scores of the selected sites on the one hand and the ecological quality scores, including an index of landscape connectivity around the sites, on the other hand, in relation to national scores. Our results show that 64% of the area of offset sites is located in areas where the biophysical integrity score is above the French median, and 40% is located in spaces where it is above the last quartile. However, the majority of offset sites are found in landscapes with lower ecological quality than the mainland territory. These findings suggest that the strategy for locating compensatory measures does not primarily aim to generate significant ecological gains but rather responds to other economic and land constraints. This raises questions about the effectiveness of offsetting in moving towards no biodiversity net loss.https://journals.openedition.org/cybergeo/40826anthropogenic impactterritorial planningbiodiversity
spellingShingle Brian Padilla
Salomée Gelot
Adrien Guette
Jonathan Carruthers-Jones
La compensation écologique permet-elle vraiment de tendre vers l’absence de perte nette de biodiversité ?
Cybergeo
anthropogenic impact
territorial planning
biodiversity
title La compensation écologique permet-elle vraiment de tendre vers l’absence de perte nette de biodiversité ?
title_full La compensation écologique permet-elle vraiment de tendre vers l’absence de perte nette de biodiversité ?
title_fullStr La compensation écologique permet-elle vraiment de tendre vers l’absence de perte nette de biodiversité ?
title_full_unstemmed La compensation écologique permet-elle vraiment de tendre vers l’absence de perte nette de biodiversité ?
title_short La compensation écologique permet-elle vraiment de tendre vers l’absence de perte nette de biodiversité ?
title_sort la compensation ecologique permet elle vraiment de tendre vers l absence de perte nette de biodiversite
topic anthropogenic impact
territorial planning
biodiversity
url https://journals.openedition.org/cybergeo/40826
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