We are a research group in the Department of Earth and Environment at Boston University advised by assistant professor Christoph Nolte. We study the effects and costs of environmental policies, especially biodiversity conservation and climate mitigation and adaptation. Our research projects often combine satellite observations with large spatio-temporal data on land policy, ownership, and use.
Research
Effects and costs of land conservation efforts, environmental valuation.
Teaching
Environmental statistics, economics, data science for conservation
Data
Property boundaries, land cover histories, land value estimates
Meet the research team and find out how to join us.
Current projects
- High-resolution prediction and uncertainty estimation of land value and conservation costs in the contiguous United States (NSF)
- Comparing the effectiveness of conservation instruments in the Colombian Andes biodiversity hotspot (NASA)
- LakeSense: tracking lake water quality from space to estimate its benefits (NASA)
- Economics and equity in adapting to hurricanes (NSF)
Recent publications
- Nolte et al. (2023) Data practices for studying the impacts of environmental amenities and hazards with nationwide property data. Land Economics
- Anderegg et al. (2023). Climate change greatly escalates forest disturbance risks to US property values. Environmental Research Letters
- Chaudhry, Nolte, Fairbanks (2023) Water market participation and agricultural land values. Land Economics
- Gourevitch et al. (2023) Unpriced climate risk and potential consequences of overvaluation in U.S. housing markets. Nature Climate Change
- Guignet et al. (2023) The external costs of industrial chemical accidents: a nationwide property value study. Journal of Housing Economics
- Guignet and Nolte (2023) Hazardous waste and home values: an analysis of treatment and disposal sites in the US. Journal of the Association of Environmental and Resource Economists
- Hennighausen et al. (2023) Flood insurance reform and housing market dynamics. Journal of Housing Economics
- Johnson et al. (2023) Moving to the country: understanding the effects of COVID-19 on property values and farmland loss. Journal of Housing Economics
- Kemink et al. (2023) Assessing prioritization measures for a private land conservation program in the U.S. Prairie Pothole Region. Conservation Science and Practice
- Malakoff & Nolte (2023) Estimating the parcel-level impacts of agricultural conservation easements on farmland loss using satellite data in New England. Land Use Policy
- Mamun, Nelson, Nolte (2023) Estimating the impact of Critical Habitat designation on the values of undeveloped and developed parcels. Land Economics
- Mamun et al. (2023) Valuing water quality in the US using a national data set on property values. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the U.S.A.
- Pollack et al. (2023) Flood risk signals in the property market and their implications for flood risk management. Journal of Housing Economics
- Stapp et al. (2023) Little evidence of management change in California’s forest offset program. Communications Earth and Environment
- Swedberg et al. (2023) Spatial heterogeneity in hedonic price effects for lake water quality. Land Economics
- Zabel, Nolte, Paterson. (2023) Estimating the value of national park designations using hedonic property value models. Land Economics
- Reboredo Segovia et al. (2022) Implementing land acquisitions for watershed services in the tropical Colombian Andes produces marginal progress for advancing area‐based conservation objectives. Conservation Letters
- Pollack et al. (2022) Aggregation bias and its drivers in large-scale flood loss estimation. Journal of Flood Risk Management
- Yang et al. (2021) Risk to global biodiversity and Indigenous lands from China’s overseas development finance. Nature Ecology and Evolution
- Nolte (2020) High-resolution land value maps reveal underestimation of conservation costs in the United States. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences