Economic valuation of impacts to beneficial uses of water quality in California: Proposed methodology

Regional Water Quality Basin Plans in California protect the beneficial uses of water quality. Beneficial uses of water quality provide goods and services that can be estimated in monetary terms. Assessing the economic value of beneficial uses of water quality is necessary for enforcement, as well as, for setting priorities for water quality protection and preservation. The economic theory proposes several methods to assess the monetary value of the goods and services provided by water quality. A simpler methodology must be made available to regional board staff.;In an ideal world, economic values would be defined for beneficial uses of water bodies in regional basin plans. The current state of the art in economics and water pollution science, however, is not easily applicable for watersheds in major urban areas. This study proposes a methodology for estimating the economic damages of water pollution.