Introduction • All impacts in money terms • No impacts in monetary terms • Some impacts in money terms • Risk & uncertainty

Introduction

The approach to decision making is likely to vary according to the number of impact categories/criteria that can be expressed (or not) in money terms. There are three possible variations:

• all impacts are expressed in money terms (this could also include those cases where all significant impacts are expressed in money terms);
• no impacts are expressed in money terms; and
• some impacts are expressed in money terms and some are not.

The level of decision being made (management decisions, restoration works, managed realignment/compensatory habitat) will determine the number of impacts, using AST’s that are to be considered (see Appraisal of options using ASTs). Of these, in most cases, it is likely that only a subset will be able to be valued in money terms. It is likely to be necessary, therefore, to select a preferred option by comparing both monetary and non-monetary impacts.

The following pages provide further explanation on how decision making can be undertaken for each decision level, based on the terms in which impacts can be expressed (i.e. monetary or non-monetary terms).