Get to know N-EWN
A community of researchers, practitioners, and educators working together to advance the practice of natural infrastructure.
We work across four main branches
In order to help facilitate the widespread adoption of natural infrastructure practices across the United States, we’ve identified four main areas that need additional work:
Developing methods and standards
New tools, techniques and guidance are needed to effectively plan, design, construct and operate natural infrastructure at different scales
Assessing benefits and costs
Natural infrastructure provides communities with a broad array of economic, environmental and social benefits. Improved approaches are needed to evaluate, quantify and forecast these benefits to support planning and decision making
Monitoring performance and outcomes
Technically sound, efficient and applicable methods are needed to track natural infrastructure performance over time, develop the evidence base for future designs, ensure compliance with policy and inform project operations and adaptive management
Integrating people and policy
Providing infrastructure that supports human wellbeing and equitably meets the needs of diverse communities requires integration of human values, attitudes, beliefs, perceptions and policies with modern communication and collaboration practices
Combining a diversity of on-the-ground experience with interdisciplinary teams.
The N-EWN community is made up of over 30 partners from industry, academia and the non-profit sector.
What N-EWN’s been up to:
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N-EWN Member Dr. Amber Wutich named a 2023 MacArthur fellow
We are immensely proud to share that Dr. Amber Wutich, a N-EWN member from Arizona State University, has been named a 2023 MacArthur Fellow. Wutich specializes in water insecurity, and investigates its impacts on human well-being. Her work was recently covered by NPR, where they referred to her “groundbreaking research showing how social structures[…] are used…
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N-EWN publication touts opportunities for improving infrastructure and supporting biodiversity
Jointly advancing infrastructure and biodiversity conservation A team from the Network for Engineering With Nature recently published a comment in the journal Nature Reviews Earth & Environment, describing the opportunity that comes with melding biodiversity conservation and innovation in infrastructure, as well as the crucial importance for our society in seizing that opportunity. The paper…
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Biohabitats Named N-EWN Partner
Biohabitats has joined the Network for Engineering With Nature amongst a group of exciting new partners. Learn more about their work here. Biohabitats is a conservation-focused landscape design group, applying the science of ecology to restoring ecosystems, conserving habitat and regenerating the natural systems that sustain all life on Earth. Their areas of expertise include…
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