Plan to bring wildlife back to Loch Ness
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A LOCHSIDE site is set to become a living laboratory, demonstrating the benefits of rewilding.
Infrastructure services firm AECOM has launched the Natural Capital Laboratory on a 100-acre site near Loch Ness.
Working with landowners and conservation charity the Lifescape Project, they will restore the natural environment over five years, bringing back native forest and reintroducing locally extinct species.
AECOM will design and test experimental new techniques to quantify, measure and communicate environmental and social change, applying cutting-edge technologies including drones, artificial intelligence, virtual reality and space satellites.
Robert Spencer, director for sustainability with the firm, said: “We expect this will affect real change among businesses and organisations with significant land assets and encourage wider uptake of natural capital thinking.
“With growing demand for public and private sector organisations to better value and account for natural capital, they will need to consider how they interact with and manage their natural assets in everyday decision-making.”