Ingram, Jane CarterBagstad, KennethVardon, MichaelRhodes, Charles R.Posner, Stephen M.Casey, Clyde F.Glynn, Pierre D.Shapiro, Carl D.2024-03-252212-0416http://hdl.handle.net/1885/316287Global understanding of the interconnections between the environment and economy has increased, driving the development of frameworks and standards that support the measurement and valuation of natural capital and ecosystem services by both governments and businesses. This paper outlines how businesses can use natural capital accounts (NCA) aligned to the System of Environmental Economic Accounting (SEEA) standard described in this special issue to support identification, management, and valuation of natural capital not typically listed on corporate balance sheets. Such accounts have direct applications for business strategic planning, investment decisions, supply chain management, operations management, risk management, and corporate reporting. Businesses also have important roles to play in advancing SEEA-aligned NCA by providing information that would be useful to include in the accounts and by helping to shape accounts to provide decision-relevant information for both the private and the public sectors. Current pilot SEEA-aligned NCA data and analyses developed for the United States can help address some of the common challenges that businesses face in using natural capital data such as accessibility, quality, and credibility, important for business decision making. However, improvements are needed to fill data gaps and produce more frequent and timely estimates aligned to the temporal resolution needed by businesses.This work was conducted as a part of the “Accounting for U.S. Ecosystem Services at National and Subnational Scales” working group supported by the National Socio-Environmental Synthesis Center (SESYNC) under funding received from the National Science Foundation (grant DBI-1052875) and the U.S. Geological Survey John Wesley Powell Center for Analysis and Synthesis (grant GX16EW00ECSV00). We thank Mairi-Jane Fox for constructive comments on an earlier draft of this paper. Contributions from Carl Shapiro were provided while serving as Director of the Science and Decisions Center at the U.S. Geological Survey and contributions from Pierre Glynn were provided while serving as Chief, Water Cycle Branch at the U.S. Geological Survey. Any use of trade, firm, or product names is for descriptive purposes only and does not imply endorsement by the U.S. Governmenapplication/pdfen-AU© 2022 The authorsEnvironmental and Social GovernanceSEEARiskNatural capital accountingSupply chainInvestmentsSustainabilityBusiness202210.1016/j.ecoser.2022.1014342022-11-13