The overall purpose of this thesis is to investigate the economic value and use of geological information. Earthobservations of a geological nature, may have profound impacts on peoples everyday lives. Geological informationplays a key role in addressing the challenges of sustainable development, and contributes to improved decisionmakingprocesses related to, for instance, land degradation and water protection. Still, few have researched theeconomic values attached to such information. This thesis contains an introduction and five self-contained papers.Paper (I) provides a review of previous research addressing the economic value of geological information andother earth observations, as well as, related products, services and infrastructure. The paper also identifiesimportant lessons and topics that require increased attention in future research. The review of prior research showsthat significant economic benefits can be attached to the use of geological information. Still, it is often difficult tocompare results across studies since they differ in scope and make alternative assumptions concerning whichsectors to cover. Furthermore, previous research is not uniform in its treatment of potential (rather than onlyexisting) users, and it employs varying conceptions of avoided costs. The paper concludes that future researchshould devote more attention to the public and experience good characteristics of geological information and othertypes of earth observations, thus highlighting the preconditions for information adoption as well as addressing therole of potential users.Papers (II) and (III) investigate the determinants of adopting geological information in the public sector, with anemphasis on Swedish municipalities. Paper (II) contributes to the literature by providing theoretical explanationsand empirical findings on various individual and organizational factors influencing the adoption of geologicalinformation. The paper employs an information adoption model based on literature on diffusion of innovation. Itis estimated using data collected from 677 officials in all Swedish municipalities. The results indicate thatperceived usefulness and educational efforts have the largest influence on the adoption decision followed by agender effect. Furthermore, the results also show that organizational effects exist at the working unit level, butthere appear to be no spatial interactions across municipal boundaries.Paper (III) further investigates the adoption of geological information in the public sector by considering whetheranalyses of user patterns can be improved by considering an interrelated model estimation involving two types ofgeoinformation. The empirical tests focus on whether there are gender differences in how peer advice affects theuse of geoinformation. The information adoption model is estimated using probit and bivariate probits. Overall theresults indicate a more accurate prediction pattern when a secondary geoinformation decision was included, thussuggesting that different types of geoinformation should be analyzed jointly. The officials at Swedishmunicipalities tend to use both types of geoinformation, thus alluding to a demand for combined geoinformationproducts among the target population. Finally, there is evidence of women’s decisions to use geoinformation beingaffected by peer advice.Paper (IV) focuses on the economic value of hydrogeological information, namely water quality. The willingnessto pay (WTP) for reduced health risks following the exposure to emerging contaminants and microbial outbreaksin drinking water is assessed. Emerging contaminants, such as highly fluorinated substances (e..g., PFOA andPFOS), have been found in drinking water post treatment on a global level. The drinking water is the main sourceof exposure for humans. The WTP is assessed through a choice experiment approach, which also accounts fordifferences in perceptions between PFASs and microbial outbreaks due to parasites or bacteria. Knowledge aboutpublic preferences across different health threats is key to assessing support for policies aimed at reducing suchhealth risks. A majority of the respondents were found to have a higher WTP for reducing the risk of chemicalexposure to PFASs than reducing the corresponding risk of microbial outbreaks.In Paper (IV) it is evident that risk adverse individuals have a higher WTP for reducing health risks of drinkingwater, compared with individuals with other risk preferences. However, there is no consensus in the literature onhow to accurately capture risk preferences beyond financial decisions. Paper (V) therefore discusses thetheoretical assumptions used when measuring risk preferences and whether it is necessary to address domain riskspecific preferences. In order to test if a general risk preference is enough we present a hypothetical experimenton risk preferences for the health and financial domains, respectively. We also consider the design of theexperiment and compare the format with a reduced form to control for potential framing effects. The riskpreferences were elicited using switch multiple price list lotteries with hypothetical payments, and the questionswere adapted to the health domain by framing the lotteries as improvements in current health status using a visualanalogue scale as the reference point. The results show that individual risk preferences tend to be relativelyinconsistent across the two studied domains, and that the respondents appear to be more risk averse in the healthdomain than in the financial. The majority of the respondents tend to give too much weight to low-probabilityevents, which is consistent with cumulative prospect theory.

Groundwater is used worldwide as a major source for agricultural irrigation, industrial processes, mining, and drinking water. An accurate understanding of groundwater levels and trends is essential for decision makers to effectively manage groundwater resources throughout an aquifer, ensuring its sustainable development and usage. Unfortunately, groundwater is one of the most challenging and expensive water resources to characterize, quantify, and monitor on a regional basis. Data, though present, are often limited or sporadic, and are generally not used to their full potential to aid decision makers in their groundwater management.This thesis presents a solution to this under-utilization of available data through the creation of an open-source, Python-based web application used to characterize, visualize, and quantify groundwater resources on a regional basis. This application includes tools to extrapolate and interpolate time series observations of groundwater levels in monitoring wells through multi-linear regression, using correlated data from other wells. It is also possible to extrapolate time series observations using machine learning techniques with Earth observations as inputs. The app also performs spatial interpolation using GSLIB Kriging code. Combining the results of spatial and temporal interpolation, the app enables the user to calculate changes in aquifer storage, and to produce and view aquifer-wide maps and animations of groundwater levels over time. This tool will provide decision makers with an easy to use and easy to understand method for tracking groundwater resources. Thus far, this tool has been used to map groundwater in Texas, Utah, South Africa, Colombia, and the Dominican Republic.

The purposes of this thesis are to: (a) provide a review of previous research on the economic value of geological information, including the identification of important lessons from such work: and (b) assess the current use and non-use of geological information in Swedish municipalities. The thesis consists of three papers all related to the assessment or adoption of geological information.Paper I provides a review of previous research on the economic value of geological information and other earth observations as well as related products, services and infrastructure. Furthermore, the paper identifies important lessons and issues that require increased attention in future research. The review of prior research shows that significant economic benefits are attached to the use of geological information. The value of geological information has typically been measured in terms of avoided costs. Still, it is difficult to compare results across studies since they differ in scope and make alternative assumptions concerning which sectors to cover. Furthermore, previous research is not uniform in its treatment of potential (rather than only existing) users, and it employs varying conceptions of avoided costs. The paper concludes that future research should devote more attention to the public and experience good characteristics of this type of information, thus highlighting the preconditions for information adoption as well as addressing the role of potential users. A number of specific methodological challenges also deserve further scrutiny in future research, such as the use of discount rates and benefit-transfer approaches in the empirical context of geological information.Based on the results of Paper I it is important to also analyze what, beyond technological advances, influences the adoption of geological information. Paper II and III investigate the determinants of adopting geological information in the public sector with an emphasis on Swedish municipalities. Paper II contributes to the literature by theoretical explanations and empirical findings on individual and organizational effects influencing the adoption of geological information. In this paper an information adoption model is proposed and tested against data collected from 677 officials in Swedish municipalities. The model is estimated using linear probability (LPM) and instrument variable generalized method of moment (IV-GMM) approaches. The results suggest that perceived advantages have the largest effect on the likelihood of adopting geological information, but also follow-up education (motivation) and gender are found to affect adoption behavior. In addition, the results also indicate a group effect within working units. Some implications of the findings and future research areas are discussed.Paper III further investigates the adoption of geological information in the public sector by considering social effects (collegial advice), and whether the information is jointly adopted with related information. The related information considered in this paper is other geoinformation such as map data, demographic information concerning population or building information. The empirical analysis builds on the survey sent out to officials at Swedish municipalities. The information adoption model is estimated using probit and bivariate probits. The results suggest that the adoption of geological and related information is a joint and complementary decision. It is also found that collegial advice, perceived skills from education, motivation to adopt, perceived advantage, gender and working unit affect the likelihood of adopting geological information.

Since 2002, NASA's GRACE Satellite mission has allowed scientists of various disciplines to analyze and map the changes in Earth's total water storage on a global scale. Although the raw data is available to the public, the process of viewing, manipulating, and analyzing the GRACE data can be difficult for those without strong technological backgrounds in programming or geospatial software. This is particularly true for water managers in developing countries, where GRACE data could be a valuable asset for sustainable water resource management. To address this problem, I have a developed a utility for subsetting GRACE data to particular regions of interest and I have packaged that utility in a web app that allows water managers to quickly and easily visualize GRACE data these regions. Using the GLDAS-Noah Land Surface Model, the total water storage for the regions derived from the raw GRACE data is decomposed into surface water, soil moisture, and groundwater components. The GRACE Groundwater Subsetting Tool is easily deployed, open-source, and provides access to all of the major signal processing solutions available for the total water storage data. The application has been successfully applied to both developed and developing countries in various parts of the world, including the Central Valley region in California, Bangladesh, the La Plata River Basin in South America, and the SERVIR Hindu Kush Himalaya region. The groundwater data in this application has proven capable of monitoring groundwater use based on drought trends as well as agricultural demand in a number of locations and can assist in uniting decision makers and water users in the mission of sustainably managing the world's groundwater resources.