Over time, we will continue to develop PEWI to improve features, design, and usability. In the future, we envision expanding PEWI even further—potentially with more land covers and indicators, additional complexities, other land-use contexts, and more interactive graphics. Our vision includes incorporating ecosystem services indicators, such as nutritional value of food produced and energy produced from biomass. The possibilities for PEWI are endless, and feedback from PEWI users will be an instrumental part of future development efforts.
Because our objective is to build a robust, efficient land-use modeling tool, we designed PEWI to be open source. We invite other scientists, coders, and the public to contribute to the growth and improvement of PEWI. If you would like to contribute to PEWI's code please visit our GitHub code repository or pewi@iastate.edu for more information.
Contribute to PEWI Science Model
We are always striving to improve the science and data that drive the PEWI model. In the near future, we aim to incorporate models that estimate land-use effects on flooding and pollination. We also hope to index final ecosystem services, such as the nutritional content of the crops grown on a PEWI watershed.
Think PEWI is a great tool? Help us spread the word! We are working hard to get PEWI into the hands of educators, land managers, and technical service providers. If you have an idea about how we could improve outreach or would like to partner with our team, please contact Carrie Chennault or Lisa Schulte Moore. We would love to hear from you!
Our primary objective is to help people understand ecological, social, and economic issues related to ecosystem services, tradeoffs, and land management. We believe PEWI is a powerful tool to achieve this, and hope to expand the use of PEWI with student learners in the classroom and with adult learners in stakeholder groups. Have you created a lesson plan that you would like to share?