Prioritizing conservation practice locations for effective water quality improvement using the Agricultural Conservation Planning Framework (ACPF) and the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT)

This paper presents a framework for prioritizing agricultural conservation practice (CP) locations to improve water quality, integrating the Agricultural Conservation Planning Framework (ACPF) with the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) model. The proposed method uses multicriteria ranking by considering spatial sediment pollution hotspots (from SWAT), CP installation costs, and pollutant reduction effectiveness, to efficiently select CP placements from among the many suggested by ACPF. Case studies in two Pennsylvania watersheds (Conewago and Mahantango) demonstrate the approach for grassed waterways and water and sediment control basins, showing that combining criteria (yield and unit cost) leads to more cost-effective and targeted pollutant reductions than single criteria alone. The methodology is flexible and can be adapted to other pollutants, locations, and CP types, facilitating more efficient resource allocation in watershed planning. Ultimately, the study concludes that prioritizing conservation practices using this multicriteria framework can substantially enhance environmental benefits and cost-effectiveness compared to current first-come, first-served approaches.