CAMP WILKES,

ALONG BILOXI BAY, MS

Contact Information & Resources

EDGe$ Online Tool Landing Page

https://edges.nist.gov/

For more information about EDGe$

https://www.nist.gov/services-resources/software/

edge-economic-decision-guide-software-online-tool

NIST Community Resilience Program

https://www.nist.gov/topics/community-resilience

NIST Contact

edges@nist.gov

“

“Using EDGe$ was helpful as someone with a limited economics 

background. I could have created a spreadsheet and tried to do a 

benefit-cost analysis myself, but EDGe$ provided a methodological 

“ framework so that I could focus on finding accurate inputs and 

communicating our results.”

- Camille Sicangco, Mississippi State University Extension Service Apprentice

Success Story

Situation

Across the Mississippi Gulf Coast, bulkheads are the dominant method of shoreline stabilization 

for private properties. However, living shorelines have become increasingly recognized as a 

resilient and sustainable alternative to bulkheads. The introduction of living shorelines presents 

opportunities and challenges to evaluate economic tradeoffs for both project and community-wide scales. Current Extension programs, such as the Coastal Conservation and Restoration 

Program (CCR), foster understanding of resilient alternatives and benefit from being able to 

share clear beneift-cost analyses with their audiences.

Coastal shorelines in Mississippi are predominantly privately owned and often located in areas 

with conditions favorable for living shorelines. Camp Wilkes is a privately owned campground 

located along Biloxi Bay, MS. A 150-foot (45.7 m) bulkhead was donated and installed along 

the shoreline in 2016, but it failed shortly thereafter. In 2018-2019, Camp Wilkes worked with 

the CCR program to evaluate options for shoreline stabilization and implement a living shoreline. 

To support the use of this case study in future Extension programming with private landowners, CCR partnered with the Program for Local Adaptation to Climate Effects: Sea-Level Rise 

(PLACE:SLR) and performed a comparative economic analysis that evaluated the costs and 

benefits of living shoreline relative to bulkheads for small-scale projects.

Process

PLACE:SLR used EDGe$ to perform a benefit-cost analysis (BCA) to assess living shorelines 

as compared to bulkheads, using the following considerations and assumptions:

• A 60-year planning horizon; 

• A bulkhead would have to be replaced every 25 years (based on expert opinion); 

• Non-disaster related benefits of living shorelines include a reduction in annual maintenance 

and replacement costs (every 25 years) compared to bulkheads;

• All benefits associated with the living shoreline are expected to accrue to Camp Wilkes; 

• A discount rate of 2.3% was applied based on the 2020 OMB Circular A-94 Appendix C; 

• Analysis did not include assessment of avoided damage by major hurricanes (Categories 3-5), 

due limited information available for comparing performance of living shorelines and bulkheads 

in major storms. For less intense hurricanes, reduced costs were included. 

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Select Candidate

Strategies

Dene Investment

Objective & Scope

Identify Benets & Costs

Identify Non-Market

(Non-Economic)

Considerations

Dene Analysis

Parameters

Perform Economic

Evaluation 

Rank Strategies

2

1

3

4

5

6

7

Steps to Conduct 

Benefit-Cost Analysis 

for Resilient Solutions

October 2021

EDGe$

Economic Decision Guide

Software Online Tool

Easy to use community resilience benefit-cost analysis tool
CAMP WILKES,

ALONG BILOXI BAY, MS

Outcomes

EDGe$ provided the ability to explore various planning horizons and scenarios, which allow for 

a transparent set of economic comparisons between traditional and novel shoreline stabilization 

approaches. The analysis produced two important findings: (1) EDGe$ demonstrated that a living shoreline was cost-effective for a 60-year planning period even if the initial cost of the living 

shoreline is 3.25 times that of a bulkhead; and (2) Senstivity analysis demonstrated that a living 

shoreline is not only a cost-effective alternative for bulkhead replacement at an even shorter 

time period (15 years instead of 25 years), but it also meets the needs of the owner’s 30-year 

planning horizon.

Advantage of Using EDGe$

EDGe$ aided the PLACE:SLR team with common definitions and economic data requirements 

when designing the analysis to help them understand what inputs (e.g., avoided replacement 

and maintenance costs) could be changed as well as how to interpret economic outputs (e.g., 

return-on-investment). The structure of the tool helped provide a roadmap of how to complete 

the BCA, instead of using an unstructured spreadsheet where it would be easier to make errors 

in the process. The flexibility of the EDGe$ Online Tool enabled evaluation of different timeframes and discount rates for this analysis, which was valuable to assess different scenarios 

and solution options.

This study demonstrates that EDGe$:

• Has the flexibility to help users understand relationships between project inputs and expected 

future costs and benefits;

• Allows users to compare the relative net benefit-cost of solutions;

• Enables users to evaluate the benefit-cost of solutions that have high uncertainty or variability in 

costs or benefits;

• Allows users to conduct sensitivity analyses, so that different scenarios can be considered in 

the decision-making process.

Success Story (cont.)

2/2

Select Candidate

Strategies

Dene Investment

Objective & Scope

Identify Benets & Costs

Identify Non-Market

(Non-Economic)

Considerations

Dene Analysis

Parameters

Perform Economic

Evaluation 

Rank Strategies

2

1

3

4

5

6

7

Steps to Conduct 

Benefit-Cost Analysis 

for Resilient Solutions

October 2021

EDGe$

Economic Decision Guide

Software Online Tool

Easy to use community resilience benefit-cost analysis tool

Find Out More on the

EDGe$ Online Tool