There’s More Than One Way to Value a Gull : Environment: A new social science is evolving from the need to determine the worth of sea creatures killed in oil spills so that damages can be recovered.

What is a California brown pelican worth?

At least eight of the birds, which are endangered, have been found dead as a result of the Feb. 7 oil spill off the Orange County coast. Once the spill is cleaned up and investigators have determined who is responsible, someone will be getting a bill for the pelicans--as well as for hundreds of other dead birds and environmental damage.

Sizing up that bill, however, is not an easy matter.

It’s not as though the oil and shipping companies were responsible for killing cows. If that were the case, the price of beef would dictate the size of the settlement.

But there’s no easily discernible market for brown pelican--nor for least tern or surf scoter, which were hard hit by the slick--so there’s no simple way to say what they’re worth.

That’s not to say that the task is impossible. Oil slicks and other man-made environmental problems have made what is known as “environmental valuation” an important discipline, and economists have developed new ways of approaching the problem.

A number of techniques are now available for trying to determine value, said Sara Russell, a deputy state attorney general who guided the state’s case against Shell Oil for its 1988 oil spill in Martinez, northeast of San Francisco. Even in the case of wild animals, researchers can try to estimate a market value--sea otters sometimes go for about $15, for instance, because that’s the going rate for a pelt--or assign a “travel cost value” by asking a targeted group of people how far they would be willing to travel to see a particular animal or resource.

Those procedures are still in use, but in recent years a survey technique known as the “contingent valuation methodology,” which involves subtly questioning people about the ways in which they value wildlife and other resources, has gained favor among environmental economists. That approach will likely be used in conjunction with other techniques to assess the environmental damage in Orange County, according to the officials in the state attorney general’s office who will be heading the state’s civil suit.

If used, the surveys would question hundreds of people and take several months to conduct. From them will emerge a “price,” not only for the endangered pelicans but for more common species as well.

“For something as common as a sea gull, you wouldn’t expect to find a very high value,” said John Loomis, an environmental studies and agricultural economics professor at UC Davis. “But take a bald eagle; there you’d find very high values, certainly in the thousands of dollars.”

The survey would be diverse and complicated, but as one part of it, randomly selected participants might be shown a picture of a beach. On it would be several birds.

The survey conductor might then ask: “How much would you pay to go to this beach?”

Say the respondent replied “$10.” Then the surveyor would produce a second photograph. This time it would show essentially the same beach, but with a pelican added to the scene.

If the respondent answers “$10.50,” for instance, that respondent would be listed as having valued the birds at 50 cents.

If that held true as an average for the entire sample, the value of the pelicans would be set at about 50 cents and multiplied by the number of people who live near enough to the beach--or visit it frequently enough--to feel the loss of the animal. The value of the animals lost will become part of the amount the state seeks in a lawsuit against those responsible for the spill.

In addition, endangered species are assigned an additional “uniqueness value” that reflects the value people give to an animal simply for being alive, whether they see it or not.

“Like fine wine or the Statue of Liberty, we care about some things just because they exist,” Loomis said. “They have cultural or symbolic value. . . .” Neither lawyers nor environmentalists pretend the environmental valuation is perfect, but both groups say it’s nearly indispensable for evaluating damage from a spill like the American Trader’s.

“It’s still an evolving social science, but we’ve got to start somewhere,” Russell said. “It’s important because these are valuable resources, and we need to be able to say how valuable.”