_essons
earned E
from the CLIMATE READY
ESTUARIES PROGRAM
-------
EPA's Climate Ready Estuaries (CRE) provides targeted assistance to National
Estuary Programs (NEPs) to plan for climate change. In its first years, CRE partners
have successfully completed vulnerability assessments, engaged stakeholders,
identified climate change indicators, and initiated adaptation planning efforts.
The NEPs have a wealth of knowledge about stakeholder engagement,
environmental planning, and coastal management. As they have grappled
with the challenges that climate change will pose in their watersheds, the NEPs
have drawn on their experience and have identified successful strategies and
common challenges.
This compilation presents best practices and lessons learned that are taken from
the CRE annual progress report for 2010. The varied experiences of CRE partners
around the country can guide other communities or organizations that are
planning responses for climate change impacts.
Vulnerability Assessment Efforts
Vulnerability assessments can help to identify key concerns for an estuary and may also assist in identifying
information needs. General lessons learned for these efforts include:
Recognize that non-climate drivers,
such as development, pollution, and
population growth, often exacerbate
climate change vulnerabilities.
When working with limited data,
use readily available scientific best
professional judgment to help support
decision making. Surveying both local
and regional experts and stakeholders
can assist in building knowledge, as
they have access to some of the most
up-to-date information and research.
Focus on emergency and disaster
management, which is one area
where NEPs can work
with local and state governments to
incorporate climate change issues.
Vulnerability and risk assessment can
help identify areas that need targeted
adaptation that also supports and
uses emergency planning experts and
resources.
Collaborate with and use local
partners, such as universities, non-
profits, Sea Grants, and National
Estuarine Research Reserves to fill
information gaps.
Determine scope — vulnerability
assessments do not necessarily have
to be broad in scope. Focusing on the
vulnerability of a specific resource, such
as horseshoe crabs in the Delaware
Estuary or culverts in the Oyster River
Watershed, may generate momentum
for adaptation.
-------
i.
Stakeholder Engagement Efforts
Each CRE partner that has undertaken stakeholder engagement
activities has developed its own lessons learned on locally specific issues
and key audiences. General lessons learned for these efforts include:
Leverage existing efforts. Some regions
have many different organizations
already working on climate change
and adaptation, including work on
acquiring data/information, stakeholder
engagement, and education/outreach.
Several NEPs have learned the value in
leveraging these existing activities and
organizations through partnerships and
division of labor on different efforts.
Focus on local issues. It can be more
effective to communicate about
local impacts to communities (e.g.,
flooding, drought) rather than tackling
the broader issue of climate change.
Presenting local evidence of climate
change (e.g., changes in seasonal
events or animal behavior, local
projections of wetland loss) to local
officials and the general public is often
a useful approach to
build support for adaptation.
Link climate change adaptation
messages to clean water supply and
stormwater drainage. This can be an
effective way to engage local decision
makers, as constituents are increasingly
concerned about these issues.
Target entities most responsible for
construction and maintenance of public
infrastructure (e.g., municipalities,
counties or regional authorities) first
to encourage greater willingness to
engage on the impacts of sea level rise
due to the significant fiscal implication
of infrastructure loss or damage.
Conduct meetings or phone calls with
key stakeholders to help identify what
stakeholders are already working on
and their key needs for undertaking
climate change adaptation. For some
NEPs, these meetings revealed that
stakeholders need specific targeted
technical assistance on adaptation
techniques rather than data or
information on impacts.
Climate Change Indicators and Monitoring Efforts
The development of climate change indicators for estuaries is still an evolving field, but there have already been a
number of lessons learned from the CRE partners:
Identify desired climate change
information outputs prior to the
beginning of the indicator selection
process. For example, determine
whether any outreach materials will be
needed to communicate information on
indicators, or how indicators will need
to be incorporated into different types of
management documents.
Consider conducting a climate change
vulnerability assessment prior to
developing climate change indicators. A
vulnerability assessment may be useful
in order to ensure that the candidate list
of indicators is comprehensive and to
identify variables that are indicative of
consequences rather than drivers.
J
1 Explore the development of conceptual
ecological models (CEMs) of climate
change prior to developing indicators.
CEMs are an excellent way to organize
thoughts and visually portray complex
relationships. CEMs are organized
in a hierarchical way among drivers,
stressors, ecological effects, key
attributes, and measures. The measures
point the way to key indicators of
climate change.
1 Draw up a universe of candidate
indicators from which to consider.
Identify any factors that are uncertain
(such as the direct tie to climate change
or available monitoring), as these
factors will be important to consider
later. Additional candidates can be
added to the list as the process evolves.
Obtain as much public and scientific
input as possible on selecting a subset
of indicators for more intense review.
Citizens will help to keep the list relevant
to public interests. A survey sent to
all known stakeholders, posted on the
website and listed in newsletters, is
an excellent way to obtain many
completed surveys.
Recognize that regional efforts that
cross state lines often require additional
involvement from government agencies
and other key stakeholders. The
involvement of key local, state, and
regional organizations will be important
to discuss during the initial stages of any
indicator development process.
-------
Adaptation Planning Efforts
Adaptation plans may contain a wide range of adaptation
actions that are designed to reduce impacts or exploit beneficial
opportunities resulting from climate change. Adaptation planning
efforts require coordination and collaboration at many levels.
Lessons learned from the CRE partners include:
Start small. Demonstrating assessment
and planning in one innovative
community can generate interest to
replicate and build on the effort for a
much larger region.
Build adaptation planning into other
local, state, and/or federal planning
efforts, in order to:
Ensure that climate change planning
becomes a part of routine activities
that public officials and citizens
already support.
• Bring more resources to bear and
more easily achieve consensus.
1 Incorporate adaptation into restoration
efforts already underway. This may
be a key management option for
reducing vulnerability to future climate
change impacts.
1 Recognize that small steps do lead to
future progress. Initiation of a climate
adaptation process in one place will
tend to generate interest and other
financial and technical support, often
from unlikely sources.
1 Practice adaptive management. As
new partners join and support fledgling
adaptation efforts, process managers
may have to adapt the initial scope
and content of their work; often
expanding and refocusing the overall
effort to incorporate the interests of
these new partners and to ensure their
support for adaptation.
CLIMATE READY
ESTUARI ES
oEPA
www.epa.gov/cre
EPA 842-F-11-009
JUNE 2011
------- |