Management Action

Climate change will challenge park managers with difficult decisions as they evaluate potential future climate scenarios and what can be done to protect species and ecosystems.

NPS/Jacob Frank

What should we be doing differently in light of climate change, and what actions continue to make sense? Climate change will present novel challenges to natural resource management. Decisions will need to be made—and adapted—amid uncertainty and complexity. Traditional approaches will become increasingly untenable.Climate change isn’t impacting all parks and regions equally. A variety of tools—such as planning frameworks, climate forecasts, and vulnerability assessments—can help park managers decide where to focus their resources and energy as they plan for a future in which the landscape will be different.The Planning for a Changing Climate and Resist-Accept-Direct (RAD) frameworks are tangible ways of teasing apart these complex problems to identify effective, climate-informed responses. These approaches make climate action feasible through systematic, structured assessments of options that can be attached as bite-sized elements. Climate Smart Conservation and RAD help parks develop forward-looking goals and actions based on the emerging discipline of climate change adaptation. This means we need to prepare for, cope with, or adjust to climatic changes and associated impacts. For natural resource management, this means managing for change, not just persistence.

applying climate to decision making

Traits, Tradeoffs, and Pivot Points

Monitoring that Informs Management

• 

  San Francisco Bay Area

  Global climate change is changing fundamental processes such as temperature regimes and streamflow patterns.

• 

  Climate Change in National Parks

  Review the science on future risks in national parks due to climate change.

• 

  National Capital Region

  Knowing if natural resources are stable or changing can help managers make sound, science-based decisions for the future.

• 

  Southern Plains

  Climate change has direct and indirect effects on ecosystems from streams to grasslands.

• 

  Southern Colorado Plateau

  The combination of high elevation and a semi-arid climate makes the Colorado Plateau particularly vulnerable to climate change.

• 

  Northern Colorado Plateau

  Long-term monitoring can reveal how sensitive different ecosystem components are to climate change.

More Regional Tools for Managers

Synthesis of Climate and Ecological Science to Support Grassland Management Priorities in the North Central Region, U.S. Geological Survey, 2023
Grassland Management Priorities for the North Central Region, U.S. Geological Survey, 2023

North Cascades National Park

Modeling for Grizzly Reintroduction

More Tools for Managers

Ecological Risk Assessment of Managed Relocation as a Climate Change Adaptation Strategy

Videos: Warming Up to Adaptation

• 

  warming up to adaptation

  Everglades National Park

  Situated on the edge of Florida Bay, the popular visitor area of Flamingo faces threats from rising seas and storm surge.

• 

  warming up to adaptation

  Big Bend National Park

  Explore how future climate scenarios helped guide important decisions about how best to adapt water infrastructure.

• 

  warming up to adaptation

  Glacier National Park

  Bull trout are threatened by both invasive species and increasingly warming waters; managers try a bold strategy.