Climate Ready Vulnerability Assessment
To create a framework for adapting to climate change, decision makers need to understand specific threats to our water supply, land use suitability, hazard risks, ecosystems and quality of life. A vulnerability assessment that defines the projected degree to which an ecosystem, landscape, or watershed is vulnerable to change will help to create this framework. Presently those who are open to considering climate change in their decisions do not have access to actionable information. This study aims to tap into a comprehensive set of climate, hydrology, vegetation, and fire futures to fill a critical gap in understanding climate impacts to inland watershed resources and connect the products of that analysis directly to specific local government decisions being made in the near future. Specifically, the launch of Sonoma County's Climate Action 2020 (CA2020) this year presents a unique opportunity to generate a data-rich vulnerability assessment as the scientific basis for adaptation policies and practices developed in collaboration with local government decision-makers.
CA2020 is a multi-jurisdictional climate action planning (CAP) project, through which all nine cities and the county will adopt a CEQA compliant CAP that includes mitigation and adaptation strategies. Currently, CA2020 is funded to identify generic policy responses (i.e. "consider climate impacts during the development review process.") Local partners will emerge from this Climate Ready project with the knowledge, data, and tools to prioritize vulnerabilities and implement policies to address them. Also, because regional natural resource and conservation agencies will be at the table in developing the vulnerability assessment, this Climate Ready project will provide meaningful and actionable results to a wide set of stakeholders.
The goals of this project are to integrate available climate change information for the Russian River Basin in Sonoma, Marin, and Napa counties (Figure 1) into useable products for evaluating decisions that affect land and water. This will allow the development of adaptation responses that benefit both built and natural systems and will advance the priorities of a regional, multi-agency user group by defining appropriate applications of science-based vulnerability assessments at the local watershed and jurisdiction level.
Objective and Scope
The objective of this entire study is to craft a vulnerability assessment using the data developed for the Terrestrial Biodiversity Climate Change Consortium (TBC3) project (entitled Pepperwood Project in 2011-2013), California and Great Basin Southwest Climate Science Center project (see Flint and Flint, 2014; http://dx.doi.org/10.5066/F76T0JPB ), and daily unimpaired flows developed for the Sonoma County Water Agency (Flint et al., draft). The results will be included in reports on specific sub-regions and resources of concern that will be iteratively defined on the basis of workshops with stakeholders. Primary parameters will include temperature, hydrologic variables (including evapotranspiration, recharge, runoff and soil moisture conditions), and secondary impacts in terms of vegetation and fire stressors. Interactions with stakeholders will identify thresholds of concern (for example, number of days exceeding some temperature value that is considered a health risk, or number of years a drought can be tolerated given the existing water supply infrastructure), and reports will be developed into user-friendly formats and will enable stakeholders to develop planning documents for adaptation to climate change. The specific tasks for the USGS include initial interactions with stakeholders to explain data availability and interpretation, and the analysis of the datasets to provide graphics, tables, and explanations for the reports, which will be produced by project partners Climate Smart Information Exchange and North Bay Climate Adaptation Initiative.
Relevance and Benefits
This project will consider several priority water-resource issues identified in USGS Circular 1309 (USGS, 2007), including developing tools with which to predict ecosystem change on the basis of water availability, quantifying, forecasting, and securing freshwater for our future, and, in particular, assessing the consequences of climate change. This proposal will also support capabilities within the California Water Science Center (CAWSC) to develop hydrologic modeling tools relevant to the present science issues underlying the management of watersheds and hydrologic hazards in light of changes expected under future climate conditions. This project relates explicitly to the mission of the USGS Water Mission Area to provide scientific information that will be utilized by decision-makers to effectively manage the landscape and water resources for water-related natural hazards, recreational and ecological use, aquatic health, and environmental quality.
Approach
The technical team for this project comprises members of the TBC3 groups who have worked together on multiple climate projection modeling and resource management decision-support efforts for the San Francisco Bay Area region and California. Specifically, the USGS will be responsible for participating in approximately monthly or bi-monthly meetings for project management, to develop introductory products for meetings with user groups, participating in user group workshops to define customized reports for users, coordinate with Climate Smart Information Exchange team and North Bay Climate Adaptation Initiative develop vulnerability indicators locally and region-wide, present final products for review and feedback, finalize reports, and conduct training on use of information. The USGS will participate as a team with Point Blue and Pepperwood Foundation from the North Bay Climate Adaptation Initiative to analyze existing data to develop a range of indicators for assessing vulnerability of landscape and water resource assets that will be extracted and summarized for present and future time periods for use in resource management planning. Depending on the final products identified by user groups, vulnerability metrics will be analyzed to compare historical conditions with projected future conditions using the data available. User specific information and products will be developed and final reports prepared and presented. All analyses will be documented in formal peer-reviewed publications.
Task 1: Water availability and reliability
There will be several analyses to address projected changes in water availability and reliability.
- Analysis of recharge estimates region wide considering locations currently with recharge that are projected using the BCM with 6 future climate projections to still have recharge.
- Drought assessment region wide to create spatially distributed frequency and intensity maps using various drought indices.
- Calculation of changes in monthly streamflow for Lagunitas Creek and annual inflows for 7 reservoirs in Marin County.
- Using daily model and four future projections, assessment of extreme heat events, and calculation of daily low flows and flooding thresholds and changes in frequency for Russian River tributaries and main stem gage locations, Sonoma Creek, Napa River, and Petaluma River.
Task 2: Landscape change and environmental demand
There will be a region-wide analysis to evaluate changes in watershed function in future projections in comparison to historical conditions. These will include:
- changes in the relative proportions of recharge and runoff
- drought stress and changes in climatic water deficit to identify resiliency
- wildfire risk
- changes in agricultural demand for Russian River valleys and Sonoma Valley.
Task 3: Document results and provide guidance
There will be user reports that will go through USGS review following FSP guidelines to describe analyses of projected change in water availability and landscape stress and will be published by RCPA and available on the Flint Hydrology website with an associated DOI. All daily analyses will be documented in the draft Russian River unimpaired flows manuscript due in January 2015. USGS will assist the Climate Smart Information Exchange team and North Bay Climate Adaptation Initiative in the development of user reports describing the methods and results, develop presentations, attend workshops and provide guidance on use of information.
To create a framework for adapting to climate change, decision makers need to understand specific threats to our water supply, land use suitability, hazard risks, ecosystems and quality of life. A vulnerability assessment that defines the projected degree to which an ecosystem, landscape, or watershed is vulnerable to change will help to create this framework. Presently those who are open to considering climate change in their decisions do not have access to actionable information. This study aims to tap into a comprehensive set of climate, hydrology, vegetation, and fire futures to fill a critical gap in understanding climate impacts to inland watershed resources and connect the products of that analysis directly to specific local government decisions being made in the near future. Specifically, the launch of Sonoma County's Climate Action 2020 (CA2020) this year presents a unique opportunity to generate a data-rich vulnerability assessment as the scientific basis for adaptation policies and practices developed in collaboration with local government decision-makers.
CA2020 is a multi-jurisdictional climate action planning (CAP) project, through which all nine cities and the county will adopt a CEQA compliant CAP that includes mitigation and adaptation strategies. Currently, CA2020 is funded to identify generic policy responses (i.e. "consider climate impacts during the development review process.") Local partners will emerge from this Climate Ready project with the knowledge, data, and tools to prioritize vulnerabilities and implement policies to address them. Also, because regional natural resource and conservation agencies will be at the table in developing the vulnerability assessment, this Climate Ready project will provide meaningful and actionable results to a wide set of stakeholders.
The goals of this project are to integrate available climate change information for the Russian River Basin in Sonoma, Marin, and Napa counties (Figure 1) into useable products for evaluating decisions that affect land and water. This will allow the development of adaptation responses that benefit both built and natural systems and will advance the priorities of a regional, multi-agency user group by defining appropriate applications of science-based vulnerability assessments at the local watershed and jurisdiction level.
Objective and Scope
The objective of this entire study is to craft a vulnerability assessment using the data developed for the Terrestrial Biodiversity Climate Change Consortium (TBC3) project (entitled Pepperwood Project in 2011-2013), California and Great Basin Southwest Climate Science Center project (see Flint and Flint, 2014; http://dx.doi.org/10.5066/F76T0JPB ), and daily unimpaired flows developed for the Sonoma County Water Agency (Flint et al., draft). The results will be included in reports on specific sub-regions and resources of concern that will be iteratively defined on the basis of workshops with stakeholders. Primary parameters will include temperature, hydrologic variables (including evapotranspiration, recharge, runoff and soil moisture conditions), and secondary impacts in terms of vegetation and fire stressors. Interactions with stakeholders will identify thresholds of concern (for example, number of days exceeding some temperature value that is considered a health risk, or number of years a drought can be tolerated given the existing water supply infrastructure), and reports will be developed into user-friendly formats and will enable stakeholders to develop planning documents for adaptation to climate change. The specific tasks for the USGS include initial interactions with stakeholders to explain data availability and interpretation, and the analysis of the datasets to provide graphics, tables, and explanations for the reports, which will be produced by project partners Climate Smart Information Exchange and North Bay Climate Adaptation Initiative.
Relevance and Benefits
This project will consider several priority water-resource issues identified in USGS Circular 1309 (USGS, 2007), including developing tools with which to predict ecosystem change on the basis of water availability, quantifying, forecasting, and securing freshwater for our future, and, in particular, assessing the consequences of climate change. This proposal will also support capabilities within the California Water Science Center (CAWSC) to develop hydrologic modeling tools relevant to the present science issues underlying the management of watersheds and hydrologic hazards in light of changes expected under future climate conditions. This project relates explicitly to the mission of the USGS Water Mission Area to provide scientific information that will be utilized by decision-makers to effectively manage the landscape and water resources for water-related natural hazards, recreational and ecological use, aquatic health, and environmental quality.
Approach
The technical team for this project comprises members of the TBC3 groups who have worked together on multiple climate projection modeling and resource management decision-support efforts for the San Francisco Bay Area region and California. Specifically, the USGS will be responsible for participating in approximately monthly or bi-monthly meetings for project management, to develop introductory products for meetings with user groups, participating in user group workshops to define customized reports for users, coordinate with Climate Smart Information Exchange team and North Bay Climate Adaptation Initiative develop vulnerability indicators locally and region-wide, present final products for review and feedback, finalize reports, and conduct training on use of information. The USGS will participate as a team with Point Blue and Pepperwood Foundation from the North Bay Climate Adaptation Initiative to analyze existing data to develop a range of indicators for assessing vulnerability of landscape and water resource assets that will be extracted and summarized for present and future time periods for use in resource management planning. Depending on the final products identified by user groups, vulnerability metrics will be analyzed to compare historical conditions with projected future conditions using the data available. User specific information and products will be developed and final reports prepared and presented. All analyses will be documented in formal peer-reviewed publications.
Task 1: Water availability and reliability
There will be several analyses to address projected changes in water availability and reliability.
- Analysis of recharge estimates region wide considering locations currently with recharge that are projected using the BCM with 6 future climate projections to still have recharge.
- Drought assessment region wide to create spatially distributed frequency and intensity maps using various drought indices.
- Calculation of changes in monthly streamflow for Lagunitas Creek and annual inflows for 7 reservoirs in Marin County.
- Using daily model and four future projections, assessment of extreme heat events, and calculation of daily low flows and flooding thresholds and changes in frequency for Russian River tributaries and main stem gage locations, Sonoma Creek, Napa River, and Petaluma River.
Task 2: Landscape change and environmental demand
There will be a region-wide analysis to evaluate changes in watershed function in future projections in comparison to historical conditions. These will include:
- changes in the relative proportions of recharge and runoff
- drought stress and changes in climatic water deficit to identify resiliency
- wildfire risk
- changes in agricultural demand for Russian River valleys and Sonoma Valley.
Task 3: Document results and provide guidance
There will be user reports that will go through USGS review following FSP guidelines to describe analyses of projected change in water availability and landscape stress and will be published by RCPA and available on the Flint Hydrology website with an associated DOI. All daily analyses will be documented in the draft Russian River unimpaired flows manuscript due in January 2015. USGS will assist the Climate Smart Information Exchange team and North Bay Climate Adaptation Initiative in the development of user reports describing the methods and results, develop presentations, attend workshops and provide guidance on use of information.