Developing science syntheses to facilitate climate-informed land management decisions and NEPA analyses on rangelands in the sagebrush biome

The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is the largest public land management agency in the United States and manages those lands for diverse and sometimes conflicting resources, uses, and values. As a result, decision making on BLM lands is complex. The use of science information – including climate change science – in decision making can help public land managers to balance different desired uses and values across public landscapes and achieve long-term resource management goals.

Strengthening the use of science and climate information in federal decision making is a priority for the current administration and for federal agencies. Recent policies from the Department of the Interior (DOI) present a suite of actions for DOI agencies to foster climate change adaptation and resilience on public lands. The USGS is committed to developing climate science that is relevant to decision making through programs such as the National and Regional Climate Adaptation Science Centers (CASCs). However, conducting a comprehensive review of available climate science can be challenging for BLM and other DOI land managers due to the volume, complexity, and evolving nature of available science.

USGS, BLM, and USFWS have co-developed a new type of science product, the structured science synthesis, to inform NEPA analyses. Each synthesis centers on a specific issue, which typically arises from the combination of a proposed action considered by land management agencies and a specific type of resource, and the science and structure of each synthesis is tailored for easy use in NEPA analyses.

Project Goals

Our goal is to evaluate and facilitate the use of climate change science in agency NEPA analyses. We are 1) developing a suite of climate-informed science syntheses, 2) developing worked examples of environmental impact analyses to accompany those syntheses, and 3) evaluating the utility of using both in facilitating the incorporation of science, including climate science, into agency NEPA analyses.

Anticipated Benefits

Both the syntheses and analysis examples include climate sections to help land managers more quickly understand and assess the influence of changing climate conditions on resources. These products are designed to provide information and analyses required by the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). The BLM conducts comprehensive NEPA analyses each year to analyze and disclose to the public the potential environmental impacts of each of their decisions. Thus, the products produced in this project have the potential to strengthen science use in public lands decisions each year.

Interagency Science-Management Partnership:

The USGS, BLM, and US Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) are partnering to coproduce practical, actionable science that informs planning, policy, and management decisions on public lands managed by the BLM (see Beier and others, 2017, and BLM’s Coproduction Toolkit for more information on coproduction). This project is also in collaboration with researchers from the Department of Forest and Rangeland Stewardship at Colorado State University and the North Central Climate Adaptation Science Center.