Risk research projects

The purpose of this request for proposals (RFP) is to provide one year of seed funding for risk-focused USGS projects that might not otherwise be funded. In the USGS Risk Plan, hazard is defined “a dangerous process, phenomenon, substance, activity, or condition that may cause loss of life, injury or other health impacts, property damage, loss of livelihoods and services, social and economic disruption, or environmental damage.” Therefore, projects related to geohazards (e.g., earthquakes, volcanoes, landslides, coastal storms), wildfires, contaminants, wildlife disease outbreaks, as well as slow-onset events (e.g., drought, sea level rise, long-term erosion or subsidence) -- or any combination of these -- are eligible. Importantly, the Risk Plan (and this RFP) focuses on the intersection of hazards and society; projects solely focused on hazards, and not their potential impact to assets of societal value, will not be as competitive.

Current Projects (Fiscal years '23 and '24)

FY23​

Site Prioritization Tool for Invasive Species: Integrating Diverse Spatial Data to Inform Risk
Principal investigator: Catherine Jarnevich

This project will develop an invasive species management tool for the contiguous USA that integrates both the risk of invasion at a site, such as disturbance and transport vectors, and the locations of important and unique resources. Invasive species can have direct health and societal impacts, and indirect impacts such as altering fire risk from changes in fuels. Stakeholders, such as the National Park Service co-investigators, have requested this information on integrated invasion risk to efficiently guide their limited funds for management efforts (prevention and early detection/rapid response). We have updated preliminary nationwide data related to invasion risk and site sensitivity, focusing on layers identified by stakeholders, to feed into a web-tool that will provide resource managers information to target efforts on locations of highest conservation concern that are also most at risk of invasion.   ​

Data will include readily available spatial layers such as richness of imperiled species and ecosystem disturbances derived from LandTrendr. We will also include spatial layers developed through this project, including potential human spread of invasive species and the observed density of nonnative species biodiversity. Each of these data layers represent some contribution to invasion risk or conservation concern, and the web-tool being developed will allow users to combine them to produce maps to target areas for management efforts. Users will be able to select from these data layers and weight their relative importance to create a spatially explicit estimate of invasion risk unique to each user’s intended use parameters. This web tool will be a publicly available, innovative tool that integrates and enables usage of spatial data. It will share these data as map layers to address a current, real-world problem faced by land managers trying to juggle invasive species management needs alongside limited resources to address these needs.
 

Risk to Campers on Tributary Debris Fans of the Colorado River in Grand Canyon, AZ from Known Debris Flow Hazards
Principal investigator: Paul Grams ​

Intense rainfall during summer thunderstorms frequently causes flash floods and debris flows in tributaries of the Colorado River in Grand Canyon, resulting in dangerous conditions for visitors to Grand Canyon National Park. Debris flows rapidly mobilize mud and boulders, transporting large volumes of sediment to debris fans that are commonly used for camping. These events present an extreme hazard to campers and have resulted in damage to property, injuries, and fatalities. Although flash floods and debris flows are known hazards, there is currently no specific hazard information available to the many thousands of people that visit the Colorado River each summer. ​

The goal of our USGS Risk Research and Applications Community of Practice project is to develop a risk assessment and communication plan for visitors to the river corridor in Grand Canyon National Park. Specifically, we aim to increase awareness about flash flood and debris flow risk so that people can be better informed when making decisions while in the backcountry. We are developing a risk assessment map for commonly used campsites utilizing information about debris flow probability of occurrence for more than 700 drainages in the National Park that will help identify potentially hazardous campsites. We have also held a workshop with stakeholders, including recreational river users, professional river guides, representatives from land management agencies, and emergency services professionals. In this workshop, we identified and prioritized methods for communicating risk to the public. This workshop also resulted in the initiation of a working group to develop a satellite-based text messaging emergency warning system that could reach visitors to the backcountry where cellular service is unavailable and provide alerts about threatening weather conditions.
 

Indigenous Drought Risk Assessment in the Colorado River Basin: Weaving Indigenous Knowledge into Assessment of Drought Risk
Principal investigator: Jessica Driscoll

The cross-cutting and cascading impacts of climate change and drought are posing unprecedented new challenges across the western landscape. The USGS has initiated a new approach to science to engage with local communities to provide science resources, data, and information to support drought planning, mitigation, and recovery.  The objective of these engagements is to build and reinforce long-lasting relationships with Tribal governments and Indigenous communities through a series of local engagement sessions starting in September 2023. Trust is key to meaningful engagement and communication in all formal and informal government-to-government notification processes.​

• Tribal Engagement Series: Drought in the Colorado River Basin

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FY24​

Evaluating Potential Health Impacts of Great Salt Lake Dust Events to Support Decision-Making About Water Conservation and Dust Mitigation
Principal investigator: Molly Blakowski

Dust produced from the dry lakebeds of desiccating saline lakes is a documented human health concern. Now that Great Salt Lake (GSL) has reached a new historic low, water managers, public health experts, and policymakers in Utah need to understand the specific health risks that low GSL levels pose to nearby communities. The USGS Utah Water Science Center (UTWSC) dust team, in cooperation with the Utah Department of Health and Human Services (UDHHS), Utah State University (USU), and the University of Utah (U of U), propose to co-produce a retrospective dust health study examining temporal associations between GSL lakebed exposure, dust event occurrence, and emergency department (ED) visits for respiratory and cardiovascular conditions. Although GSL water surface-elevation data and regional ED visit data are readily available, particle pollution (PP) monitors in this area have limited records and none are close enough to the lakebed to isolate impacts from GSL dust events. To address this data gap, we will reconstruct a spatially explicit timeseries of GSL dust event occurrence in northern UT using wind speed, weather codes, and visibility data from regional airports. We will relate the timeseries to nearby ED visit data using time-lagged regression models to evaluate health risks. We will explore connections between lake levels and dust event occurrence by regressing the number of GSL dust events per year against average annual lakebed area. Results from this work will help decision-makers evaluate health costs of changing lake levels and support data-driven decision-making about GSL water management and dust mitigation.​
 

Optimizing management actions to mitigate drought risk
Principal investigator: Evan Grant

Optimizing the number and location for management throughout a species’ range is challenging, given differences in species abundances, environmental characteristics, and spatially varying sensitivity to climate change and other drivers. This combination of spatial variation results in non-linear benefit accumulation from management actions. Thus, a simple ranking of relative expected improvement of each site under management results in a sub-optimal allocation of resources. To evaluate the optimal allocation of drought mitigation management resources across a species’ range, we will use the Cascades frog (Rana cascadae) as a case study. We will use an integrated species distribution model, which incorporates multiple species datasets and environmental covariates, to estimate the current intensity of R. cascadae. We can then intersect the species intensity with a drought map and evaluate the change in species by varying the number and position of management actions in the region. We will use return on investment curves to evaluate the optimal set of actions to maximize the net benefit to R. cascadae. Our results will be presented in a report and associated interactive application so that combinations of management action locations can be evaluated by the decision makers. Our approach can then be scaled to other species or other geographic regions.​
 

Incorporating nested uncertainty into management decision making
Principal investigator: Riley Mummah

Models are commonly used to evaluate the current or future state of a system and guide management decision making. However, there is often uncertainty about which model is correct or which management action to take. In these instances, value of information (VoI) analysis can be used to evaluate model outputs across management options to identify which source of uncertainty is the most valuable to resolve. Uncertainty in decision making can arise from discrete hypotheses expressed as alternative models, but parametric uncertainty (about the system dynamics as well as the effects of management actions) is nested within the models and is typically ignored. Our aim is to develop a tool to evaluate nested sources of uncertainty on the decision making process, using Shenandoah salamander (Plethodon shenandoah) as a case study. Shenandoah National Park is currently weighing eleven management actions for the conservation of the Shenandoah salamander. To date, we have developed six alternative models to explain P. Shenandoah occupancy, which each contain 12-19 parameters. We will develop a procedure to simultaneously evaluate parametric uncertainty, model uncertainty, and management uncertainty in an Expected Value of Partial Information (EVXI) approach. We will thus be able to identify the relative contributions of each uncertainty source, which will provide a quantification of the importance of all the uncertainties to the management decisions of the National Park Service within Shenandoah National Park.​
 

Preparing for Ecological Emergencies: A Framework for Pre-Crisis Data Collection in a Changing World
Principal investigator: Michala Phillips*​

The rapid pace of global change necessitates that federal scientists work to address ecological emergencies (i.e., natural hazards, ecological invasions, disease, and extreme climate events). In the past year, ecological emergencies including Typhoon Mawar, wildfires in Hawaiʻi, and quagga mussels in the Snake River prompted urgent responses from USGS scientists. Effective response and recovery often depend on the quality and availability of data collected before the emergency occurs. Data collection before an ecological emergency occurs aids in both understanding of the ecosystem and swift decision-making during and after a crisis. Post-disaster success often hinges on access to pre-disaster data, stressing the pivotal role of strategic pre-collection. The time scale of an emergency (i.e., immediate vs. long-term) influences data needs. As examples, USGS scientists had just days to gather baseline data for the Snake River mussel crisis, while monitoring for wildfire preparedness involves years of data collection and analysis. Well-informed prioritization is key: resources for pre-emergency data collection are often limited and must be strategically deployed, supporting societal needs collaboratively with partners and communities. To address these challenges, we propose to convene a working group to create a framework for co-development of pre-crisis data collection plans in the Ecosystems and Water Mission Areas. This collaborative effort aims to unify diverse perspectives; craft a typology of ecological emergencies; and delineate data needs from long-term preparedness to rapid response. We will create a flexible decision support tool that USGS scientists and partners can use to co-create proactive pre-emergency plans for data collection, contributing to effective monitoring and preparedness across disciplines.

*This project has been co-sponsored with the USGS Northwest-Pacific Islands Region.