A new version of NatureServe’s Climate Change Vulnerability Index (CCVI 4.0) is now available online, offering practitioners and policymakers an improved cost-effective way to evaluate species vulnerability to climate change. The newest update was developed in collaboration with multiple USGS Climate Adaptation Science Centers and incorporated direct input from partners, including many state fish and wildlife agencies who use the CCVI to inform State Wildlife Action Plans. The CCVI tool can be used in many ways, including to identify at-risk species and areas home to a high number of at-risk species, to determine which climatic factors are significant for a species, and to help researchers identify species that have been insufficiently studied. 

The CCVI determines species vulnerability using three key factors: Climate exposure, sensitivity, and adaptive capacity. Climate exposure refers to the magnitude and rate of climate change a species experiences, sensitivity evaluates how strongly those changes affect it, and adaptive capacity describes the species’ ability to adjust to changing conditions. The last major update to the CCVI was made in 2015, but much has changed since then. The updated CCVI 4.0 now incorporates a decade of new scientific insights on how climate change impacts terrestrial and freshwater species and provides a new web-based platform to improve data sharing and collaboration. It also includes updated climate exposure data, a new vulnerability comparison across two future emissions scenarios, and a refined adaptive capacity framework created by researchers from the Northwest CASC.  

Looking ahead, researchers from NatureServe and the USGS CASC network plan to keep refining the CCVI 4.0 by testing additional climate variables and including scenario-planning features. These improvements will help natural resource managers navigate uncertain futures in conservation planning and decision-making. 

Access CCVI 4.0 on the NatureServe website