Climate Research in
Western Mountains
A Future Agenda
Peter A. Stine
Sierra Nevada Research Center
Pacific Southwest Research Station
USDA Forest Service
Davis, California
The Consortium
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Exciting assemblage of scientific expertise
Enthusiasm
Relevance
Importance
Opportunities
Collaboration has been impressive
Data
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Massive amounts
Grand spatial and temporal scales
Multi-disciplinary sources and needs
Complex relationships
Basic Research
• The building blocks of our understanding
• What we are trained to do; how we are
rewarded
• Climate change deals with complex
relationships, multi-disciplinary problems
• Obviously there are tremendous resource
management implications
Some Significant Findings
• Changes in the hydrological cycle
– Snow decreases in proportion of total precip
– Earlier snowmelt
• Snowpack is critical to groundwater recharge
• Local processes will have a meaningful
influence on how global climate change
translates into local conditions (think globally, act
locally)
• Temperature is a strong predictor of how much
area will burn in subsequent season
Needed Research Emphases
• Ecological response to near term climate
change (especially at a landscape scale)
– Vegetation has endured climate change in the past,
how much “disruption” to the system should we
expect in this next period of change?
• Sierra Nevada Climate Change Assessment Project
• Relative role of fire suppression activities and
climate change in influencing fire severity and
extent
• How will exotic flora exacerbate ecological
response to near term climate change?
Promote Coordination
• Many related activities on behalf of various
organizations
• Overlap in purpose
• Some efforts have developed significant
progress
• Capitalize on efforts, data, activities
• E.g. USGS, USFS, NEON, etc.
Causes of Climate Change
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Scientifically intriguing
Anthropogenic? Natural cycles?
Regardless, global society must cope
Can society mitigate or influence climate
change, particularly that caused by
activities of humans?
Public Relations
• The message of doom strikes fear
• The limited ability to respond, especially
without significant societal adjustments,
not the least of which is economic, invokes
fear
• Fear is met with denial or rejection
• So don’t ignore the ramifications but offer
means to cope, solutions
Beyond Research
• We need to do more; expand beyond our
typical limits of activities and expertise
• Collaboration should include educators,
outreach specialists, editors, journalists
Sierra Nevada Forest Plan
Amendment
• U.S. Forest Service land management
direction
• 2001 and revised 2004 Decisions
• No mention of climate change or any
reference to how land managers will cope
• What would they do with the information
we currently have?
• What will they have to work with in 5
years?
New Objectives
• Future activities of CIRMOUNT should have
innovative and new aspirations
• Meetings/activities could include:
– collaborations to produce text books
– workshops to produce outreach materials
– find opportunities to find out what managers need to
know; engage managers
• Find logical industry partners in the mission of
CIRMOUNT (water managers, ski resorts)
Demonstration Projects
• “Adopt a Forest” or Park or watershed
• Work with managers to draw all of our
insights to date to apply to a given place
• If CIRMOUNT scientists were managing
the Forest or Park what considerations
would you make to cope with near term
(e.g. 5-30 years) climate change?
Other Possible initiatives for
CIRMOUNT
• Develop a project directed at communicating
“information that can be put to work”
• Synthesize what we currently know; a set of
basic relevant findings
• Disclose what we do not know, coordinate
research agenda
• Acknowledge uncertainty and disagreement
• Target different audiences (managers, policymakers, public)
Self-Examination of the
Scientific Evidence
• Is the relevant scientific information considered?
• Is the scientific information reasonably
interpreted and accurately presented?
• Are the uncertainties associated with the
relevant scientific information acknowledged and
documented?
• Are the relevant management consequences
identified and documented, including associated
risks and uncertainties?