Access a range of climate-related reports issued by government agencies and scientific organizations. Browse the reports listed below, or filter by scope, content, or focus in the boxes above. To expand your results, click the Clear Filters link.
This report discusses impacts of Hurricane/Post Tropical Cyclone Sandy on fishing and fishing-related businesses in New York and New Jersey one year after landfall. It describes major factors leading to different levels of impact on different sectors, and some reasons behind these different impact levels. Further examined are types of impediments to recovery, aids to recovery, and community impacts. It concludes with (1) two factors that can potentially improve response to, and lessen impacts of, future natural disasters, and (2) lessons learned by the researchers.
In 1993, Portland was the first U.S. city to create a local action plan for cutting carbon. Portland’s Climate Action Plan is a strategy to put Portland and Multnomah County on a path to achieve a 40 percent reduction in carbon emissions by 2030 and an 80 percent reduction by 2050 (compared to 1990 levels). The 2015 Climate Action Plan builds on the accomplishments to date with ambitious new policies, fresh research on consumption choices, and engagement with community leaders serving low-income households and communities of color to advance equity through the City and County’s climate action efforts.
The two main objectives of this pilot project were to (1) assess the vulnerability of Boston's Central Artery/Tunnel System to sea level rise and extreme storm events, and (2) investigate and present adaptation options to reduce identified vulnerabilities.
Many climate-related hydrologic variables in New England have changed in the past century, and many are expected to change during the next century. It is important to understand and monitor these changes because they can affect human water supply, hydroelectric power generation, transportation infrastructure, and stream and riparian ecology. This report describes a framework for hydrologic monitoring in New England by means of a climate-response network.
This report—the first phase of the Department of the Interior (DOI) assessment effort for Hurricane Sandy projects—was developed for DOI by a metrics expert group of physical and ecological scientists and socioeconomic experts who recommended performance metrics for measuring changes in resilience resulting from the DOI-sponsored projects. It identifies natural and artificial coastal features most affected by Hurricane Sandy along the Northeast coast—such as marshes, beaches, and estuaries—and recommended metrics that would indicate resilience change in those features.
The Northern Plains has experienced increased weather variability and climatic changes throughout the 20th and early 21st centuries. This assessment presents observed changes, such as increased length of frost-free seasons, which pose risks and opportunities to agricultural production in the region. The assessment also highlights adaptation practices working land managers might consider to prepare for and respond to changes in climate by adjusting management in ways that harness benefits or reduce anticipated effect.
This "report card" has been issued annually since 2006, and is a timely and peer-reviewed source for clear, reliable, and concise environmental information on the current state of different components of the Arctic environmental system relative to historical records. The information is intended for a wide audience, including scientists, teachers, students, decision makers, and the general public interested in the Arctic environment and science. Report Card 2015 contains 12 contributions prepared by an international team of 72 scientists from 11 different countries.
The State of New Hampshire has initiated a coordinated effort to proactively prepare for the effects of climate change on the natural and human resources of New Hampshire. An important aspect of this effort is to develop a vulnerability assessment of hydrologic response to climate change. The U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with the New Hampshire Department of Health and Human Services, is developing tools to predict how projected changes in temperature and precipitation will affect change in the hydrology of watersheds in the State. This study is a test case to assemble the information and create the tools to assess the hydrologic vulnerabilities in four specific watersheds.
This report draws upon a large collection of peer-reviewed National Research Council reports and other national and international reports to provide a brief, reader-friendly primer on the complex ways in which the changes currently affecting the Arctic and its diverse people, resources, and environment can—in turn—affect the entire globe. Topics in the booklet include how climate changes currently underway in the Arctic are a driver for global sea level rise, new prospects for natural resource extraction, and rippling effects through the world's weather, climate, food supply, and economy.
Successfully negotiating climate change challenges will require integrating a sound scientific basis for climate preparedness into local planning, resource management, infrastructure, and public health, as well as introducing new strategies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions or increase carbon sequestration into nearly every sector of California’s economy. This Research Plan presents a strategy for developing the requisite knowledge through a targeted body of policy-relevant, California-specific research over three to five years (from early 2014), and determines California’s most critical climate-related research gaps.
This report builds on Maine’s earlier report from 2009—it is not intended as a comprehensive revision of all aspects of the original report. This update focuses on highlights of the understanding in 2015 of past, present, and future trends in key indicators of a changing climate specific to Maine, and recent examples of how Maine people are experiencing these changes.
The Resilient Strategies Guide for Water Utilities provides options for drinking water, wastewater, and stormwater utilities to assist them in developing plans that contain strategies that address their specific needs and priorities.
The Guide outlines the resilience planning process and helps you to identify potential strategies and promote a better understanding of resilience strategies. At the end of the Guide, you can download a report containing all of your selections and submitted information.
Find out how hometowns across the United States are building their resilience to climate change. Two women who studied climate change science and policy in graduate school took a three-month road trip to find out what climate change adaptation looks like in the United States. They visited more than 30 communities preparing for climate change and documented what they learned in blogs and through media reports. This report describes six big lessons from the ongoing adaptation work they saw across the country.
According to this NOAA-sponsored study, natural oceanic and atmospheric patterns are the primary drivers behind California's ongoing drought.
This report provides current and relevant climate adaptation information to a diverse audience of legislators, government agencies, policy makers, educators, nongovernment organizations, business, industry, researchers, other stakeholders and the public.
This Synthesis Report summarizes the Fifth Assessment Report (AR5) of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). This report distills, synthesizes, and integrates the key findings of the three IPCC Working Group contributions—The Physical Science Basis; Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability; and Mitigation of Climate Change—to the AR5 for the benefit of decision makers in government, the private sector, and the general public. The report also includes findings from two Special Reports released in 2011: Renewable Energy Sources and Climate Change Mitigation and Managing the Risks of Extreme Events and Disasters to Advance Climate Change Adaptation. The Synthesis Report confirms that climate change caused by human activities is having impacts on ecosystems and human well-being across the U.S. and around the world.
This report links climate change projections with their associated health outcomes, and identifies populations and locations most vulnerable to these health outcomes in San Francisco. The goal of the Climate and Health Profile is to support local public health climate adaptation efforts, and advance urban health and environmental justice in the climate and health field.
This study investigates how climate change will impact the telecommunications and data center services sector. The report looks not only at the headline-grabbing impacts of extreme weather events, such as those incurred by Hurricane Sandy, but also the risks brought on by slow-onset, gradual changes to the base climate.
This report outlines 100 recommendations to help improve federal programs and their ability to prepare for climate change, drawing from a series of workshops with leading federal, state, and local officials and building upon lessons learned post-disaster in New Orleans (following Hurricane Katrina), New York (following Hurricane Sandy), and Vermont (after Hurricane Irene). The report identifies more than 30 federal programs, initiatives, and laws that can be used to prepare for extreme events such as storms, floods, and heat waves as well as rising seas. This report informed the White House's State, Local, and Tribal Leaders Task Force on Climate Preparedness and Resilience.
This report is a synthesis of climate science relevant for management and planning for Colorado's water resources. The report focuses on observed climate trends, climate modeling, and projections of temperature, precipitation, snowpack, and streamflow.
This report reviews the coastal risk-reduction strategies and levels of protection that have been used along the United States East and Gulf Coasts to reduce the impacts of coastal flooding associated with storm surges. It evaluates their effectiveness in terms of economic return, protection of life safety, and minimization of environmental effects. According to the report, the vast majority of the funding for coastal risk-related issues is provided only after a disaster occurs. The report calls for the development of a national vision for coastal risk management that includes a long-term view, regional solutions, and recognition of the full array of economic, social, environmental, and life-safety benefits that come from risk reduction efforts.
A 24-year tradition encompassing the work of 425 authors from 57 countries, 2013's State of the Climate report uses dozens of climate indicators to track patterns, changes, and trends of the global climate system.
This plan—an update to the 2009 California Climate Adaptation Strategy—augments previously identified strategies in light of advances in climate science and risk management options.
This report provides a basic summary of the observed and projected changes to the ecosystems in Hawai'i and their resulting impacts for residents.
This technical report looks at more than 60 years of coastal water level and local elevation data, analyzing sea level rise and nuisance flood frequency changes around the United States.
This plan summarizes the U.S. General Service Administration's approach, accomplishments, plans, actions, and coordination activities to evaluate the agency’s climate change risks and vulnerabilities to manage both the short and long-term effects of climate change on the agency’s mission and operations.
Intense rainstorms, floods, and heat waves will become more common in the Great Lakes region due to climate change in the coming decades. While ice-cover declines will lengthen the commercial navigation season on the lakes, warmer lake temperatures will increase risks from invasive species, and could threaten water quality. Material in this report is largely a synthesis of the information contained in the National Climate Assessment’s chapters on the Midwest (Chapter 18) and Northeast (Chapter 16). Donald Scavia, GLISA's co-director, was one of the convening authors of the NCA's Midwest regional chapter; GLISA also served as a hub for the compilation of technical inputs for the Midwest chapter.
This report looks at how climate change is affecting the nation’s wildlife and habitats, and addresses how natural resource managers need to prepare for and adapt to these unprecedented changes.
The National Climate Assessment assesses the science of climate change and its impacts across the United States, now and throughout this century. It documents climate change-related impacts and responses for various sectors and regions, with the goal of better informing public and private decision making at all levels.
The assessment draws from a large body of scientific peer-reviewed research, technical input reports, and other publicly available sources; all sources meet the standards of the Information Quality Act. The report was extensively reviewed by the public and experts, including a panel of the National Academy of Sciences, the 13 federal agencies of the U.S. Global Change Research Program, and the Federal Committee on Environment, Natural Resources, and Sustainability.
This publication, known by the acronym SOFIA, is released every two years to provide policymakers and civil society with a global view of fisheries and aquaculture and associated policy issues. The 2014 report includes a special study of initial assessments of vulnerabilities to climate change in fisheries and aquaculture. The full archive is available online.
This report focuses on livestock diseases that are sensitive to climate change. The report aims to help practitioners reduce the risks of key climate-sensitive infectious diseases by strengthening risk management systems for disease outbreaks. The three diseases chosen for the study—Rift Valley fever, Bluetongue, and East Coast fever—spread through “vectors” such as insects and parasites, the prevalence of which fluctuates depending on key weather and climate variables such as temperature and humidity. As the symptoms of climate change continue, the frequency and extent of these diseases are expected to escalate.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Working Group II's contribution to the Fifth Assessment Report (AR5) relates to climate impacts, adaptation, and vulnerability. A Summary for Policymakers and the underlying scientific and technical assessment are also available.
The dramatic impact of climate variability and climate change continued to be felt all over the world throughout 2013. The World Meteorological Organization statement on the status of the global climate in 2013 provides a snapshot of global and regional trends in weather and climate over the past year and highlights some of the year’s most significant extreme events.
As with the rest of the world and the Caribbean region in particular, the coastal and marine communities of the US Virgin Islands (USVI) are susceptible to the effects of climate change. Hazards include increasingly hazardous coastal conditions and loss of life-sustaining marine, coastal, and island resources. Climate change is anticipated to add to the stresses of the coastal environment by altering temperature and precipitation patterns, increasing the likelihood of extreme precipitation events, and accelerating rates of sea level rise.
Responding and adapting to such changes requires an understanding of the risks; weighing options for adapting to changing conditions; and instituting a suite of strategies to implement, measure, and fund response actions having the most benefits to the ecosystems and communities that depend on those services. With support from National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) Coral Reef Conservation Program, The Nature Conservancy’s (TNC) Caribbean Program directed a project with the objective of developing decision-support tools and conservation strategies that will advance the implementation of ecosystem-based adaptation (EBA) to climate change within the USVI.
This report uses a Question and Answer format to discuss climate change and its causes. The booklet provides an authoritative overview of global climate change for decision makers, policy makers, educators, and other individuals seeking information on climate science.
This report describes a community-driven project built on efforts by Shaktoolik and other at-risk, mainly Alaska Native villages on the Bering Sea coast to adapt to potentially devastating effects of climate change. The project involved a multi-party approach to assist the community of Shaktoolik to make a decision whether to relocate or stay at the current location. The result is a well-defined process that may be replicated by other at-risk communities in the region. The final report documents lessons learned, adaptation methods for Shaktoolik, potential funding sources, and a step-by-step action plan to implement the community's decision.
