The Climate Change Vulnerability Assessment Tool for Coastal Habitats (CCVATCH) is a decision support tool for land managers, decision makers, and researchers that integrates local data and knowledge and current research with local/regional climate change predictions to provide an assessment of potential habitat vulnerabilities. Through a facilitated and inclusive process, it guides the evaluation of how changes in CO₂, precipitation, air and water temperature, sea level change, and storm frequency and severity will directly affect a habitat and also interact with the non-climate stressors of invasive/nuisance species, nutrients, sedimentation, erosion, and environmental contaminants.

With guidance from an accompanying document, users assign numerical scores for the current condition of the habitat, the direct sensitivity of the habitat to climate change, potential interactions of non-climate stressors with climate change, and the adaptive capacity of the habitat. Users enter these scores into a spreadsheet to calculate an overall vulnerability score for each habitat they assess.