Geology topics

Amber N. Runyon

Publications and source records attributed to Amber N. Runyon.

8 recordsLinked to original sources

USGS2025

Drought and deluge— Opportunities for climate-change adaptation in US national parks

In a changing climate, resource management depends on anticipating changes and considering uncertainties. To facilitate effective decision making on public lands, we regionally summarized the magnitude and uncertainty of projected change in management-relevant climate variables for 332 national park units across the contiguous US. Temperature, frequency of extreme precipitation events, and drought exposure are all projected to increase within seven regions delineated in the US National Climate Assessment. In particular, the anticipated collective impacts of droughts and flooding events will lead to unique management challenges, including combinations of management actions that may seem inconsistent. Furthermore, uncertainty in the magnitude of change varied by region and climate variable considered, pointing to specific opportunities for prioritization, transferability, and innovation of climate adaptation regionally and at the park-unit scale.

conterminous United States↗

USGS2025

Accurately characterizing climate change scenario planning in the U.S. National Park Service: Comment on Murphy et al. 2023

We more accurately locate the boundary between current practice and research priorities regarding climate change scenario planning in U.S. federal land management agencies by supplementing the characterization in a recent article (“Understanding perceptions of climate change scenario planning in United States public land management agencies”) of its use in the U.S. National Park Service. Accurately reflecting the full depth and breadth of efforts to streamline and mainstream the method for climate change adaptation planning in the U.S. National Park Service provides readers helpful guidance and resources called for by Murphy et al.

Society and Natural Resources↗

USGS2024

Best practices for incorporating climate change science into Department of the Interior analyses, consultations, and decision making

The purpose of this document is to provide technical guidance, practical application examples, and resource lists for those who conduct, manage, and/or interpret technical workflows within the Department of the Interior. This document is intended to support implementation of Department of the Interior policy 526 DM 1 and establish best practices for using climate change science to inform analysis, consultation, and decision making. The Earth’s climate is an interconnected system that distributes energy, heat, and water around the planet. Due to human-driven increases in long-lived greenhouse gases, the Earth’s climate is now changing. For Departmental decision-making purposes, assuming a static, unchanging baseline climate is no longer consistent with current knowledge about the climate system. There are uncertainties about future climate and how resources or assets (RoAs) will respond to new conditions. To depict the possibilities, the global climate science community develops scenarios and models to explore how future climate may respond to socioeconomic and technological development in the world. Principles for informing policy development, planning and decisions, and regulatory processes using climate change science must: 1) consider the effects of future climate change, 2) characterize the risks, and 3) characterize the uncertainties. Best practices include: Use multiple scenarios to assess risks from a range of plausible societal pathways. When constraints prevent the use of multiple scenarios or if decision makers are risk averse, ensure that the chosen scenario considers higher risk outcomes. This is particularly important for large investments or irreversible decisions and reduces the chances of overconfident decision making. Use multiple climate models within each scenario to account for the range of outcomes due to model uncertainty. Do not rely solely on a single model or an ensemble average. Use relevant climate data . Use a time-period for model projections of the future climate change consistent with the relevant timeframe of the policy, action, or decision being considered. Historical observations are useful for understanding past conditions and climate trends for the next several years, but not beyond the next decade. Consult with climate data and modeling experts to assess which data and model resources are most appropriate for any given application. Clearly describe key analysis uncertainties (including with any climate observations, models, and scenarios used), and how they were addressed in the analysis and/or decision process. This ensures transparency and learning among analysts and decision makers.

Report↗

USGS2024

Climate-resource scenarios to inform climate change adaptation in Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve: Summary of 2021 climate change scenario planning

This report illustrates use of scenario planning as a climate change adaptation tool supporting Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve’s Resource Stewardship Strategy. The primary objective of scenario planning is to help resource managers and scientists make management and planning decisions informed by assessments of critical future uncertainties. This report outlines a process that synthesized future climate projections into three distinct but plausible and relevant climate summaries for the focal area and used them to develop climate-resource scenarios through participatory scenario planning. Initial steps identified the priority resource management topics and the corresponding related climate uncertainties. Next, local climate summaries were used to develop divergent climate futures: those that describe the broadest possible range of plausible conditions while capturing relevant uncertainty. The final phase further developed the climate futures and their resource implications. These participatory scenario planning exercises occurred virtually in fall (August–November) 2021. The climate-resource scenarios informed adaptation strategies in conjunction with the park’s Resource Stewardship Strategy development. The scope and complexity of this effort is unique but elements from the scenarios and resource implications have broad applicability to other large, protected areas in Alaska and Northwest Canada.

Alaska↗

USGS2024

Resource stewardship objectives and actions for climate change-sensitive cultural and natural resources in Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve: Outputs from January–February 2022 climate change adaptation strategy development

This report presents climate change-informed resource stewardship strategies for diverse Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve natural and cultural resources. The strategies were developed in early 2022 by park staff and other subject-matter experts in a scenario-based climate change adaptation planning process. Strategy development was facilitated by National Park Service (NPS) climate change adaptation specialists. Strategies address critical climate change implications for park resources identified in an immediately preceding (fall-2021) climate-resource scenario development process. The overall, nearly-year-long scenario- and strategy-development process was entirely virtual due

Report↗

USGS2022

Overcoming “analysis paralysis” through better climate change scenario planning

This "In Brief" article describes the use of scenario planning to facilitate climate change adaptation in the National Park Service. It summarizes best practices and innovations for using climate change scenario planning, with an emphasis on management outcomes and manager perspectives. The scenario planning approach and management outcomes highlighted in this article are the culmination of more than a decade of collaboration between the USGS and the National Park Service.

Park Science↗

USGS2021

Divergent, plausible, and relevant climate futures for near- and long-term resource planning

Scenario planning has emerged as a widely used planning process for resource management in situations of consequential, irreducible uncertainty. Because it explicitly incorporates uncertainty, scenario planning is regularly employed in climate change adaptation. An early and essential step in developing scenarios is identifying “climate futures”—descriptions of the physical attributes of plausible future climates that could occur at a specific place and time. Divergent climate futures that describe the broadest possible range of plausible conditions support information needs of decision makers, including understanding the spectrum of potential resource responses to climate change, developing strategies robust to that range, avoiding highly consequential surprises, and averting maladaptation. Here, we discuss three approaches for generating climate futures: a Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP)-ensemble, a quadrant-average, and an individual-projection approach. All are designed to capture relevant uncertainty, but they differ in utility for different applications, complexity, and effort required to implement. Using an application from Big Bend National Park as an example of numerous similar efforts to develop climate futures for National Park Service applications over the past decade, we compare these approaches, focusing on their ability to capture among-projection divergence during early-, mid-, and late-twenty-first century periods to align with near-, mid-, and long-term planning efforts. The quadrant-average approach and especially the individual-projection approach captured a broader range of plausible future conditions than the RCP-ensemble approach, particularly in the near term. Therefore, the individual-projection approach supports decision makers seeking to understand the broadest potential characterization of future conditions. We discuss tradeoffs associated with different climate future approaches and highlight suitable applications.

Climatic Change↗

USGS2021

Climate change scenario planning for resource stewardship at Wind Cave National Park

This report explains scenario planning as a climate change adaptation tool in general, then describes how it was applied to Wind Cave National Park as the second part of a pilot project to dovetail climate change scenario planning with National Park Service (NPS) Resource Stewardship Strategy development. In the orientation phase, Park and regional NPS staff, other subject-matter experts, natural and cultural resource planners, and the climate change core team who led the scenario planning project identified priority resource management topics and associated climate sensitivities. Next, the climate change core team used this information to create a set of four divergent climate futures—summaries of relevant climate data from individual climate projections—to encompass the range of ways climate could change in coming decades in the park. Participants in the scenario planning workshop then developed climate futures into robust climate-resource scenarios that considered expert-elicited resource impacts and identified potential management responses. Finally, the scenario-based resource responses identified by park staff and subject matter experts were used to integrate climate-informed adaptations into resource stewardship goals and activities for the park's Resource Stewardship Strategy. This process of engaging resource managers in climate change scenario planning ensures that their management and planning decisions are informed by assessments of critical future climate uncertainties.

South Dakota↗