Applying Climate Change Modeling to Selected Key Factors in Ecosystem Health and Adaptation in Alaska
Alaska’s high-latitude, arctic landscape places it at the front lines of environmental change. Factors such as rising temperatures, altered precipitation patterns, and associated shifts in growing degree days, summer season length, extreme heat, and the timing of spring thaw and autumn frost are rapidly changing Alaska’s ecosystems and associated human systems. The ability of Alaska’s land managers and communities to predict these changes will profoundly affect their ability to adapt. The State of Alaska recognizes the scope and magnitude of these changes and has made it a priority to ensure anticipated change is incorporated into local and regional planning. This project will involve collaboration with agency partners who have a direct interest in linking different climate variables (e.g. temperature, precipitation, etc.) with key observed or suspected landscape change. These partners will pinpoint specific climate variables that may be linked with environmental change using data and climate modeling provided by the Scenarios Network for Alaska and Arctic Planning (SNAP). Once variables are assessed and selected based on importance at the landscape scale, pertinence to stakeholders, and observed connections to climate, the SNAP team will then work with land managers to identify the best way to apply climate projections to specific research questions. Model outputs will be translated into suitable formats for use in decision making web tools. New tools delivered through this project will allow decision makers to explore the effects of ongoing and projected climate change on one or more selected key issues of concern identified by project participants, including landscape-level changes in plant, animal, and ecosystem health. This project builds upon a previous collaboration between SNAP and the Alaska CASC, Supporting Local Agricultural Planning and Adaptation in Alaska, aimed to assist growers, land managers and communities in expanding agriculture in Interior Alaska as a means of adapting to climate changes and building community self-reliance and resilience.