Integrating climate change into hazard mitigation planning: Opportunities and examples in practice

Over the last several decades, natural disasters in the United States have become more numerous and costly. Climate change threatens to further exacerbate this trend by increasing both the severity and duration of many natural hazards, ultimately leading to even greater costs in both human life and monetary resources. To prepare for these changes, a handful of local communities have integrated climate change into their Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) approved hazard mitigation plans. This paper analyzes 30 U.S. local hazard mitigation plans against a conceptual framework for how climate change could be integrated into the requirements specified in the FEMA Plan Review Crosswalk, a checklist used by FEMA to evaluate and approve local hazard mitigation plans. Results show that the majority (23/35) of communities are openly discussing how climate change could affect or already is affecting the occurrence of natural hazards. Additionally, over half also include hazard mitigation actions that are designed to be viable in a climate-altered future. These actions, however, represent only a small portion of the total actions proposed in the plans and are generally focused on researching, planning, and capacity building. In addition, few communities include a formal commitment to adapting to climate change or include clear mechanisms for integrating new climate information as it become available into plan revisions. In general, results from this analysis show that there is little consistency in how communities are integrating climate change into hazard planning. These findings point to both the nascence of this practice and the opportunity to develop more formalized guidance that can steer communities towards holistic integration of climate change into hazards planning

Comparison of 100 Resilient City Strategies and Local Adaptation Plans

Comparison of strategies developed by U.S. cities in 100 Resilient Cities (N = 8) to U.S. local adaptation plans (N = 44) on seven plan principles and overall plan quality

Envisioning a Circular Economy: The Journey of One Mid-Sized Midwestern City

The City of Ann Arbor has committed to a just and equitable transition to community-wide carbon neutrality by 2030. Our guiding plan, A2ZERO, outlines seven strategies and 44 actions that were chosen by the community to achieve this goal. One of the seven strategies is “Changing the Way We Use, Reuse, and Dispose of Materials”, including the action: “move toward a circular economy”. Many cities are trying to move towards a circular economy, tailoring policies, actions, and outreach towards their unique circumstances. Regardless of context, becoming circular requires an array of actions including collaboration and partnership, policy setting, program development, and education. This paper explores how the concept of the circular economy is discussed in the peer reviewed literature and in practitioner circles, exploring similarities and differences. Following this, we undertake a critical instance case study on the City of Ann Arbor’s materials management programs and efforts towards achieving a more circular local economy. We conclude by offering pathways that Ann Arbor and other cities across the U.S. can pursue to advance a circular economy

Actionable knowledge and the art of engagement

What makes knowledge relevant to environmental sustainability actionable, and how can its societal impacts be evaluated? Scholars and practitioners have increasingly advocated that the traditional linear model of knowledge production, with its unidirectional flow of information from researchers to policy-makers, be replaced by a new approach in which researchers and knowledge-users meaningfully interact to co-create knowledge that is actionable in decision-making. This popular model — co-production — has advanced thinking on how to create usable knowledge. In practice, however, co-production has not been a single approach, but instead a diversity of forms of engaged research. Further, the jargon may both obfuscate governance dimensions and limit understanding of what works. Improved distinction among the different ways researchers and societal partners interact can enable attentive and effective engagement across contexts. Recognition of this diversity is necessary in advancing the processes and impacts of actionable knowledge for sustainability

A comprehensive review of climate adaptation in the United States: more than before, but less than needed

We reviewed existing and planned adaptation activities of federal, tribal, state, and local governments and the private sector in the United States (U.S.) to understand what types of adaptation activities are underway across different sectors and scales throughout the country. Primary sources of review included material officially submitted for consideration in the upcoming 2013 U.S. National Climate Assessment and supplemental peer-reviewed and grey literature. Although substantial adaptation planning is occurring in various sectors, levels of government, and the private sector, few measures have been implemented and even fewer have been evaluated. Most adaptation actions to date appear to be incremental changes, not the transformational changes that may be needed in certain cases to adapt to significant changes in climate. While there appear to be no one-size-fits-all adaptations, there are similarities in approaches across scales and sectors, including mainstreaming climate considerations into existing policies and plans, and pursuing no- and low-regrets strategies. Despite the positive momentum in recent years, barriers to implementation still impede action in all sectors and across scales. The most significant barriers include lack of funding, policy and institutional constraints, and difficulty in anticipating climate change given the current state of information on change. However, the practice of adaptation can advance through learning by doing, stakeholder engagements (including “listening sessions”), and sharing of best practices. Efforts to advance adaptation across the U.S. and globally will necessitate the reduction or elimination of barriers, the enhancement of information and best practice sharing mechanisms, and the creation of comprehensive adaptation evaluation metrics