new reports on ecology and climate change
Heidi Ricci
Dear TSC and AGS
The following two reports released this week are of interest in relationship to forest reserves and landscape level habitat protection.
http://wildlandsnetwork.org/files/climate-disruption-and-connectivity-exec-summary-2010.pdf
details below
Heidi
E. Heidi Ricci
Senior
Policy Analyst
Mass
Audubon
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hri...@massaudubon.org
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Ecological scientists offer strategies to expand management
of ecosystems, help them adapt to climate change;
recommendations include understanding risks of
geoengineering, prioritizing low-alteration strategies such as
preserving forests
Jan 26, 2010 – Ecological Society of America
Headlines are rewritten for editorial clarity. The original
story and headline begin below.
Original Headline: Managing Ecosystems in a
Changing Climate
WASHINGTON,
January 26, 2010 (press release) – Global warming may impair the ability
of
ecosystems to perform vital services—such as providing food, clean water
and carbon
sequestration—says the nation’s largest organization of ecological
scientists. In a statement
released today, the Ecological Society of America (ESA) outlines strategies
that focus on restoring
and maintaining natural ecosystem functions to mitigate and adapt to climate
change.
“Decision-makers cannot overlook the critical services ecosystems
provide,” says ESA President Mary
Power. “If we are going to reduce the possibility of irreversible damage
to the environment under
climate change, we need to take swift but measured action to protect and manage
our ecosystems.”
ESA recommends four approaches to limiting adverse effects of climate change
through ecosystem
management:
Prioritize low-alteration strategies. Many ecosystems sequester a
sizable amount of
carbon—simply allowing them to function naturally can significantly help
mitigation efforts.
Deforestation, for example, has a two-fold impact: removing agents of carbon
sequestration—trees
in this instance—while simultaneously releasing stored carbon. Therefore,
preserving forests is a
straightforward way to both reduce and offset emissions.
Critically evaluate management-intensive strategies. Management
strategies that seek to
increase carbon sequestration above natural levels should undergo thorough
life-cycle analysis and
evaluation prior to implementation. For example, increasing carbon uptake on
agricultural
lands—one approach to enhancing the sequestration potential of
ecosystems—typically requires
more fertilizer than standard processes; the tradeoff, therefore, is higher
emissions and pollution
associated with fertilizer production.
Acknowledge the ecological implications of geoengineering. Understand
the potential risks
associated with engineering the environment, called geoengineering, and the
unintended negative
impacts that could emerge from long-term or widespread use. For example,
injecting sulfur
particles into the atmosphere to reflect solar rays would have a cooling effect
but could also
increase acid rain and destabilize weather patterns.
Address long-term risks. Assess the far-reaching consequences of
ecosystem alterations. Monitor
carbon stores sequestered under given management practices and develop or apply
models to
forecast ecosystem responses several decades into the future.
In addition to mitigating climate change, steps should be taken to prepare
ecosystems to withstand
climate change impacts. Human activity has impaired the natural resilience of
many ecosystems. ESA
outlines four adaptation strategies to safeguard ecosystem services in the face
of climate change:
Take additional steps to protect water quality and quantity. Freshwater
resources are at
particular risk from the interaction of climate change and intensification of
human use. Rising
temperatures have already lowered river flows, warmed surface waters and dried
out wetlands.
Sustaining freshwater resources is critical to both environmental and public
health.
Enable natural species migration across human dominated landscapes. Create
and maintain
wildlife corridors across jurisdictions and private lands to help species
relocate and adapt as
habitats shift with climate change. Steps should be taken to restore the
ability of native species to
migrate across landscapes severely fragmented by human land use.
Improve capacity to predict extreme events. Monitoring and modeling
natural disturbance and
recovery processes at regional scales will help state and federal agencies
understand and respond to
novel rates and intensities of environmental change.
Manage collaboratively at the ecosystem level. Many natural resources
and services, such as fresh
water, clean air and crop pollination, are not contained within jurisdictional
boundaries; resource
management should reflect this and operate at the ecosystem level.
“Even conservative warming projections show that natural systems will
experience unprecedented
stresses, including shifting habitats and ecological processes and more
frequent and severe natural
disturbances, such as fires, floods and droughts,” ESA says in the
statement. “These unavoidable
changes will require management that addresses ecological thresholds, tipping
points and other
sources of uncertainty.”
According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, global temperatures
could rise 1-6
degrees C by the end of the 21st Century.
“The sooner such strategies are deployed, the more effective they will be
in mitigating the extent of
change and helping us to adapt to inevitable changes.” ESA says in its
statement.
The Ecological Society of America’s statement is available at:
http://www.esa.org/pao/policyStatements/pdfDocuments/Ecosystem%20Management%20in%20a%20Changing%20Climate.pdf
From: Kenyon Fields
[mailto:ken...@wildlandsnetwork.org]
Sent: Monday, January 25, 2010 6:37 PM
To: in...@wildlandsnetwork.org
Subject: New Synthesis Report on Climate Disruption and Connectivity
New Synthesis Report on Climate Disruption and Connectivity
Chaos surrounds climate change legislation in the United States and
negotiations on the international stage. Attempts to write-off the science
behind climate change further muddy the waters. The scientific literature is
widely available but is infrequently found synthesized into a single review at
the right level of depth to be useful to conservation advocates –
particularly those focused on preserving biodiversity and native ecosystems.
Accordingly, Wildlands Network commissioned a white paper synthesizing the
science of global climate change (or climate disruption) and how it will affect
biological diversity. “Climate Disruption and Connectivity: Toward a
Strategy for Nature Protection” was prepared by Dr. Barbara Dugelby*,
and is a comprehensive review of the latest scientific literature on these
critical topics. Among the conclusions is that connected networks of protected
lands, at the continental scale, are necessary to buffer the impact of climate
disruption on biological diversity and to allow for flexibility and adaptation
by flora and fauna.
We hope you will find this a useful central resource for your critical work to
defend natural systems. There is a very extensive bibliography to drawn on for
further information.
Download the full report
http://wildlandsnetwork.org/files/climate-disruption-and-connectivity-2010.pdf
Download the Executive Summary
http://wildlandsnetwork.org/files/climate-disruption-and-connectivity-exec-summary-2010.pdf
*Dr. Barbara Dugelby is Latin America Program Director at Round River
Conservation Studies
________________________________________
Kenyon Fields
Strategy Director
Wildlands Network
360-758-9913 office
360-434-3404 cell
ken...@wildlandsnetwork.org
Networks of people protecting networks of land...
www.wildlandsnetwork.org
Joseph Zorzin
Heidi Ricci
Just that it reinforces the importance of protecting large blocks of natural habitat, connected by corridors of other protected habitat, and that minimizing human disturbances to natural areas helps with ecological resiliency in the face of climate change impacts.
Heidi
Joseph Zorzin
Heidi Ricci
My interpretation based on everything I’ve read is that the possibility of up to 80% of the lands going into reserves and parklands should be retained within the range of options considered, at least going into the zoning allocation process. But the general principles outlined in these papers can be interpreted in various ways especially when considering other public values so there is nothing prescriptive that tells us exactly what the plan for MA lands should look like. It just provides more support for the idea that we need many large blocks of reserved land linked by functional corridors, and that humans should be careful in their hubris about how they can engineer improvements to natural systems.