Evaluating Urban Resilience To Climate Change: A Multi-Sector Approach (Final Report)
Citation:
U.S. EPA. Evaluating Urban Resilience To Climate Change: A Multi-Sector Approach (Final Report). U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Washington, D.C., EPA/600/R-16/365F, 2017.
Impact/Purpose:
EPA scientists and their collaborators have created an assessment tool to help cities identify climate change risks in eight different municipal sectors. The report identifies indicators of traits that may enhance or inhibit communities’ resilience to climate change, allowing decision makers to focus on planning issues that are least resilient to those impacts.
Description:
EPA is announcing the availability of this final report prepared by the Air, Climate, and Energy (ACE) Research Program, located within the Office of Research and Development, with support from Cadmus. One of the goals of the ACE research program is to provide scientific information and tools to support EPA’s strategic goal of taking action on climate change in a sustainable manner. This report describes a comprehensive, transparent, and flexible tool that cities can use to identify the greatest risks, successes, and priorities for decreasing urban vulnerability and increasing resilience to climate change. Case studies were conducted with Washington, DC and Worcester, MA to provide examples of the tool’s application. Visualizations facilitate the interpretation of case study results and are intended to further assist city managers in moving to the next step of implementing climate change adaptation activities. The approach can be applied to a variety of different cities to help target and prioritize adaptation planning.
The intended audiences for this report are local and state planners and managers engaged in the development and implementation of urban sustainability and resilience policies and practices, or anyone charged with developing and implementing climate change adaptation plans, and scientists working on climate change adaptation at the local level.