Tom DeMeoRegional Ecologist

Acting Climate Change Coordinator

Climate Change Strategy for the Pacific Northwest Region,

USDA Forest Service

USDA Strategic PlanStrategic Goal 2 – Ensure our national

forests and private working lands are conserved, restored, and made more resilient to climate change, while enhancing our water resources.

Objective 2.2 – Lead efforts to mitigate and adapt to climate change

Performance measure 2.2.3- Percent of National Forests in compliance with a climate change adaptation and mitigation strategy.

National Roadmap for Responding to Climate Change

USDA Forest ServiceJuly 2010

Agency Capacity1.Employee education2.Designated climate change coordinators3.Develop program guidelines and training

Partnership and Education

4.Integrate science and management5.Develop partnerships

Adaptation6.Assess Vulnerability7.Set Priorities8.Monitor Change

Mitigation and Sustainable

Consumption9.Assess and manage carbon10.Reduce environmental footprint

USFS Response

to Climate Change

Regional strategy with seven major points:• Improving climate change awareness and

literacy

• Vulnerability assessment• Adaptation strategy• Monitoring

• Guidance to field

• Collaboration

• Sustainable Operations

Strategy with seven major points:• Improving climate change awareness and

literacy

Survey: 42% of Forest Service employees either don’t believe the climate is changing, or that there is nothing we can do about it

This probably reflects views of the general public

Strategy with seven major points:• Improving climate change awareness and literacy

Social science tells us:1.Public is arrayed in groups from “urgent action

needed” to “active opposition”2.You can influence the groups in the middle3.Environment is never a top issue with the public at

large4.Interest in the climate change issue waxes and

wanes (Credit: Suzanne Moser,

consultant)

Strategy with seven major points:• Improving climate change awareness and

literacy Social science tells usDON’T1.Scare people. They will give up.2. Think providing more information is

sufficient (the information deficit paradigm). People receive information through cultural, political, and experience filters. Don’t underestimate how strong these are.

Strategy with seven major points:• Improving climate change awareness and

literacy Social science tells usDO1.Embrace “reasonable hope”2.Move the discussion away from “them, there, then” to “us, here, now”2.Show people a reasonable pathway to success

Strategy with seven major points:• Improving climate change awareness and

literacy

Examples of reasonable hope: Consider recycling, hybrid cars, organic gardening,

reusable grocery bags, and the local food movement

Not so long ago all these were considered fringe ideas; now they are mainstream.

Practical education and incentives brought this about.

Strategy with seven major points:• Reasonable hope for climate change:

1. Show people they can save money. Example: home solar panels in Oregon

2. Show the numbers for carbon saved by using local food

3. Show how land use laws improve their quality of

life

….Making it “us, here, now”

Strategy with seven major points:

• Vulnerability assessment• Adaptation strategy• Monitoring

Strategy with seven major points:

• Vulnerability assessment

--Development underway--Interim products by the spring of 2011--Final products in the fall of 2011

Strategy with seven major points:

• Vulnerability assessment

--Terrestrial--Aquatic--Socio-economic

DRAFT Terrestrial

Strategy with seven major points:

• Adaptation strategy• Monitoring

--Following the vulnerability assessment, develop these two together

--Will probably involve expert panels

Strategy with seven major points:

• Adaptation strategy

The best adaptation strategy is a well-thought out anddefensible restoration strategy --Need (active or passive) --Efficacy --Public support

Strategy with seven major points:

• Guidance to field

--Field wants to know: - What do we do about climate

change? - Show us the game plan.

Strategy with seven major points:

• Guidance to field

--”What’s the plan?” --Carbon accounting --Vulnerability assessment --Restoration priorities

Strategy with seven major points:

• Collaboration

--Necessary but not sufficient --Moving beyond talk to specific projects can

be difficult --People protect their interests; reduce

anxieties --Be specific about what you are asking them

to contribute, and what they will gain

Strategy with seven major points:

• Sustainable Operations --Reducing fleet fuel use, more energy-

efficient buildings, teleconferences.

Any mule can kick a barn down, but only a carpenter can build one.

--Sam Rayburn