A 2021 report from EPA, USDA-FS, DOI, and NIST compared the air quality and health impacts of smoke from prescribed fire, which is used as a land management tool, with smoke from wildfire. The report found that using prescribed fire is not without risk as it can result in smoke-related air quality and public health impacts—but at a much smaller scale compared to wildfire. The assessment could be informative to multiple levels of government as they engage and plan for future land and fire management activities. The...
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Highlights
Since 1989, the U.S. Global Change Research Program (USGCRP) has submitted annual reports to Congress called Our Changing Planet. The reports describe the status of USGCRP research activities, provide progress updates, and document recent accomplishments
In particular, Our Changing Planet highlights progress and accomplishments in interagency activities. These highlights represent the broad spectrum of USGCRP activities that extend from Earth system observations, modeling, and fundamental research through synthesis and assessment, decision support, education, and public engagement. Highlights describe the state of science at the time of publication of each yearly report, and may not reflect more recent advances in understanding. The date of publication of the source report is noted on each highlight page.
As the climate changes, hotter-than-usual days and nights are becoming more common, and heat waves are expected to become more frequent and intense. Cities experience higher temperatures than surrounding areas–known as the urban heat island effect–and residents often face higher health risks during extreme heat events. To help monitor changes in the health challenges associated with heat waves in urban areas, the USGS and EPA are developing data, analyses, and indicators for characterizing trends in the urban heat island effect...
In 2021, USGCRP’s Interagency Crosscutting Group on Climate Change and Human Health (CCHHG) supported the global GEO Health Community of Practice in holding a global conversation on the use of Earth observations and climate information for decision-making around COVID-19, and in convening regionally focused workshops on the use of observations for health in the Americas, Africa, and Asia. The GEO Health Community of Practice is a network of governments,...
In December 2021, the U.S. Committee on the Marine Transportation System issued the third report in a series about the response and resilience of the Nation’s marine transportation system after major hurricanes. The report assessed the impacts to ports from the 2020 hurricane season, which saw a record-breaking number of storms form in the Atlantic basin during a global pandemic. Three storms were examined in-depth: Hurricanes Laura, Sally, and Delta. The report was authored by the Marine...
Throughout 2021, the interagency Sea Level Rise Task Force, under the auspices of USGCRP’s CoastsIG and the Subcommittee on Ocean Science and Technology, engaged in extensive collaboration to produce the 2022 Sea Level Rise Technical Report, which provides the most up-to-date sea level rise projections for all U.S. states and territories by decade for the next 100 years and beyond (Sweet et al., 2022). The report projects that sea levels along the U.S. coastline will rise an additional 10–12...
SilvaCarbon leverages state-of-the-art science and technology to advance the generation and use of information in managing forest and terrestrial carbon.
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New climate indicators and communications efforts tell the story of climate change through federally supported observations.
Climate indicators show trends over time in important aspects of our environment, such as greenhouse gas levels in the atmosphere and the start of spring each year. Indicators are based on long-term, consistently collected data and can be used to assess risks and vulnerabilities from a changing climate and to inform response actions. IndIWG developed an interagency web platform for...
A journal special issue highlights advances in the science of protecting species and ecosystems from climate change impacts.
An increasingly important climate change adaptation strategy is to focus conservation on climate change refugia, or areas that are relatively buffered from contemporary climate change. Protection and management of climate change refugia can help shelter native species and ecosystems from current climate change impacts and provide longer-term havens that protect valued ecological and sociocultural resources. The U.S. Geological Survey and EPA,...
Collaborative studies among scientists and decision-makers are identifying strategies to meet current and future water demands.
The western United States faces growing water challenges. Drought, population change, aging infrastructure, and ecosystem needs all strain existing water and power infrastructure, and future climate change is expected to further...
A new resource ensures that Federal health and climate research is accessible to inform the Fifth National Climate Assessment.
In 2020, the CCHHG began an effort to identify and organize information on federally funded research activities on climate change and human health since 2016. This group, co-led by EPA and NASA, collated this information into a Federal climate change and health research compendium document to help inform authors of the Fifth National...