Read the 2018 National Climate Assessment chapter report about climate adaptation in the United States, found in the required reading folder here: （upload）

Refer to the 4th National Climate Assessment Chapter 28 “Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions to
answer the following questions.

1) (4 pts) What are the different stages of adaptation planning?

2) (3 pts) What are some strategies used in in climate change adaptation. Name 3 and clearly describe them.

3) (3 pts) What are some of the challenges to successful adaptation planning? Explain in detail.

Recommended Citation for Chapter
Lempert, R., J. Arnold, R. Pulwarty, K. Gordon, K. Greig, C. Hawkins Hoffman, D. Sands, and C. Werrell, 2018:
Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions. In Impacts, Risks, and Adaptation in the United States: Fourth
National Climate Assessment, Volume II [Reidmiller, D.R., C.W. Avery, D.R. Easterling, K.E. Kunkel, K.L.M.
Lewis, T.K. Maycock, and B.C. Stewart (eds.)]. U.S. Global Change Research Program, Washington, DC, USA,
pp. 1309–1345. doi: 10.7930/NCA4.2018.CH28

On the Web: https://nca2018.globalchange.gov/chapter/adaptation

Federal Coordinating Lead Authors
Jeffrey Arnold
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers

Roger Pulwarty
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration

Chapter Lead
Robert Lempert
RAND Corporation

Chapter Authors
Kate Gordon
Paulson Institute

Katherine Greig
Wharton Risk Management and Decision
Processes Center at University of Pennsylvania
(formerly New York City Mayor’s Office of Recovery
and Resiliency)

Cat Hawkins Hoffman
National Park Service

Dale Sands
Village of Deer Park, Illinois

Caitlin Werrell
The Center for Climate and Security

Impacts, Risks, and Adaptation in the United States: Fourth National Climate Assessment, Volume II

Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions28

Technical Contributors are listed at the end of the chapter.

Review Editor
Mary Ann Lazarus
Cameron MacAllister Group

http://doi.org/10.7930/NCA4.2018.CH28

https://nca2018.globalchange.gov/chapter/adaptation

Impacts, Risks, and Adaptation in the United States: Fourth National Climate Assessment, Volume II
Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions28

Seawall surrounding Kivalina, AlaskaKey Message 1

Adaptation Implementation Is Increasing
Adaptation planning and implementation activities are occurring across the United States
in the public, private, and nonprofit sectors. Since the Third National Climate Assessment,
implementation has increased but is not yet commonplace.

Key Message 2

Climate Change Outpaces Adaptation Planning
Successful adaptation has been hindered by the assumption that climate conditions are and will
be similar to those in the past. Incorporating information on current and future climate conditions
into design guidelines, standards, policies, and practices would reduce risk and adverse impacts.

Key Message 3

Adaptation Entails Iterative Risk Management
Adaptation entails a continuing risk management process; it does not have an end point. With this
approach, individuals and organizations of all types assess risks and vulnerabilities from climate
and other drivers of change (such as economic, environmental, and societal), take actions to
reduce those risks, and learn over time.

Key Message 4

Benefits of Proactive Adaptation Exceed Costs
Proactive adaptation initiatives—including changes to policies, business operations, capital
investments, and other steps—yield benefits in excess of their costs in the near term, as well
as over the long term. Evaluating adaptation strategies involves consideration of equity, justice,
cultural heritage, the environment, health, and national security.

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions

1311 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

Key Message 5

New Approaches Can Further Reduce Risk
Integrating climate considerations into existing organizational and sectoral policies
and practices provides adaptation benefits. Further reduction of the risks from
climate change can be achieved by new approaches that create conditions for altering
regulatory and policy environments, cultural and community resources, economic and
financial systems, technology applications, and ecosystems.

Executive Summary
Across the United States, many regions and sec-
tors are already experiencing the direct effects of
climate change. For these communities, climate
impacts—from extreme storms made worse by
sea level rise, to longer-lasting and more extreme
heat waves, to increased numbers of wildfires
and floods—are an immediate threat, not a far-off
possibility. Because these impacts are expected
to increase over time, communities throughout
the United States face the challenge not only of
reducing greenhouse gas emissions, but also of
adapting to current and future climate change to
help mitigate climate risks.

Adaptation takes place at many levels—national
and regional but mainly local—as governments,
businesses, communities, and individuals
respond to today’s altered climate conditions and
prepare for future change based on the specific
climate impacts relevant to their geography and
vulnerability. Adaptation has five general stages:
awareness, assessment, planning, implemen-
tation, and monitoring and evaluation. These
phases naturally build on one another, though
they are often not executed sequentially and the
terminology may vary. The Third National Climate
Assessment (released in 2014) found the first
three phases underway throughout the United
States but limited in terms of on-the-ground
implementation. Since then, the scale and scope
of adaptation implementation have increased,
but in general, adaptation implementation is not
yet commonplace.

One important aspect of adaptation is the
ability to anticipate future climate impacts and
plan accordingly. Public- and private-sector
decision-makers have traditionally made plans
assuming that the current and future climate in
their location will resemble that of the recent
past. This assumption is no longer reliably true.
Increasingly, planners, builders, engineers,
architects, contractors, developers, and other
individuals are recognizing the need to take
current and projected climate conditions into
account in their decisions about the location
and design of buildings and infrastructure,
engineering standards, insurance rates, prop-
erty values, land-use plans, disaster response
preparations, supply chains, and cropland and
forest management.

In anticipating and planning for climate
change, decision-makers practice a form of risk
assessment known as iterative risk manage-
ment. Iterative risk management emphasizes
that the process of anticipating and responding
to climate change does not constitute a single
set of judgments at any point in time; rather,
it is an ongoing cycle of assessment, action,
reassessment, learning, and response. In the
adaptation context, public- and private-sector
actors manage climate risk using three types of
actions: reducing exposure, reducing sensitivi-
ty, and increasing adaptive capacity.

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions

1312 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

Climate risk management includes some
attributes and tactics that are familiar to most
businesses and local governments, since these
organizations already commonly manage or
design for a variety of weather-related risks,
including coastal and inland storms, heat
waves, water availability threats, droughts, and
floods. However, successful adaptation also
requires the often unfamiliar challenge of using
information on current and future climate,
rather than past climate, which can prove dif-
ficult for those lacking experience with climate
change datasets and concepts. In addition,
many professional practices and guidelines, as
well as legal requirements, still call for the use
of data based on past climate. Finally, factors
such as access to resources, culture, gover-
nance, and available information can affect not
only the risk faced by different populations but
also the best ways to reduce their risks.

Achieving the benefits of adaptation can
require up-front investments to achieve
longer-term savings, engaging with differing
stakeholder interests and values, and planning
in the face of uncertainty. But adaptation also
presents challenges, including difficulties in
obtaining the necessary funds, insufficient
information and relevant expertise, and juris-
dictional mismatches.

In general, adaptation can generate significant
benefits in excess of its costs. Benefit–cost
analysis can help guide organizations toward

actions that most efficiently reduce risks, in
particular those that, if not addressed, could
prove extremely costly in the future. Beyond
those attributes explicitly measured by bene-
fit–cost analysis, effective adaptation can also
enhance social welfare in many ways that can
be difficult to quantify and that people will
value differently, including improving economic
opportunity, health, equity, security, education,
social connectivity, and sense of place, as well
as safeguarding cultural resources and practic-
es and environmental quality.

A significant portion of climate risk can
be addressed by mainstreaming; that is,
integrating climate adaptation into existing
organizational and sectoral investments,
policies, and practices, such as planning,
budgeting, policy development, and operations
and maintenance. Mainstreaming of climate
adaptation into existing decision processes has
already begun in many areas, such as financial
risk reporting, capital investment planning,
engineering standards, military planning, and
disaster risk management. Further reduction
of the risks from climate change, in particular
those that arise from futures with high levels
of greenhouse gas emissions, calls for new
approaches that create conditions for altering
regulatory and policy environments, cultural
and community resources, economic and
financial systems, technology applications,
and ecosystems.

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions

1313 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

Five Adaptation Stages and Progress

The figure illustrates the adaptation iterative risk management process. The gray arced lines compare the current status of
implementing this process with the status reported by the Third National Climate Assessment in 2014. Darker color indicates
more activity. From Figure 18.1 (Source: adapted from National Research Council, 2010.1 Used with permission from the National
Academies Press, ©2010, National Academy of Sciences).

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions

1314 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

Introduction

Many regions and sectors across the United
States already experience significant impacts
from climate change effects, and many of these
effects are projected to increase. By the middle
of this century, annual losses in the United
States due to climate change could reach hun-
dreds of billions of dollars (Ch. 29: Mitigation).2

Adaptation refers to actions taken at the
individual, local, regional, and national levels to
reduce risks from even today’s changed climate
conditions and to prepare for impacts from
additional changes projected for the future.3,4,5,6

Adaptation is a form of risk management. Risk
is sometimes defined as the likelihood of an
event’s occurrence multiplied by a measure
of its consequences for human and natural
systems. But because the probabilities and
consequences of climate change threats are
often not known with precision, and because
different people often value the same conse-
quences differently, it is useful to define risk
more broadly as “the potential for adverse
consequences when something of value is at
stake, and the outcome is uncertain.”7 Risk
arises from the combination of exposure to cli-
mate hazards, sensitivity to those hazards, and
adaptive capacity. Adaptation can, however,
provide significant societal benefits, reducing
by more than half the cost of climate impacts
in some sectors (Ch. 29: Mitigation).8

Adaptation involves managing both short- and
long-term risks. Many important climate-
influenced effects—storm intensity, sea level,
frequency of heat waves—have already changed
due to past greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions
and will continue to change in the decades
ahead.3,4 Because several GHGs, in particular
carbon dioxide, reside in the atmosphere for
decades or longer, many climate-influenced
effects are projected to continue changing

through 2050, even if GHG emissions were to
stop immediately. Thus, climate risk manage-
ment requires adaptation for the next several
decades, independent of the extent of GHG
emission reductions. After 2050, the magnitude
of changes, and thus the demands on adapta-
tion, begins to depend strongly on the scale of
GHG emissions reduction today and over the
coming decades.4,9

Individuals, business entities, governments,
and civil society as a whole can take adaptation
actions at many different scales. Some of
these are changes to business operations,
adjustments to natural and cultural resource
management strategies, targeted capital
investments across diverse sectors, and chang-
es to land use and other policies. Adaptation
actions can yield beneficial short-term and/or
longer-term outcomes in excess of their costs,
based on economic returns, ecological bene-
fits, and broader concepts of social welfare and
security. Moreover, many strategies can pro-
vide multiple benefits, resulting in long-term
cost savings. For example, restoring wetlands
can provide valuable habitat for fish and
wildlife as well as flood protection to nearby
communities,10 and conserving mangrove
ecosystems can protect coastal communities
from damaging storms11 as well as help to
store carbon.12

People are not uniformly vulnerable to climate
change. Access to resources, culture, gover-
nance, and information affects the risks faced
by different populations and partly determines
the best ways to reduce their risks.13 Achiev-
ing the benefits of adaptation can require
up-front investments to achieve longer-term
savings, engaging with differing stakeholder
interests and values, and planning in the face
of uncertainty.

Integrating climate risk management into
existing design, planning, and operations

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions

1315 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

workflows (or mainstreaming), in contrast to
adding novel decision processes for climate
adaptation alone, can provide many adaptation
benefits.14,15,16 Additional climate risk reduction,
particularly under the most severe longer-term
climate change projections, emphasizes the
need for more and more significant changes
to regulatory and policy environments at all
scales, to cultural and community resource
planning, to economic and financial systems, to
technology applications, and to ecosystems.

Key Message 1
Adaptation Implementation Is
Increasing

Adaptation planning and implementation
activities are occurring across the United
States in the public, private, and non-
profit sectors. Since the Third National
Climate Assessment, implementation has
increased but is not yet commonplace.

Adaptation has five general stages: 1) aware-
ness, 2) assessment, 3) planning, 4) implemen-
tation, and 5) monitoring and evaluation, as
shown in Figure 28.1,17,18 although these are also
known by other terms (see, for example, the
U.S. Climate Resilience Toolkit at https://tool-
kit.climate.gov/ and the University of Notre
Dame’s Collaboratory for Adaptation to Climate
Change at http://gain.nd.edu). Adaptation is
an ongoing process in which organizations
and individuals repeatedly cycle through
the process shown in Figure 28.1, though
specific adaptation efforts can follow different
routes through these stages (e.g., California

Emergency Planning Agency and California
Natural Resources Agency 201219).

The Third National Climate Assessment (NCA3)
found that the first three stages were under-
way throughout the United States but with
limited on-the-ground implementation.18 Since
then, the scale and scope of adaptation imple-
mentation have increased, including by federal,
state, tribal, and local agencies (see Vogel et
al. 2017, Halofsky et al. 2015, Leggett 2015, Ray
and Grannis 2015, Wentz 2017, and the many
examples of adaptation implementation in this
chapter and elsewhere in this report14,20,21,22,23).
For instance, Miami-Dade County’s Capital
Improvement Program is addressing hazards
related to sea level rise, as is San Francisco’s
2015 Seawall Resiliency Project. It remains diffi-
cult, however, to tally the extent of adaptation
implementation in the United States because
there are no common reporting systems, and
many actions that reduce climate risk are
not labeled as climate adaptation.14 Enough is
known, however, to conclude that adaptation
implementation is not uniform nor yet com-
mon across the United States.24

Adaptation actions in the United States have
increased in part due to 1) the growing aware-
ness of climate-related threats and impacts
and the risks these pose to business operations
and supply chains (Ch. 16: International, KM 1),
critical public infrastructure and communities,
natural areas and public lands, and ecosystems;
2) the wider recognition that investing in adap-
tation provides economic and social benefits
that exceed the costs; and 3) the increasing
number and magnitude of extreme events that
have occurred.14

https://toolkit.climate.gov/

https://toolkit.climate.gov/

http://gain.nd.edu/

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions

1316 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

Five Adaptation Stages and Progress

Figure 28.1: The figure illustrates the adaptation iterative risk management process. The gray arced lines compare the current
status of implementing this process with the status reported by the Third National Climate Assessment in 2014. Darker color
indicates more activity. Source: adapted from National Research Council, 2010.1 Used with permission from the National
Academies Press, ©2010, National Academy of Sciences.

Box 28.1: Department of Housing and Urban Development National Disaster
Resilience Competition

Rebuild by Design is a design-driven approach to create innovative local resilience solutions conducted in the af-
termath of Superstorm Sandy (http://www.rebuildbydesign.org/about#comp456). It was structured to connect
local communities with some of the Nation’s leading design firms to identify and solve problems collaboratively
and to address vulnerabilities exposed by Superstorm Sandy. The design solutions for the winning proposals
ranged in scope and scale from large-scale green infrastructure projects to small-scale residential resilience
retrofits. The competition process strengthened the understanding of regional interdependencies, fostering
coordination and resilience both at the local level and across the United States. Ultimately, nine projects were
selected for implementation and received Community Development Block Grant-Disaster Recovery funding
totaling $930 million.

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions

1317 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

While the level of implementation is now
higher than at the time of NCA3, the scale of
adaptation implementation for some effects
and locations seems incommensurate with the
projected scale of climate threats.25 Communi-
ties have focused more on actions that address
current variability and recent extreme events
than on actions to prepare for future change
and emergent threats.14 Communities are
currently focused more on capacity building
and on making buildings and other assets less
sensitive to climate impacts. Communities
have been less focused on reducing exposure
through actions such as land-use change
(preventing building in high-risk locations)
and retreat. Furthermore, many communities’
adaptation actions arise and are funded in the
context of recovery after an event, rather than
taken proactively. Often, such adaptation is
not as comprehensive as suggested by best
practice guidance, as when adaptation plans
address sea level rise but not other climate
impacts. Few current adaptation plans seek

to exploit synergies among various types of
actions, and many plans pay little attention to
the costs of actions or their co-benefits. Often
explicit attention to evaluation and monitoring
is scant or nonexistent.

Managing the Challenge
Public- and private-sector decision-makers
have traditionally made plans assuming that
the current and future climate will resemble
the recent past, an assumption known as
stationarity.27 The assumption is often made
explicitly. For instance, in order to design a
new dam or to negotiate contracts on future
deliveries of hydropower and irrigation water,
a water agency might use probability distribu-
tions for precipitation and extreme flow events
that are based on past or current streamflows
in a watershed. In other cases, this assump-
tion is made implicitly, as when a city issues
building permits for coastal properties using
current flood maps without updating them to
reflect projected sea level rise.

Box 28.2: Adaptation Actions by Individuals

Many jurisdictions publish guidance to help individuals take actions to reduce the risks from natural hazards.
For example, the city of Chicago suggests residents in flood-prone areas take the following actions
before a flood:26

• Avoid building in a floodplain unless you elevate and reinforce your home.

• Elevate the furnace, water heater, and electric panel if susceptible to flooding.

• Install check valves in sewer traps to prevent floodwater from backing up into your home.

• Construct barriers (levees, beams, sandbags, and floodwalls) to stop floodwater from entering the building.

• Seal walls in basements with waterproofing compounds to avoid seepage.

• Keep an adequate supply of food, candles, and drinking water in case you are trapped inside your home.

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions

1318 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

Key Message 2
Climate Change Outpaces
Adaptation Planning

Successful adaptation has been hindered
by the assumption that climate condi-
tions are and will be similar to those in
the past. Incorporating information on
current and future climate conditions
into design guidelines, standards, poli-
cies, and practices would reduce risk and
adverse impacts.

The assumption that current and future
climate threats and impacts will resemble
those of the past is no longer reliably
true.4,27,28 Human-caused carbon pollution
in the atmosphere has already pushed many
climate-influenced effects—such as the fre-
quency, intensity, or duration of some types
of storms and extreme heat, drought, and sea
level rise—outside the range of recorded recent
natural variability.4,6,28,29 In addition, improved
understanding of climate and Earth system
science since the advent of systematic data
collection in the 19th century has made it clear
that the natural variability of the climate sys-
tem at regional scales is much larger in places
than previously understood. For instance, the
southwestern United States was much wetter
in the 20th century than in most of the preced-
ing thousand years.

The deviation of climate patterns from the
recent historical record is expected to grow
even larger in the future because of continuing
GHG emissions and because the full impact of
previous emissions has not yet been felt due to
long delays in the climate system’s response to
those emissions.3,4,28 Failure to anticipate and
adjust to these changes could be costly.

Adjusting to projected climate risk, rather than
relying on interpretations of past impacts, has

important implications for the location and
design of built human infrastructure, engineer-
ing standards, insurance rates, property values,
land-use plans and planning frameworks or
processes, disaster response preparations,
and cropland and forest management. In many
respects, such climate risk management has
attributes familiar to many decision-makers
in businesses and communities that com-
monly manage or design now for a variety of
weather-related risks, including storms, heat
waves, water availability threats, and floods.
Most organizations also manage other short-
and longer-term risks and thus have direct
experience with preparing for uncertain future
conditions over multiple timescales.

However, climate adaptation is also less
familiar to some individuals and organizations
in that it requires a complete reversal from
the near-universal current assumption of an
unchanging climate. Many factors make the
reversal of this assumption difficult, including
unfamiliarity with climate change datasets
and concepts; the need to differentiate among
the timescales of weather and climate; the
challenge of balancing slow-moving, chronic
threats and faster, acute ones; the potential
and unknown cascading effects of large-scale
global changes on local and regional impacts;30
and a lack of public awareness that some cur-
rent and future changes in climate will be slow
to accumulate but will take even longer in time
to reverse, for the changes that are reversible.31

The timescales of climate threats also generally
do not align with the scales of governance,
impeding adaptation progress and often
hindering problem identification and solving.
Climate change introduces an unfamiliar new
source of uncertainty. Where previously an
organization may have created plans using
a single, well-understood historical record
to project a single set of future climate
conditions, it now often faces large numbers

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions

1319 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

of climate model projections produced with
myriad uncertainties whose local implications
may differ significantly across each projection.

Key Message 3
Adaptation Entails Iterative Risk
Management

Adaptation entails a continuing risk man-
agement process; it does not have an
end point. With this approach, individuals
and organizations of all types assess
risks and vulnerabilities from climate
and other drivers of change (such as
economic, environmental, and societal),
take actions to reduce those risks, and
learn over time.

To grapple with these challenges, organizations
have adopted a wide variety of approaches
that, to varying degrees, address the five gen-
eral stages of adaptation listed above. Iterative
risk management provides a comprehensive
framework and set of processes appropriate
for addressing adaptation challenges.32,33,34,35,36
The framework includes steps for anticipating,
identifying, evaluating, and prioritizing current
and future climate risks and vulnerabilities; for
choosing an appropriate allocation of effort
and resources toward reducing these risks; and
for monitoring and adjusting actions over time
while continuing to assess evolving risks and
vulnerabilities. Risk communication accompa-
nies each of these steps.33,37,38,39 Iterative risk
management helps address equity, economics,
and other measures of social well-being and
supports participatory stakeholder processes,
which can enhance transparency and foster
defensible decision-making, an important
component of successful adaptation efforts.40

Iterative risk management emphasizes that
the process of anticipating and responding to
climate change does not constitute a single

set of judgments at any point in time; rather,
it is an ongoing cycle of assessment, action,
reassessment, learning, and response.41 The
process helps manage risks that are well
known, as well as those that are deeply uncer-
tain due to data limitations or the irreducible
unpredictability of some aspects of current and
future climate.33,42

Iterative risk management is consistent with
most of the elements in the many climate
adaptation efforts and approaches currently in
use,42,43 including climate vulnerability assess-
ment, iterative risk assessment, and adaptive
management as often practiced by federal and
other land and resource management agen-
cies,44 as well as disaster risk management.45
Using a comprehensive framework helps
highlight commonalities and differences across
the approaches used by different jurisdictions
and sectors, facilitating comparison and learn-
ing among their users. It also situates climate
adaptation squarely within the broad range
of other risk management activities, such as
in the financial, engineering, environmental,
health, and national security sectors.2

Adaptation Actions to Reduce Risk
Steps to implementing iterative risk man-
agement help decision-makers compare and
allocate investments and identify incentives
for managing and reducing risk. The planning
and implementation steps of the generalized
adaptation framework combine several types of
actions46,47,48,49 that

1. reduce exposure (for example, reduce
the presence of people or assets in loca-
tions that could be adversely affected by
climate impacts);

2. reduce sensitivity (that is, lower the degree
to which a system is adversely affected by
exposure to climate impacts); and

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions

1320 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

3. increase adaptive capacity (that is, raise
the ability of human and natural systems
to prepare for, adjust to, respond to, and
recover from experienced or anticipated
climate impacts).

For instance, in the time since Superstorm
Sandy, New York City has reduced its potential
future flood impacts by relocating a limited
number of households out of the most flood-
prone areas (reduced exposure), raising the
height of some structures above the ground
so they suffer less damage from any flooding
(reduced sensitivity), and training the officials
responsible for revising building codes and
land-use policies to use the most up-to-date
estimates of flood risk (increased adaptive
capacity). Enhancing social cohesion—the
degree to which those in a community identify
with the community and with each other—is
also known to increase adaptive capacity, such
as the ability to rebound quickly from disas-
ters.50 More broadly, while adaptive capacity
often refers only to the targets of adaptation
action (such as communities, ecosystems,
and infrastructure), “the ability of institutions
themselves to adjust and evolve will be key to
their ability to manage for change.”51

Different populations also have different expo-
sure, sensitivity, and adaptive capacity based
on their access to resources and information,
their culture, and the quality of governance.
Such consideration can usefully inform deci-
sions about the equitable and just allocation of
resources in reducing climate risk.52

Adapting to Current Variability and Preparing
for Future Change
Adaptation addresses two timescales: 1)
adapting to current variability, which in any
particular location may now be different than
suggested by the historical record of climate
observations, and 2) preparing for future
change. This distinction is useful because

some decision-makers may not appreciate the
extent to which climate has already changed
and because these timescales often call for
different types of adaptation actions.

Miami Beach is currently raising the level of its
roads and building seawalls to reduce current
flooding due to higher sea levels, but it is also
choosing the height of these new structures,
anticipating that sea levels will be even higher
in the future.53 New York City and the Federal
Emergency Management Agency (FEMA)
agreed to develop two sets of flood maps,
one showing current risk for the purpose of
setting insurance rates and the other for the
longer-term purposes of setting building codes
and land-use planning.54 The National Park
Service, working with the U.S. Army Corps of
Engineers, constructed a revetment, or retain-
ing wall, and living shoreline in 2013 to protect
the Cockspur Island Lighthouse in Georgia’s
Fort Pulaski National Monument against
erosion and accelerated sea level rise. The new
revetment incorporated a wider base than is
currently required, enabling the addition of
rock to extend its height as sea levels rise in
the future.55 The State of Louisiana’s Coastal
Protection and Restoration Authority’s 2017
Coastal Master Plan has more than 100 struc-
tural and coastal restoration projects designed
to provide benefits over the next decade and
up to 50 years into the future.56

These timescale differences relate to the
ubiquitous term resilience57 that is frequently
employed in adaptation planning under a spec-
trum of meanings.58,59 These range from the
ability to withstand and recover from current
shocks and stressors while retaining basic
functions under conditions of existing and
near-term variability to the ability to transform
in desirable ways over time as the magnitude of
change increases.60,61,62,63,64,65 Recognizing these
timescales in planning, and communicating
expectations for change along those timelines,

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions

1321 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

can also help communities maximize benefits
in the near term and identify the most import-
ant opportunities for longer-term well-being
and resilience.

Organizations are increasingly exploring
alternative approaches for replacing the
assumption of an unchanging (or stationary)
climate in their risk management activities.
Vulnerability assessments, a common practice
among managers of public lands and natural
areas, often evaluate exposure, sensitivity,
and adaptive capacity, and provide rankings
of the seriousness of various climate risks.
Multi-objective approaches, such as structured
decision-making,66 explicitly include multiple
measures of well-being in risk assessment and
management, often in difficult areas such as
protecting cultural resources.40 Scenarios are
used to 1) assess risks over a range of plausible
futures that include both changes in socioeco-
nomic trends as well as climate and 2) choose
adaptation actions robust over this wide range
of futures.18 California’s 2018 Sea-Level Rise
Guidance includes probabilistic sea level rise
projections and a worst-case scenario, then
integrates both with an adaptive pathways
approach67 that encourages robust and flexible
plans that can adjust over time if seas rise
faster than expected.

Climate risk management requires addressing
socioeconomic (for example, future economic,
technology, and regulatory conditions) as well
as climate uncertainties. Risk management can
address such uncertainties, even when they
are difficult to characterize with confidence
(Ch. 17: Complex Systems, KM 3).42,68,69,70,71 The
water sector is pioneering approaches for

incorporating such information in water utility
adaptation, including scenarios and other
robust decision methods aimed at making
successful decisions insensitive to a wide
range of uncertainty.72 Some agencies are
beginning to combine both multi-objective
and multi-scenario approaches in quantitative
tools that identify vulnerabilities and evaluate
tradeoffs among adaptive pathways, seeking
risk management strategies that perform well
across multiple scenarios and measures of
well-being.73,74,75,76 Implementing such methods
can require a more complete set of system
models than some agencies commonly use in
their planning routines, though such tools are
becoming increasingly available.77

Benefits of Adaptation Can Exceed the Costs
Adaptation can generate significant benefits
in excess of its costs. Nationally, estimates of
adaptation costs range from tens to hundreds
of billions of dollars per year78,79 but are
expected to save several times that over the
long run (Ch. 29: Mitigation).80 The benefits
and costs are larger in scenarios with high
emissions. Formal benefit analysis is still in its
early stages,81,82 and more research is needed to
assess comprehensively the benefits of specific
strategies being considered by individuals and
organizations.83 Nonetheless, experience is
growing. For instance, the U.S. Department of
Housing and Urban Development’s National
Disaster Resilience Competition required
applications to conduct benefit–cost analysis
including qualitative and difficult-to-quantify
co-benefits, such as economic revitalization
and other social benefits.84

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions

1322 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

Key Message 4
Benefits of Proactive Adaptation
Exceed Costs

Proactive adaptation initiatives—
including changes to policies, business
operations, capital investments, and
other steps—yield benefits in excess of
their costs in the near term, as well as
over the long term. Evaluating adaptation
strategies involves consideration of
equity, justice, cultural heritage, the envi-
ronment, health, and national security.

To date, there exists considerable guidance on
actions in some sectors where benefits exceed
costs, though guidance is lacking in many
other sectors.83 Benefit–cost information exists
for adaptation responses to storms and rising
seas in coastal zones, to riverine and extreme
precipitation flooding, and for agriculture
at the farm level.85,86 Some of the actions in
these sectors, at least in some locations,
appear to have large benefit–cost ratios, both
in addressing current variability and in pre-
paring for future change. A benefit–cost ratio
greater than 1 suggests a promising project to
undertake, because the benefits it generates
are greater than its costs. For instance, while
sandbags protecting individual houses can,
in general, have benefit–cost ratios less than
1, in South Florida sandbags can have a ben-
efit–cost ratio of 20 to 1,87 and along the Gulf
of Mexico coastline, 3 to 1.88 Along the Gulf of
Mexico coastline, levees and seawalls can have
benefit–cost ratios ranging from 2.3 to 1.5 to 1
for refineries and petrochemical plants, though
the ratios are lower for other assets.88

Information on the cost of actions that
can achieve common goals is increasing in
the water management sector, such as for
operational reliability and resilience and
environmental protection (Ch. 3: Water) and

for responding to extreme heat events (Ch.
14: Human Health). Loss of water services or
power during a high heat event, for example,
can produce considerable costs that can have
cascading effects on other sectors, thereby
further driving up costs.89 The benefits of these
adaptive actions against these threats have
been studied less because they involve societal
and environmental impacts that have been
more difficult to quantify, study, and describe
systematically.

Some studies quantify large benefits from
adaptation actions involving natural systems,90
such as the decommissioning and restoration
of unused forest roads, which decreases
erosion and improves fish habitat and water
quality; the restoration of beavers to mountain
areas, whereby beaver dams improve fish
habitat and improve water supply during
summer months; and treatment of hazardous
fuel to reduce wildland fire risks (Ch. 6: For-
ests). Some types of storm water management
also show large benefits from green infrastruc-
ture and other nature-based responses.91,92
Coastal marsh restoration can sometimes
provide benefits of protection against rising
sea levels, along with added flood prevention
and enhanced biodiversity. One effort involves
restoring the river and surrounding lands of
the Tidmarsh Wildlife Sanctuary in coastal
Massachusetts, a former cranberry farm. The
project includes cutting-edge environmental
sensors that provide continuous data on marsh
restoration, cranberry farm conversion, and
climate change impacts and adaptation (see
http://www.livingobservatory.org).

Extensive co-benefits may also be available
from adaptation, in particular in the ecosystem
services and health sectors (Ch. 7: Ecosystems;
Ch. 14: Human Health). Coordinated adaptation
and GHG mitigation planning may also provide
defined co-benefits (Ch. 29: Mitigation, KM
4). For instance, tools are available to help

http://www.livingobservatory.org

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions

1323 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

decision-makers locate wind energy systems
away from sensitive ecological sites, without
incurring additional costs (for example, see the
Nature Conservancy’s Biodiversity and Wind
Siting Mapping Tool at https://www.nature.
org/ourinitiatives/regions/northamerica/
unitedstates/newyork/climate-energy/
working-with-wind.xml). Designs that provide
green space and the use of cool and green roof
technologies in cities can reduce heat-island
effects, producing multiple benefits and cost
reductions by helping to reduce emissions and
air pollution, human health risks, and economic
losses due to reduced labor productivity.93,94

Broader Measures of Well-Being
Benefit–cost analysis provides one important,
but not the sole, means to evaluate alternative
adaptation actions. Effective adaptation can
provide a broad range of benefits that can be
difficult to quantify, including improvements in
economic opportunity, human health, equity,
national security, education, social connec-
tivity, and sense of place, while safeguarding
cultural resources and practices and enhancing
general environmental quality. Aggregating
all these benefits into a single monetary value
is not always the best approach,8,95 since in
many cases a lack of data and uncertainty over
climate projections and benefit valuations may
make it impossible to give a uniform treatment
to different types of benefits, thereby implicitly
favoring some over others. More fundamental-
ly, different people may value benefits differ-
ently.96 For instance, climate change can have
significant impacts on equity and ecosystems,
even though individuals can have strongly
divergent views on distributional justice and
the intrinsic value of nature and thus on how
they value such impacts.

Considering various types of outcomes sepa-
rately in risk management processes—termed
multi-objective or multi-criteria analysis
in the relevant literature97—can facilitate

participatory planning processes. This also
enhances the fairness of such processes by
making more explicit the impacts of climate
change on outcomes to different stakehold-
ers, along with the policy tradeoffs among
those outcomes. Pittsburgh’s EcoInnovation
District, in the city’s Uptown and Oakland
neighborhoods, employs bottom-up planning
to improve the environment, support the needs
of existing residents, and expand job growth.
Louisiana’s Comprehensive Master Plan for a
Sustainable Coast has five broad objectives:
reduce economic losses from flooding, pro-
mote sustainable coastal ecosystems, provide
coastal habitats that support commerce and
recreation, sustain the region’s unique cultural
heritage, and contribute to the regional and
national economy by promoting a viable
working coast.56 The plan contains actions
that advance all five objectives, reflecting a
set of tradeoffs broadly acceptable to diverse
communities in the face of hazards, includ-
ing coastal subsidence (sinking land) and
sea level rise.98

Risk management approaches that consider
multiple objectives can include a specific focus
on equity, with important implications on the
content and process of adaptation planning
and action.99 Poor or marginalized populations
often face a higher risk from climate change
because they live in areas with higher expo-
sure, are more sensitive to climate impacts, or
lack adaptive capacity (Ch. 14: Human Health;
Ch. 15: Tribes). Prioritizing adaptation actions
for such populations may prove more equitable
and lead, for instance, to improved infrastruc-
ture in their communities and increased focus
on efforts to promote social cohesion and
community resilience that can improve their
capacity to prepare, respond, and recover
from disasters. Equity considerations can also
lead to the expanded participation of poor or
marginalized populations in adaptation plan-
ning efforts. This can enhance the fairness of

https://www.nature.org/ourinitiatives/regions/northamerica/unitedstates/newyork/climate-energy/working-with-wind.xml

https://www.nature.org/ourinitiatives/regions/northamerica/unitedstates/newyork/climate-energy/working-with-wind.xml

https://www.nature.org/ourinitiatives/regions/northamerica/unitedstates/newyork/climate-energy/working-with-wind.xml

https://www.nature.org/ourinitiatives/regions/northamerica/unitedstates/newyork/climate-energy/working-with-wind.xml

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions

1324 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

the process. Moreover, it can positively affect
choices regarding the appropriate balance
among the resources invested in reducing
climate risk and those put toward other social
goals, such as employment and education, and
inform the most appropriate mix of adaptation
actions in each community.52 Also, at the state
and national level, equity considerations for
climate adaptation can help allocate an appro-
priate distribution of resources for adaptation
among different local communities.

Key Message 5
New Approaches Can Further
Reduce Risk

Integrating climate considerations into
existing organizational and sectoral
policies and practices provides adap-
tation benefits. Further reduction of
the risks from climate change can be
achieved by new approaches that create
conditions for altering regulatory and
policy environments, cultural and com-
munity resources, economic and finan-
cial systems, technology applications,
and ecosystems.

A significant portion of climate risk can
be addressed by mainstreaming; that is,
integrating climate adaptation into existing
organizational and sectoral investments, pol-
icies, and practices. Mainstreaming can make
adaptation more likely to succeed because it
augments already familiar processes with new
information and tools, rather than requiring
extensive new structures.100,101,102 Mainstreaming
can also encourage risk management actions
that synergistically and coherently address
adaptation along with other societal objectives.
Mainstreaming can also prompt innovation
in existing organizational structures103,104 by
improving their treatment of all types of uncer-
tainty. However, mainstreaming can diminish

the visibility of climate adaptation relative to
dedicated, stand-alone adaptation approach-
es105 and may prove insufficient to address the
full range of climate risk, in particular the risks
associated with higher GHG concentrations.

Integrating climate adaptation into existing
risk management processes requires including
climate risks with the other risks an organiza-
tion regularly assesses and manages; explicitly
linking actions that address current climate
variability with those needed to address larger,
future changes; and linking policies across
sectors (for example, energy and water) and
jurisdictions. Much adaptation action occurs at
the local level, so such linking can be horizontal
(that is, among agencies within the same
local jurisdiction) and vertical (that is, among
different levels of local, state, tribal, and federal
governments).104

Existing Mainstreaming
Mainstreaming climate adaptation into existing
decision processes has begun in many areas,
in particular those with well-developed risk
management processes such as financial
risk reporting, capital investment planning,
engineering standards, military planning, and
disaster risk management.

A growing number of jurisdictions address
climate risk in their land-use, hazard mitiga-
tion, capital improvement, and transportation
plans. In 2015, FEMA began requiring states to
include the projected effects of climate change
in their state hazard mitigation plans.106 A small
number of cities explicitly link their coastal
plans and their hazard mitigation plans using
a common, climate-informed vulnerability
analysis to support both types of plans, thereby
ensuring that the different city agencies are
implementing risk reduction measures—such
as land-use measures (reducing exposure),
building codes (reducing sensitivity), and
warning, evacuation, and recovery measures

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions

1325 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

(increasing adaptive capacity)—that are syner-
gistic and coordinated.107 The City of Baltimore
used climate-informed estimates of increased
current and future storm intensity to design
its storm water master plan, which includes
green space and bio-swales that capture
runoff, to improve water quality and reduce
flood risk. California requires its water agen-
cies to address climate change in their water
management plans. Through the Department
of Energy (DOE) Partnership for Energy Sector
Climate Resilience, electric utilities across the
country are collaborating with DOE to develop
resilience planning guidance, conduct climate
change vulnerability assessments, and develop
and implement cost-effective resilience solu-
tions (Ch. 4: Energy). The National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), FEMA,
and the U.S. Geological Survey are partnering
with states to develop guidelines for integrated
climate adaptation, land use, and hazard
mitigation planning. Federal agencies have also
begun implementing climate-smart manage-
ment approaches for managing their natural
resources (Ch. 7: Ecosystems, KM 2).

Private financial markets are increasingly pay-
ing attention to climate risk, for instance, by
incorporating such risk accounting into their
portfolios. In some cases, financial firms and
companies perform climate risk accounting as
part of a voluntary or mandatory disclosure
system. In a recent report to the G20 (Group
of Twenty), the Financial Stability Board’s Task
Force on Climate-Related Financial Disclosures
provided a comprehensive framework for
such disclosure and recommended that since
“climate-related risks are material risks,” they
should be disclosed in mainstream (public)
financial filings.108,109 Ratings agencies have also
begun to incorporate physical climate risk into
credit ratings for corporations, infrastructure
bonds, and other public-sector projects. Both
Moody’s and Standard and Poor’s acknowledge

emerging risks associated with climate
change110,111 and now embed these risks into
their credit ratings.112 In particularly vulnerable
areas, such as South Florida, bond ratings are
now beginning to reflect such risks.

The engineering community has begun
incorporating climate resilience into its design
standards by incorporating information
about current and future climate threats and
impacts113 and updating existing engineering
standards, codes, regulations, and practic-
es—currently based on stationary climate
assumptions.114 The American Society of Civil
Engineers (ASCE) recommends that engineers
incorporate climate uncertainty, assess the
costs of reducing risks, and follow an adaptive
management process. Such a process would
begin with low-regret strategies that perform
well across a range of futures and periodically
update as new information becomes available.113
The ASCE and the States of California and
New York have formed committees to develop
such standards.115

Other sectors of government and industry are
also starting to consider climate risk a major
systemic risk. In its 2018 Global Risks Report,
the World Economic Forum listed the top five
environmental risks—including extreme weath-
er events and temperatures and failures of
climate change mitigation and adaptation—in
terms of both likelihood and the impact on the
global economy.116 The U.S. military now rou-
tinely integrates climate risks into its analysis,
plans, and programs,117 with particular attention
paid to climate effects on force readiness,
military bases, and training ranges (Ch. 16:
International, KM 3).118,119 Naval Station Norfolk,
for example, has replaced existing piers with
double-decker piers that are elevated by sev-
eral more feet and thus more resilient to rising
sea levels and extreme weather events (Ch. 1:
Overview, Figure 1.8).

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions

1326 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

Overcoming Up-Front Challenges
While yielding benefits, adaptation also
presents challenges. These include difficulties
obtaining the necessary funds; insufficient
information and relevant expertise; jurisdic-
tional mismatches among those responsible
for taking adaptation actions and those who
benefit from those actions; conflicting inter-
ests among relevant parties; and the pressures
on agencies and professionals that serve
the public to act cautiously, in particular by
seeking to follow long-established procedures
and experience.

Insufficient funding often hinders adaptation
(Ch. 8: Coastal; Ch. 15: Tribes).120,121,122 At the local
level, adaptation planning and assessment have
been supported by a mix of local government
funds and federal, state, and foundation
grants.121 Full-scale implementation of the pro-
posals resulting from these adaptation plan-
ning and assessment activities would require
significantly more resources. In principle, the
potential for longer-term savings can be used
to generate near-term financing for adaptation
efforts. But the mechanisms for doing so are
not yet widely in place. Underwriters of munic-
ipal bonds, the most common means of financ-
ing water infrastructure in the United States,
are just beginning to incorporate requirements
for long-term sustainability under a changing
climate as a condition for going to market.112

To the extent that climate resilience becomes
an expected and required attribute of decisions
concerning infrastructure and other long-term
investments, as well as an expected part of asset
management and life-cycle cost estimates,
financing should become more available for
cost-effective adaptation actions.123 Changing
social and economic norms could also affect the
availability of financing. Once the implications
become widely understood, public expectations,
professional standards, and due diligence on
the part of financers may similarly discourage

investing in long-lived infrastructure designed
for stationary conditions, as opposed to currently
changing and future climate conditions.124

Adaptation often increases up-front costs, thus
increasing the salience of steps to reduce those
costs. Federal, state, and local governments in the
United States spend over $400 billion annually
on public infrastructure.125 Estimates of annual
adaptation costs range from tens to hundreds
of billions of dollars annually.78 Taking advantage
of new infrastructure investments and capital
stock turnover provides one particularly favorable
opportunity for low-cost, proactive adaptation
in both the public and private sectors.2 Many
jurisdictions and businesses possess significant
stocks of deteriorating transportation, water,
energy, housing, and other infrastructure, which
often already lack resilience to current climate
and weather events (Ch. 3: Water; Ch. 4: Energy;
Ch. 12: Transportation).3,126,127 The expected turn-
over of this capital stock creates opportunities
for adaptation but also raises challenges, such as
equity concerns, if, for example, upgrading the
resilience of housing stock makes it unaffordable
for lower-income residents.

Flexible design and adaptive planning can also
reduce near-term adaptation costs while keep-
ing options open for future resilience.128 Such
options begin with low-regret options, invest in
capacity building, and adjust over time to new
information. The Fort Pulaski example cited
previously included a new coastal protection
structure with an adaptive design that can be
inexpensively adjusted as the future risk grows
larger. The Metropolitan Water District of
Southern California uses adaptive management
to organize its 25-year Integrated Resource Plan;
factored into its near-term investments in local
supplies is the expectation that some investments
will be expanded and others reduced as climate,
demand, regulatory, and other conditions change
in the future.129 However, explicitly signaling that
policies will change in the future may impede

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions

1327 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

enforcement, make decision-makers seem inde-
cisive, and make it easier for them to succumb to
political pressure from special interests.130

Catalysts for Adaptation
Catalytic events, external incentives, community
interest, leadership, and outside funding all help
spur adaptation planning and implementation.
Catalytic events, including disasters caused by
extreme storms or droughts, often precipitate
or accelerate adaptation action,131,132 as happened
with Superstorm Sandy in 2012, Hurricane Katrina
in 2005, and the 2011–2016 drought in California
(see, for example, Ch. 25: Southwest).

Internal drivers of adaptation include political
leadership and policy entrepreneurs.103 In
addition, a recognition of the challenges posed
by climate change and an ability to integrate
the problem and potential solutions into
existing belief and value structures also provide
important catalysts for adaptation.

External incentives include the legal require-
ments, engineering standards, climate-related
financial risk disclosure requirements, and chang-
es in insurance coverage. For instance, some
existing laws and regulations provide catalysts
for adaptation,133 typically through procedural
planning requirements rather than substantive
mandates. At the state and local levels, some
laws specifically require the consideration of
climate change impacts and adaptation options in
planning processes, but these cover only a small
subset of jurisdictions and geographic areas in
the United States.134,135,136 At the federal level, few
laws explicitly promote adaptation, but many can
be interpreted as requiring the consideration of
climate change impacts on the ability of a federal
agency to comply with various statutory and
regulatory mandates.23,137

Once begun, successful adaptation often
entails sustained networks, financing, the
sharing of best practices, and champions, as
shown in Box 28.3.

Box 28.3: Common Attributes of Effective Adaptation

Factors that shape or contribute to the successful adoption and implementation of adaptation by public-sector
organizations include

• plans written by a professional staff and approved by elected officials;

• community engagement, including the participatory development of plans; the formation of action teams or
regional collaborations138 across jurisdictions, sectors, and scales; and public- and private-sector leaders who
champion and support the process;

• adaptation actions that address multiple community goals, not just climate change;

• well-structured implementation, including the identification of parties responsible for each step, explicit
timelines, explicit and measurable goals, and explicit provisions and timelines for monitoring and updat-
ing the plan; and

• adequate funding for the adaptation actions and for sustained community outreach and deliberation.

(Adapted from Brody and Highfield 2005, Berke et al. 2012, Horney et al. 2012, IPCC 2012, NRC 2009, Cutter
et. al. 2012, GAO 2016, Wilhite and Pulwarty 2017, Bassett and Shandas 2010, Berke and Lyles 2013, Lyle and
Stevens 2014, Hughes 2015, Highfield and Brody 2012, Mimura et al. 201447,60,70,139,140,141,142,143,144,145,146,147,148,149.)

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions

1328 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

Formal and informal networks of government,
nongovernmental organizations, and aca-
demic, faith-based, and private-sector parties
engaged in developing and implementing
adaptation are expanding. These networks
support individuals, communities, and organi-
zations as they strive to understand and reduce
current and future climate risks. Federal, state,
and local agencies; nongovernmental organi-
zations; utilities and industry associations; and
private-sector consultants have in recent years
developed a wide range of written guidance
and online platforms intended to support cli-
mate adaptation planning and mainstreaming
efforts. While not exhaustive, the list includes
the 100 Resilient Cities, the C40 Cities Climate
Leadership Group, the Urban Sustainability
Directors Network (USDN), and the Water
Utility Climate Alliance.

Over the past several years, examples of
sustained collaborative partnerships between
research and management in support of
climate risk management have included NOAA’s
Regional Integrated Sciences and Assessments
(RISA), the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s
(USDA) Climate Hubs, and the Department of
the Interior’s (DOI) Climate Adaptation Science
Centers (CASCs). These regional climate infor-
mation networks provide data, tools, forecasts,
interpretation, and extension services for
agencies and communities to build into inte-
grated services and work together to coordi-
nate stakeholder engagement across multiple
sectors as new knowledge emerges.150,151 Some
examples include knowledge platforms, such as
the Climate Adaptation Knowledge Exchange
(www.cakex.org), the Georgetown Climate
Center’s Adaptation Clearinghouse (http://
www.adaptationclearinghouse.org/), and the
U.S. Climate Resilience Toolkit website (toolkit.
climate.gov); these platforms include direc-
tories of practitioners and inventories of data
tools for managing natural and built systems in
the face of climate change.

More local, targeted resources, such as Louisi-
ana’s Coastal Protection Restoration Authority
Master Plan Data Viewer (http://cims.coastal.
la.gov/masterplan/), offer detailed information
about climate risks and probabilities in specific
geographic locations to help planners and
communities better anticipate and prepare for
climate impacts. Such initiatives and networks
enable practitioners to share best practices
and evaluate and inform adaptation imple-
mentation while empowering communities to
advance preparedness and resilience efforts
across the United States.

Beyond Incremental Change
Integrating climate risk into existing practices
can lead to change that is more than incre-
mental. For instance, it often proves profitable
in the near term to build in low-lying areas
subject to future extreme flooding152 rather
than in areas with lower future risk. Updated
flood maps and risk-adjusted insurance rates
would likely lead to different patterns of devel-
opment.153 In many cases, however, addressing
the full range of future climate change requires
substantial changes in organizational practices
and procedures, in public- and private-sector
institutions, in individual and societal expec-
tations and norms, in capital investment
planning, and in laws.154,155 Decision-makers
may wish to take active steps to anticipate and
steer change in desired directions and to avoid
the unanticipated consequences of ad hoc or
crisis-based responses. In some cases, this
involves seeking, legitimizing, and accelerating
large changes, rather than attempting to retain
today’s conditions as long as possible.10,156,157

Reducing climate risk often requires managing
interdependent systems in ways that transcend
current jurisdictional and sectoral boundaries
(Ch. 4: Energy; Ch. 17: Complex Systems, KM 3).
Water, electric power supply, and agriculture
often depend critically on one another (see Ch.
17: Complex Systems, KM 1) but are not treated

http://www.cakex.org/

http://www.adaptationclearinghouse.org/

http://www.adaptationclearinghouse.org/

https://toolkit.climate.gov/

https://toolkit.climate.gov/

http://cims.coastal.la.gov/masterplan/

http://cims.coastal.la.gov/masterplan/

http://cims.coastal.la.gov/masterplan/

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions

1329 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

similarly for potential adaptation actions.
Effective climate risk management often
requires closer coordination among regulatory
agencies and, in some cases, may necessitate
some restructuring. For instance, the City of
Los Angeles’s One Water LA program requires
multiple city agencies to coordinate on
integrated management of the city’s water,
land-use, and flood control actions.158 Major
reforms can prove difficult and often occur
only in response to major system shocks, such
as reforms to the Stafford Act after Hurricane
Katrina159,160,161 or the consolidation of many
local water agencies in Australia into a small
number of large, regional organizations during
a decade of severe drought.162

Some sectors are already taking actions
that go beyond integrating climate risk into
current practices. Faced with substantial
climate-induced future changes, including new
invasive species and shifting ranges, ecosystem
managers have already begun to adopt novel
approaches, such as assisted migration and
wildlife corridors (Ch. 7: Ecosystems, KM 2),
and to rethink the goals of conservation man-
agement.163 Many millions of Americans live in
coastal areas threatened by sea level rise; in all
but the very lowest sea level rise projections,
retreat will become an unavoidable option in
some areas of the U.S. coastline (Ch. 8: Coastal,
KM 1). The Federal Government has already
provided resources for the relocation of some
communities, such as the Biloxi-Chitimacha-
Choctaw tribe from Isle de Jean Charles in
Louisiana. But the potential need for millions of
people and billions of dollars of coastal infra-
structure to be relocated in the future creates
challenging legal, financial, and equity issues
that have not yet been addressed.

The ability of adaptation to reduce severe
climate impacts like these will ultimately
depend less on scientific uncertainties and
the ability to implement engineering solutions
than on perceived loss of culture and identity,
in particular identities associated with unique
cultural heritage sites and a sense of place (Ch.
8: Coastal; Ch. 15: Tribes, KM 2).68 Because dif-
ferent regions and groups face different levels
of risk and have differing abilities to respond,
considerations of equity and justice influence
judgments about any limits to adaptation.52,68

Acknowledgments
Technical Contributors
Lauren Kendrick
RAND Corporation

Pat Mulroy
Brookings Institution

Costa Samaras
Carnegie Mellon University

Bruce Stein
National Wildlife Federation

Tom Watson
The Center for Climate and Security

Jessica Wentz
Columbia University

USGCRP Coordinators
Sarah Zerbonne
Adaptation and Decision Science Coordinator

Fredric Lipschultz
Senior Scientist and Regional Coordinator

Opening Image Credit
Kivalina, Alaska: © ShoreZone (CC BY 3.0). Adaptation:
cropped top and bottom to conform to the size needed
for publication.

https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/legalcode

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions – Traceable Accounts

1330 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

Traceable Accounts
Process Description
The scope for this chapter was determined by the Fourth National Climate Assessment (NCA4)
Federal Steering Committee, which is made up of representatives from the U.S. Global Change
Research Program member agencies. The scope was also informed by research needs identified
in the Third National Climate Assessment (NCA3). Authors for this NCA4 chapter were selected to
represent a range of public- and private-sector perspectives and experiences relevant to adapta-
tion planning and implementation.

This chapter was developed through technical discussions of relevant evidence and expert delib-
eration by chapter authors during teleconferences, e-mail exchanges, and a day-long in-person
meeting. These discussions were informed by a comprehensive literature review of the evidence
base for the current state of adaptation in the United States. The author team obtained input from
outside experts in several important areas to supplement its expertise.

Key Message 1
Adaptation Implementation Is Increasing

Adaptation planning and implementation activities are occurring across the United States
in the public, private, and nonprofit sectors. Since the Third National Climate Assessment,
implementation has increased but is not yet commonplace. (High Confidence)

Description of evidence base
There exists extensive documentation in the gray literature of specific adaptation planning and
implementation activities underway by local, state, regional, and federal agencies and jurisdictions.
The literature also contains reports that attempt to provide an overview of these activities, such
as the recent set of case studies in Vogel et. al. (2017).14 Websites, such as those of the Georgetown
Climate Center (http://www.georgetownclimate.org), provide summaries and examples of adap-
tation activities in the United States. The sectoral and regional chapters in this National Climate
Assessment also provide numerous examples of adaptation planning and implementation activ-
ities. The literature also offers work that aims to provide surveys of large numbers of adaptation
activity, such as Moser et. al. (2018)121 and Stults and Woodruff (2016).164

Major uncertainties
While the amount of adaptation-related activity is clearly increasing, the lack of clear standards
and the diverse lexicon used in different sectors make it difficult to systematically compare dif-
ferent adaptation activities at the level of outcomes across sectors and regions of the country. In
addition, publicly available adaptation plans may never actually result in implementation. It is thus
difficult to provide a quantitative assessment of the increase in adaptation activity other than just
counting plans and initiatives. Given the reliance on small-sample surveys, judgments about the
distribution of adaptation actions across categories have potentially large errors that are difficult
to estimate. In addition, it is difficult to assess the contribution of these activities to concrete
outcomes such as risk reduction or current and future improvements to well-being, security, and
environmental protection.130 There also exists little gap analysis that compares any given set of

http://www.georgetownclimate.org

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions – Traceable Accounts

1331 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

adaptation activities with what might be appropriate according to some normative standard or
what might be reasonably achieved. Thus, while adaptation activities are clearly increasing in the
United States, scant evidence exists for judging their consequences.

Description of confidence and likelihood
There is high confidence that the amount of adaptation activity, in particular implementation
activity, is increasing. There is less agreement and evidence regarding the consequences of
this activity.

Key Message 2
Climate Change Outpaces Adaptation Planning

Successful adaptation has been hindered by the assumption that climate conditions are and
will be similar to those in the past. Incorporating information on current and future climate
conditions into design guidelines, standards, policies, and practices would reduce risk and
adverse impacts. (High Confidence)

Description of evidence base
The assumption that the historical record of events and variability will be the same in the future
is called the stationarity assumption27 and has guided planning for climate and weather events in
most places for most of recorded history. The evidence is strong that the stationarity assumption
is no longer valid for all impacts and variability in all locations, because climate change is altering
both the events and their variability.3,4,28,165 Regional chapters in this assessment establish the
climate variables for which, and the extent to which, non-stationarity has been confirmed around
the United States. These chapters also provide extensive documentation of cases in which failure
to adapt to current and future climate conditions can cause significant adverse impacts.

Major uncertainties
While significant uncertainties can exist in estimating the extent to which current variability
differs from historic observations in any particular location, there is robust evidence that such
differences do occur in many locations (see Ch. 18: Northeast; Ch. 19: Southeast; Ch. 20: U.S. Carib-
bean; Ch. 21: Midwest; Ch. 22: N. Great Plains; Ch. 23: S. Great Plains; Ch. 24: Northwest; Ch. 25:
Southwest; Ch. 26: Alaska; and Ch. 27: Hawai‘i & Pacific Islands).5,6,28,166 However, the development
and use of analytic tools, decision-making processes, and application mechanisms built on the
assumption of non-stationarity lag significantly behind the growing realization that stationarity
is no longer a sound basis for long-range planning.167 Nonetheless, new techniques are being
applied.10,72,168 For example, scenario planning can provide alternative actions that can be carried
out if different impacts occur.70,71

Description of confidence and likelihood
There is high confidence that most organizations’ planning is currently based on extensions from
the record of local climate conditions.169

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions – Traceable Accounts

1332 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

Key Message 3
Adaptation Entails Iterative Risk Management

Adaptation entails a continuing risk management process; it does not have an end point. With
this approach, individuals and organizations of all types assess risks and vulnerabilities from
climate and other drivers of change (such as economic, environmental, and societal), take
actions to reduce those risks, and learn over time. (High Confidence)

Description of evidence base
Evidence from a large body of literature and observations of experience support the judgment that
iterative risk management is a useful framework (e.g., National Research Council 2009, America’s
Climate Choices 2010, Kunreuther et al. 2012142,170,171). The literature also suggests its conceptual
similarity with other methods that use different names.

Major uncertainties
The literature and practice of climate change are undergoing a process of maturation and conver-
gence. The process began with many organizations and sectors developing their own approaches
and terminology in response to climate risks, meaning that a wide variety of approaches still exist
in the field. We believe that the field will progress and converge on the most effective approaches,
including iterative risk management. But this convergence is still in process, and the outcome
remains uncertain.

Description of confidence and likelihood
Significant agreement and strong evidence provide high confidence that adaptation is a form of
iterative risk management and that this is an appropriate framework for understanding, address-
ing, and communicating climate-related risks.33

Key Message 4
Benefits of Proactive Adaptation Exceed Costs

Proactive adaptation initiatives—including changes to policies, business operations, capital
investments, and other steps—yield benefits in excess of their costs in the near term, as well as
over the long term (medium confidence). Evaluating adaptation strategies involves consideration
of equity, justice, cultural heritage, the environment, health, and national security (high
confidence).

Description of evidence base
Both limited field applications and literature reviews highlight adaptation co-benefits, including
those associated with equity considerations.83 Near-term benefits are assessed from observations
of adaptation results, as well as from comparisons to similar situations without such responses;
longer-term benefits are generally assessed from projections.

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions – Traceable Accounts

1333 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

Major uncertainties
Benefits are based on understanding the relevant systems so that one can compare similar cases
and construct counterfactuals. Such understanding is excellent for many engineered systems (for
example, how a storm drain performs under various rainfall scenarios) but is less robust for many
biological systems. Benefit–cost ratios can have large uncertainties associated with estimates
of costs, the projection of benefits, and the economic valuation of benefits. In addition, because
expected differences in benefit–cost ratios are sufficiently large and the number of current exam-
ples is sufficiently low, there are large uncertainties in applying results from one case to another.

Description of confidence and likelihood
There is suggestive evidence that provides medium confidence that many proactive adaptation
actions offer significant benefits that exceed their costs. However, because of a small sample size
and insufficient evaluation, it is in general hard to know the extent to which this is true in any
particular case. There is strong agreement that evaluating adaptation involves consideration of a
wide range of measures of social well-being.

Key Message 5
New Approaches Can Further Reduce Risk

Integrating climate considerations into existing organizational and sectoral policies and
practices provides adaptation benefits. Further reduction of the risks from climate change
can be achieved by new approaches that create conditions for altering regulatory and policy
environments, cultural and community resources, economic and financial systems, technology
applications, and ecosystems. (High Confidence)

Description of evidence base
There is significant agreement, but only case study evidence, that effective adaptation can be
realized by mainstreaming.100,101,102 Significant evidence exists regarding the scale of longer-term
adaptation required in some climate futures based on modeling studies. Significant agreement, but
less direct evidence, exists on the scale of organizational and other changes needed to implement
these adaptation actions.

Major uncertainties
It is not well understood how community acceptance of needed adaptations develops. This
presents both a barrier to the implementation of adaptation measures and an opportunity for
additional research into ways to close this gap in understanding. Additionally, a need exists to
clarify the co-benefits of addressing multiple threats and opportunities. Effective adaptation also
depends on networks of collaboration among researchers and practitioners and the long-term
support of monitoring networks. The sustainability of both types of networks is a major uncertain-
ty. Their effectiveness is both an uncertainty and major research need.

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions – Traceable Accounts

1334 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

Description of confidence and likelihood
There is significant agreement that provides high confidence, in at least some cases, that both 1)
mainstreaming climate information into existing risk management and 2) creating enabling envi-
ronments and institutions to improve adaptation capacity, implementation, and evaluation reduce
risk, produce co-benefits across communities and sectors, and help secure economic investments
into the future.

1335 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions – References

References
1. National Research Council, 2010: Adapting to the

Impacts of Climate Change. The National Academies
Press, Washington, DC, 292 pp. http://dx.doi.
org/10.17226/12783

2. Gordon, K. and the Risky Business Project, 2014: The
Economic Risks of Climate Change in the United States :
A Climate Risk Assessment for the United States.
Risky Business Project, New York, 51 pp. https://
riskybusiness.org/site/assets/uploads/2015/09/
RiskyBusiness_Report_WEB_09_08_14

3. Wuebbles, D.J., D.R. Easterling, K. Hayhoe, T. Knutson,
R.E. Kopp, J.P. Kossin, K.E. Kunkel, A.N. LeGrande,
C. Mears, W.V. Sweet, P.C. Taylor, R.S. Vose, and
M.F. Wehner, 2017: Our globally changing climate.
Climate Science Special Report: Fourth National
Climate Assessment, Volume I. Wuebbles, D.J., D.W.
Fahey, K.A. Hibbard, D.J. Dokken, B.C. Stewart, and
T.K. Maycock, Eds. U.S. Global Change Research
Program, Washington, DC, USA, 35-72. http://dx.doi.
org/10.7930/J08S4N35

4. Hayhoe, K., J. Edmonds, R.E. Kopp, A.N. LeGrande,
B.M. Sanderson, M.F. Wehner, and D.J. Wuebbles,
2017: Climate models, scenarios, and projections.
Climate Science Special Report: Fourth National
Climate Assessment, Volume I. Wuebbles, D.J., D.W.
Fahey, K.A. Hibbard, D.J. Dokken, B.C. Stewart, and
T.K. Maycock, Eds. U.S. Global Change Research
Program, Washington, DC, USA, 133-160. http://
dx.doi.org/10.7930/J0WH2N54

5. Vose, R.S., D.R. Easterling, K.E. Kunkel, A.N. LeGrande,
and M.F. Wehner, 2017: Temperature changes in the
United States. Climate Science Special Report: Fourth
National Climate Assessment, Volume I. Wuebbles,
D.J., D.W. Fahey, K.A. Hibbard, D.J. Dokken, B.C.
Stewart, and T.K. Maycock, Eds. U.S. Global Change
Research Program, Washington, DC, USA, 185-206.
http://dx.doi.org/10.7930/J0N29V45

6. Easterling, D.R., K.E. Kunkel, J.R. Arnold, T. Knutson,
A.N. LeGrande, L.R. Leung, R.S. Vose, D.E. Waliser,
and M.F. Wehner, 2017: Precipitation change in the
United States. Climate Science Special Report: Fourth
National Climate Assessment, Volume I. Wuebbles,
D.J., D.W. Fahey, K.A. Hibbard, D.J. Dokken, B.C.
Stewart, and T.K. Maycock, Eds. U.S. Global Change
Research Program, Washington, DC, USA, 207-230.
http://dx.doi.org/10.7930/J0H993CC

7. IPCC, 2014: Climate Change 2014: Synthesis Report.
Contribution of Working Groups I, II and III to the
Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change. Core Writing Team, R.K.
Pachauri, and L.A. Meyer, Eds., Geneva, Switzerland,
151 pp. https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar5/syr/

8. EPA, 2017: Multi-model Framework for Quantitative
Sectoral Impacts Analysis: A Technical Report
for the Fourth National Climate Assessment. EPA
430‐R‐17‐001. U.S. Environmental Protection
Agency (EPA), Washington, DC, 271 pp. https://
c f p u b . e p a . g o v/s i/s i _ p u b l i c _ r e c o r d _ R e p o r t .
cfm?dirEntryId=335095

9. IPCC, 2013: Climate Change 2013: The Physical Science
Basis. Contribution of Working Group I to the Fifth
Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on
Climate Change. Stocker, T.F., D. Qin, G.-K. Plattner,
M. Tignor, S.K. Allen, J. Boschung, A. Nauels, Y. Xia,
V. Bex, and P.M. Midgley, Eds. Cambridge University
Press, Cambridge, UK and New York, NY, 1535 pp.
http://www.climatechange2013.org/report/

10. Stein, B., P. Glick, N. Edelson, and A. Staudt, 2014:
Climate-Smart Conservation: Putting Adaptation
Principles into Practice. National Wildlife Foundation,
Washington, DC, 262 pp. https://www.nwf.org/
climatesmartguide

11. Jones, H.P., D.G. Hole, and E.S. Zavaleta, 2012:
Harnessing nature to help people adapt to climate
change. Nature Climate Change, 2 (7), 504-509.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nclimate1463

12. Chen, G., M.H. Azkab, G.L. Chmura, S. Chen, P.
Sastrosuwondo, Z. Ma, I.W.E. Dharmawan, X.
Yin, and B. Chen, 2017: Mangroves as a major
source of soil carbon storage in adjacent seagrass
meadows. Scientific Reports, 7, 42406. http://dx.doi.
org/10.1038/srep42406

13. Hardy, D., H. Lazrus, M. Mendez, B. Orlove, I. Rivera-
Collazo, J.T. Roberts, M. Rockman, K. Thomas, B.P.
Warner, and R. Winthrop, 2018: Social Vulnerability:
Social Science Perspectives on Climate Change,
Part 1. USGCRP, Washington, DC, 38 pp. https://
www.globalchange.gov/content/social-science-
perspectives-climate-change-workshop

http://dx.doi.org/10.17226/12783

http://dx.doi.org/10.17226/12783

https://riskybusiness.org/site/assets/uploads/2015/09/RiskyBusiness_Report_WEB_09_08_14

https://riskybusiness.org/site/assets/uploads/2015/09/RiskyBusiness_Report_WEB_09_08_14

https://riskybusiness.org/site/assets/uploads/2015/09/RiskyBusiness_Report_WEB_09_08_14

http://dx.doi.org/10.7930/J08S4N35

http://dx.doi.org/10.7930/J08S4N35

http://dx.doi.org/10.7930/J0WH2N54

http://dx.doi.org/10.7930/J0WH2N54

http://dx.doi.org/10.7930/J0N29V45

http://dx.doi.org/10.7930/J0H993CC

https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar5/syr/

https://cfpub.epa.gov/si/si_public_record_Report.cfm?dirEntryId=335095

https://cfpub.epa.gov/si/si_public_record_Report.cfm?dirEntryId=335095

https://cfpub.epa.gov/si/si_public_record_Report.cfm?dirEntryId=335095

http://www.climatechange2013.org/report/

https://www.nwf.org/climatesmartguide

https://www.nwf.org/climatesmartguide

http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nclimate1463

http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/srep42406

http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/srep42406

https://www.globalchange.gov/content/social-science-perspectives-climate-change-workshop

https://www.globalchange.gov/content/social-science-perspectives-climate-change-workshop

https://www.globalchange.gov/content/social-science-perspectives-climate-change-workshop

1336 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions – References

14. Vogel, J., K.M. Carney, J.B. Smith, C. Herrick, M.
Stults, M. O’Grady, A.S. Juliana, H. Hosterman, and
L. Giangola, 2016: Climate Adaptation—The State of
Practice in U.S. Communities. Kresge Foundation,
Detroit. http://kresge.org/sites/default/files/
library/climate-adaptation-the-state-of-practice-
in-us-communities-full-report

15. Biesbroek, G.R., R.J. Swart, T.R. Carter, C. Cowan,
T. Henrichs, H. Mela, M.D. Morecroft, and D. Rey,
2010: Europe adapts to climate change: Comparing
national adaptation strategies. Global Environmental
Change, 20 (3), 440-450. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.
gloenvcha.2010.03.005

16. Preston, B.L., R.M. Westaway, and E.J. Yuen, 2011:
Climate adaptation planning in practice: An evaluation
of adaptation plans from three developed nations.
Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global
Change, 16 (4), 407-438. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/
s11027-010-9270-x

17. Hinkel, J., S. Bharwani, A. Bisaro, T. Carter, T. Cull,
M. Davis, R. Klein, K. Lonsdale, L. Rosentrater, and
K. Vincent, 2013: PROVIA Guidance on Assessing
Vulnerability, Impacts and Adaptation to Climate
Change. Klein, R., Ed. United Nations Environment
Programme, PROVIA Secretariat, Nairobi, Kenya, 16
pp. http://www.adaptation-undp.org/sites/default/
files/provia-guidance-nov2013-summary

18. Melillo, J.M., T.C. Richmond, and G.W. Yohe, Eds.,
2014: Climate Change Impacts in the United States:
The Third National Climate Assessment. U.S. Global
Change Research Program, Washington, DC, 841 pp.
http://dx.doi.org/10.7930/J0Z31WJ2

19. Cal EMA and CNRA, 2012: California Adaptation
Planning Guide. California Emergency Management
Agency (Cal EMA) and California Natural Resources
Agency (CNRA), Mather and Sacramento, CA, 48 pp.
http://resources.ca.gov/docs/climate/01APG_
Planning_for_Adaptive_Communities

20. Halofsky, J.E., D.L. Peterson, and K.W. Marcinkowski,
2015: Climate Change Adaptation in United States
Federal Natural Resource Science and Management
Agencies: A Synthesis. U.S. Global Change Research
Program, Washington, DC, 80 pp. http://www.
g l o b a l c h a n g e . g o v/s i t e s/g l o b a l c h a n g e/ f i l e s/
ASIWG_Synthesis_4.28.15_final

21. Leggett, J.A., 2015: Climate Change Adaptation by
Federal Agencies: An Analysis of Plans and Issues
for Congress. CRS Report. R43915 Congressional
Research Service, Washington, DC, 99 pp. https://
fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R43915

22. Ray, A.D. and J. Grannis, 2015: From planning to action:
Implementation of state climate change adaptation
plans. Michigan Journal of Sustainability, 3, 5-28.
http://dx.doi.org/10.3998/mjs.12333712.0003.001

23. Wentz, J., 2017: Planning for the effects of climate
change on natural resources. Environmental
Law Reporter, 47 (3), 10,220-10,244. http://
columbiaclimatelaw.com/files/2017/03/Wentz-
2017-03-Planning-for-the-Effects-of-Climate-
Change-on-Natural-Resources

24. Woodruff, S.C. and M. Stults, 2016: Numerous
strategies but limited implementation guidance in
US local adaptation plans. Nature Climate Change, 6
(8), 796-802. http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nclimate3012

25. Keohane, R.O. and D.G. Victor, 2011: The regime
complex for climate change. Perspectives on
Politics, 9 (1), 7-23. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/
S1537592710004068

26. City of Chicago, 2018: Flood Preparedness [web
site]. Office of Emergency Management and
Communications. https://www.cityofchicago.org/
city/en/depts/oem/supp_info/alertready/flood-
preparedness.html

27. Milly, P.C.D., J. Betancourt, M. Falkenmark, R.M.
Hirsch, Z.W. Kundzewicz, D.P. Lettenmaier, and R.J.
Stouffer, 2008: Stationarity is dead: Whither water
management? Science, 319 (5863 ), 573-574. http://
dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.1151915

28. Knutson, T., J.P. Kossin, C. Mears, J. Perlwitz, and M.F.
Wehner, 2017: Detection and attribution of climate
change. Climate Science Special Report: Fourth
National Climate Assessment, Volume I. Wuebbles,
D.J., D.W. Fahey, K.A. Hibbard, D.J. Dokken, B.C.
Stewart, and T.K. Maycock, Eds. U.S. Global Change
Research Program, Washington, DC, USA, 114-132.
http://dx.doi.org/10.7930/J01834ND

29. Sweet, W.V., R. Horton, R.E. Kopp, A.N. LeGrande,
and A. Romanou, 2017: Sea level rise. Climate Science
Special Report: Fourth National Climate Assessment,
Volume I. Wuebbles, D.J., D.W. Fahey, K.A. Hibbard,
D.J. Dokken, B.C. Stewart, and T.K. Maycock, Eds. U.S.
Global Change Research Program, Washington, DC,
USA, 333-363. http://dx.doi.org/10.7930/J0VM49F2

http://kresge.org/sites/default/files/library/climate-adaptation-the-state-of-practice-in-us-communities-full-report

http://kresge.org/sites/default/files/library/climate-adaptation-the-state-of-practice-in-us-communities-full-report

http://kresge.org/sites/default/files/library/climate-adaptation-the-state-of-practice-in-us-communities-full-report

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2010.03.005

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2010.03.005

http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11027-010-9270-x

http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11027-010-9270-x

http://www.adaptation-undp.org/sites/default/files/provia-guidance-nov2013-summary

http://www.adaptation-undp.org/sites/default/files/provia-guidance-nov2013-summary

http://dx.doi.org/10.7930/J0Z31WJ2

http://resources.ca.gov/docs/climate/01APG_Planning_for_Adaptive_Communities

http://resources.ca.gov/docs/climate/01APG_Planning_for_Adaptive_Communities

http://www.globalchange.gov/sites/globalchange/files/ASIWG_Synthesis_4.28.15_final

http://www.globalchange.gov/sites/globalchange/files/ASIWG_Synthesis_4.28.15_final

http://www.globalchange.gov/sites/globalchange/files/ASIWG_Synthesis_4.28.15_final

https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R43915

https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R43915

http://dx.doi.org/10.3998/mjs.12333712.0003.001

http://columbiaclimatelaw.com/files/2017/03/Wentz-2017-03-Planning-for-the-Effects-of-Climate-Change-on-Natural-Resources

http://columbiaclimatelaw.com/files/2017/03/Wentz-2017-03-Planning-for-the-Effects-of-Climate-Change-on-Natural-Resources

http://columbiaclimatelaw.com/files/2017/03/Wentz-2017-03-Planning-for-the-Effects-of-Climate-Change-on-Natural-Resources

http://columbiaclimatelaw.com/files/2017/03/Wentz-2017-03-Planning-for-the-Effects-of-Climate-Change-on-Natural-Resources

http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nclimate3012

http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S1537592710004068

http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S1537592710004068

https://www.cityofchicago.org/city/en/depts/oem/supp_info/alertready/flood-preparedness.html

https://www.cityofchicago.org/city/en/depts/oem/supp_info/alertready/flood-preparedness.html

https://www.cityofchicago.org/city/en/depts/oem/supp_info/alertready/flood-preparedness.html

http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.1151915

http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.1151915

http://dx.doi.org/10.7930/J01834ND

http://dx.doi.org/10.7930/J0VM49F2

1337 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions – References

30. Bowles, D.C., C.D. Butler, and S. Friel, 2014: Climate
change and health in Earth’s future. Earth’s Future,
2 (2), 60-67. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/2013ef000177

31. Dryden, R., M.G. Morgan, A. Bostrom, and W.
Bruine de Bruin, 2017: Public perceptions of how
long air pollution and carbon dioxide remain in the
atmosphere. Risk Analysis, 38 (3), 525-534. http://
dx.doi.org/10.1111/risa.12856

32. Hess, J.J., J.Z. McDowell, and G. Luber, 2012:
Integrating climate change adaptation into public
health practice: Using adaptive management to
increase adaptive capacity and build resilience.
Environmental Health Perspectives, 120 (2), 171-179.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1289/ehp.1103515

33. Jones, R.N., A. Patwardhan, S.J. Cohen, S. Dessai,
A. Lammel, R.J. Lempert, M.M.Q. Mirza, and H. von
Storch, 2014: Foundations for decision making. Climate
Change 2014: Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability.
Part A: Global and Sectoral Aspects. Contribution
of Working Group II to the Fifth Assessment Report
of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
Field, C.B., V.R. Barros, D.J. Dokken, K.J. Mach, M.D.
Mastrandrea, T.E. Bilir, M. Chatterjee, K.L. Ebi, Y.O.
Estrada, R.C. Genova, B. Girma, E.S. Kissel, A.N. Levy,
S. MacCracken, P.R. Mastrandrea, and L.L. White,
Eds. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, United
Kingdom and New York, NY, USA, 195-228.

34. Berrang-Ford, L., T. Pearce, and J.D. Ford, 2015:
Systematic review approaches for climate change
adaptation research. Regional Environmental
Change, 15 (5), 755-769. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/
s10113-014-0708-7

35. Wigand, C., T. Ardito, C. Chaffee, W. Ferguson, S.
Paton, K. Raposa, C. Vandemoer, and E. Watson,
2017: A climate change adaptation strategy for
management of coastal marsh systems. Estuaries and
Coasts, 40 (3), 682-693. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/
s12237-015-0003-y

36. Fatorić, S. and E. Seekamp, 2018: A measurement
framework to increase transparency in historic
preservation decision-making under changing climate
conditions. Journal of Cultural Heritage, 30, 168-179.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.culher.2017.08.006

37. Renn, O. and P. Graham, 2005: Risk Governance:
Towards an Integrative Approach. White Paper No.1.
Geneva, Switzerland, 156 pp. https://www.irgc.org/
IMG/pdf/IRGC_WP_No_1_Risk_Governance__
reprinted_version_

38. Renn, O., 2008: Risk Governance: Coping with
Uncertainty in a Complex World. Routledge, London,
UK, 368 pp.

39. Moss, R., P.L. Scarlett, M.A. Kenney, H. Kunreuther,
R. Lempert, J. Manning, B.K. Williams, J.W. Boyd, E.T.
Cloyd, L. Kaatz, and L. Patton, 2014: Ch. 26: Decision
support: Connecting science, risk perception, and
decisions. Climate Change Impacts in the United
States: The Third National Climate Assessment. Melillo,
J.M., Terese (T.C.) Richmond, and G.W. Yohe, Eds. U.S.
Global Change Research Program, Washington, DC,
620-647. http://dx.doi.org/10.7930/J0H12ZXG

40. Fatorić, S. and E. Seekamp, 2017: Evaluating a decision
analytic approach to climate change adaptation of
cultural resources along the Atlantic Coast of the
United States. Land Use Policy, 68, 254-263. http://
dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.landusepol.2017.07.052

41. NRC, 2011: America’s Climate Choices. National
Research Council. The National Academies Press,
Washington, DC, 144 pp. http://www.nap.edu/
catalog.php?record_id=12781

42. Weaver, C.P., R.J. Lempert, C. Brown, J.A. Hall, D. Revell,
and D. Sarewitz, 2013: Improving the contribution of
climate model information to decision making: The
value and demands of robust decision frameworks.
Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Climate Change, 4 (1),
39-60. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/wcc.202

43. National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and
Medicine, 2016: Characterizing Risk in Climate Change
Assessments: Proceedings of a Workshop. Beatty, A.,
Ed. The National Academies Press, Washington, DC,
100 pp. http://dx.doi.org/10.17226/23569

44. DOI, 2008: Adaptive Management Implementation
Policy. 522 DM 1, 3 pp. U.S. Department of Interior.
https://www.doi.gov/sites/doi.gov/files/elips/
documents/Chapter%20%201_%20ADAPTIVE%20
M A N A G E M E N T % 2 0 I M P L E M E N T A T I O N % 2 0
POLICY

http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/2013ef000177

http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/risa.12856

http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/risa.12856

http://dx.doi.org/10.1289/ehp.1103515

http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10113-014-0708-7

http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10113-014-0708-7

http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s12237-015-0003-y

http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s12237-015-0003-y

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.culher.2017.08.006

https://www.irgc.org/IMG/pdf/IRGC_WP_No_1_Risk_Governance__reprinted_version_

https://www.irgc.org/IMG/pdf/IRGC_WP_No_1_Risk_Governance__reprinted_version_

https://www.irgc.org/IMG/pdf/IRGC_WP_No_1_Risk_Governance__reprinted_version_

http://dx.doi.org/10.7930/J0H12ZXG

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.landusepol.2017.07.052

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.landusepol.2017.07.052

http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=12781

http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=12781

http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/wcc.202

http://dx.doi.org/10.17226/23569

https://www.doi.gov/sites/doi.gov/files/elips/documents/Chapter%20%201_%20ADAPTIVE%20MANAGEMENT%20IMPLEMENTATION%20POLICY

https://www.doi.gov/sites/doi.gov/files/elips/documents/Chapter%20%201_%20ADAPTIVE%20MANAGEMENT%20IMPLEMENTATION%20POLICY

https://www.doi.gov/sites/doi.gov/files/elips/documents/Chapter%20%201_%20ADAPTIVE%20MANAGEMENT%20IMPLEMENTATION%20POLICY

https://www.doi.gov/sites/doi.gov/files/elips/documents/Chapter%20%201_%20ADAPTIVE%20MANAGEMENT%20IMPLEMENTATION%20POLICY

1338 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions – References

45. Lavell, A., M. Oppenheimer, C. Diop, J. Hess, R.
Lempert, J. Li, R. Muir-Wood, S. Myeong, S. Moser,
and K. Takeuchi, 2012: Climate change: New
dimensions in disaster risk, exposure, vulnerability,
and resilience. Managing the Risks of Extreme Events
and Disasters to Advance Climate Change Adaptation.
A Special Report of Working Groups I and II of the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Field,
C.B., V. Barros, T.F. Stocker, D. Qin, D.J. Dokken, K.L.
Ebi, M.D. Mastrandrea, K.J. Mach, G.-K. Plattner, S.K.
Allen, M. Tignor, and P.M. Midgley, Eds. Cambridge
University Press, Cambridge, UK and New York, NY,
25-64. https://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/special-reports/
srex/SREX-Chap1_FINAL

46. IPCC, 2007: Climate Change 2007: Impacts,
Adaptation and Vulnerability. Contribution of
Working Group II to the Fourth Assessment Report
of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
Parry, M.L., O.F. Canziani, J.P. Palutikof, P.J. van der
Linden, and C.E. Hanson, Eds. Cambridge University
Press, Cambridge, UK, 976 pp. https://www.ipcc.ch/
pdf/assessment-report/ar4/wg2/ar4_wg2_full_
report

47. IPCC, 2012: Managing the Risks of Extreme Events
and Disasters to Advance Climate Change Adaptation.
A Special Report of Working Groups I and II of the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Field,
C.B., V. Barros, T.F. Stocker, D. Qin, D.J. Dokken, K.L.
Ebi, M.D. Mastrandrea, K.J. Mach, G.-K. Plattner, S.K.
Allen, M. Tignor, and P.M. Midgley, Eds. Cambridge
University Press, Cambridge, UK and New York, NY,
582 pp. https://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/special-reports/
srex/SREX_Full_Report

48. USGCRP, 2016: The Impacts of Climate Change on
Human Health in the United States: A Scientific
Assessment. U.S. Global Change Research
Program, Washington, DC, 312 pp. http://dx.doi.
org/10.7930/J0R49NQX

49. Bierbaum, R., A. Lee, J. Smith, M. Blair, L.M. Carter,
F.S. Chapin, III, P. Fleming, S. Ruffo, S. McNeeley,
M. Stults, L. Verduzco, and E. Seyller, 2014: Ch. 28:
Adaptation. Climate Change Impacts in the United
States: The Third National Climate Assessment. Melillo,
J.M., Terese (T.C.) Richmond, and G.W. Yohe, Eds. U.S.
Global Change Research Program, Washington, DC,
670-706. http://dx.doi.org/10.7930/J07H1GGT

50. Adger, W.N., T.P. Hughes, C. Folke, S.R. Carpenter,
and J. Rockström, 2005: Social-ecological resilience
to coastal disasters. Science, 309 (5737), 1036-1039.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.1112122

51. Stein, B.A., A. Staudt, M.S. Cross, N.S. Dubois, C.
Enquist, R. Griffis, L.J. Hansen, J.J. Hellmann, J.J.
Lawler, E.J. Nelson, and A. Pairis, 2013: Preparing
for and managing change: Climate adaptation for
biodiversity and ecosystems. Frontiers in Ecology
and the Environment, 11 (9), 502-510. http://dx.doi.
org/10.1890/120277

52. Biehl, P.F., S. Crate, M. Gardezi, L. Hamilton, S.L.
Harlan, C. Hritz, B. Hubbell, T.A. Kohler, N. Peterson,
and J. Silva, 2018: Innovative Tools, Methods, and
Analysis: Social Science Perspectives on Climate
Change, Part 3. USGCRP, Washington, DC, 38 pp.
https://www.globalchange.gov/content/social-
science-perspectives-climate-change-workshop

53. Flechas, J., 2017: “Miami Beach to begin new $100
million flood prevention project in face of sea
level rise.” Miami Herald, January 28, updated
March 23. http://www.miamiherald.com/news/
local/communi ty/miami-dade/miami-beach/
article129284119.html

54. FEMA, 2016: Mayor De Blasio and FEMA Announce Plan
to Revise NYC’s Flood Maps. Release Number: NR-007.
https://www.fema.gov/news-release/2016/10/17/
mayor-de-blasio-and-fema-announce-plan-revise-
nycs-flood-maps

55. National Park Service, 2016: Foundation Document:
Fort Pulaski National Monument. FOPU 348/133294.
U.S. Department of the Interior, Savannah, GA, 50 pp.
https://www.nps.gov/fopu/learn/management/
upload/FOPU_FD_SP-2

56. Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority
of Louisiana, 2017: Louisiana’s Comprehensive
Master Plan for a Sustainable Coast. Coastal
Protection and Restoration Authority of Louisiana,
Baton Rouge, LA, 171 pp. http://coastal.la.gov/
our-plan/2017-coastal-master-plan/

57. Carpenter, S.R. and W.A. Brock, 2008: Adaptive
capacity and traps. Ecology and Society, 13 (2),
40. http://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol13/
iss2/art40/

58. Fisichelli, N.A., G.W. Schuurman, and C.H. Hoffman,
2016: Is “resilience” maladaptive? Towards an
accurate lexicon for climate change adaptation.
Environmental Management, 57 (4), 753-758. http://
dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00267-015-0650-6

https://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/special-reports/srex/SREX-Chap1_FINAL

https://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/special-reports/srex/SREX-Chap1_FINAL

https://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar4/wg2/ar4_wg2_full_report

https://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar4/wg2/ar4_wg2_full_report

https://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar4/wg2/ar4_wg2_full_report

https://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/special-reports/srex/SREX_Full_Report

https://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/special-reports/srex/SREX_Full_Report

http://dx.doi.org/10.7930/J0R49NQX

http://dx.doi.org/10.7930/J0R49NQX

http://dx.doi.org/10.7930/J07H1GGT

http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.1112122

http://dx.doi.org/10.1890/120277

http://dx.doi.org/10.1890/120277

https://www.globalchange.gov/content/social-science-perspectives-climate-change-workshop

https://www.globalchange.gov/content/social-science-perspectives-climate-change-workshop

http://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/community/miami-dade/miami-beach/article129284119.html

http://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/community/miami-dade/miami-beach/article129284119.html

http://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/community/miami-dade/miami-beach/article129284119.html

https://www.fema.gov/news-release/2016/10/17/mayor-de-blasio-and-fema-announce-plan-revise-nycs-flood-maps

https://www.fema.gov/news-release/2016/10/17/mayor-de-blasio-and-fema-announce-plan-revise-nycs-flood-maps

https://www.fema.gov/news-release/2016/10/17/mayor-de-blasio-and-fema-announce-plan-revise-nycs-flood-maps

https://www.nps.gov/fopu/learn/management/upload/FOPU_FD_SP-2

https://www.nps.gov/fopu/learn/management/upload/FOPU_FD_SP-2

2017 Coastal Master Plan

2017 Coastal Master Plan

http://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol13/iss2/art40/

http://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol13/iss2/art40/

http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00267-015-0650-6

http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00267-015-0650-6

1339 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions – References

59. Siders, A., 2016: Resilient incoherence—Seeking
common language for climate change adaptation,
disaster risk reduction, and sustainable development.
The Role of International Environmental Law in
Disaster Risk Reduction. Peel, J. and D. Fisher, Eds.
Brill-Nijhoff, Leiden, The Netherlands, 101-129.

60. Cutter, S.L., L. Barnes, M. Berry, C. Burton, E.
Evans, E. Tate, and J. Webb, 2008: A place-based
model for understanding community resilience to
natural disasters. Global Environmental Change,
18 (4), 598-606. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.
gloenvcha.2008.07.013

61. Adger, W.N., N.W. Arnell, and E.L. Tompkins, 2005:
Successful adaptation to climate change across
scales. Global Environmental Change, 15 (2), 77-86.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2004.12.005

62. Nelson, D.R., W.N. Adger, and K. Brown, 2007:
Adaptation to environmental change: Contributions
of a resilience framework. Annual Review of
Environment and Resources, 32, 395-419. http://dx.doi.
org/10.1146/annurev.energy.32.051807.090348

63. Norris, F.H., S.P. Stevens, B. Pfefferbaum, K.F.
Wyche, and R.L. Pfefferbaum, 2008: Community
resilience as a metaphor, theory, set of capacities,
and strategy for disaster readiness. American Journal
of Community Psychology, 41 (1-2), 127-150. http://
dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10464-007-9156-6

64. Walker, B.H., L.H. Gunderson, A.P. Kinzig, C. Folke,
S.R. Carpenter, and L. Schultz, 2006: A handful of
heuristics and some propositions for understanding
resilience in social-ecological systems. Ecology and
Society, 11 (1), 13. http://www.ecologyandsociety.
org/vol11/iss1/art13/

65. Magis, K., 2010: Community resilience: An
indicator of social sustainability. Society &
Natural Resources, 23 (5), 401-416. http://dx.doi.
org/10.1080/08941920903305674

66. Gregory, R., T. McDaniels, and D. Fields, 2001: Decision
aiding, not dispute resolution: Creating insights
through structured environmental decisions. Journal
of Policy Analysis and Management, 20 (3), 415-432.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/pam.1001

67. Haasnoot, M., J.H. Kwakkel, W.E. Walker, and J. ter
Maat, 2013: Dynamic adaptive policy pathways: A
method for crafting robust decisions for a deeply
uncertain world. Global Environmental Change,
23 (2), 485-498. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.
gloenvcha.2012.12.006

68. Adger, W.N., S. Dessai, M. Goulden, M. Hulme, I.
Lorenzoni, D.R. Nelson, L.O. Naess, J. Wolf, and A.
Wreford, 2009: Are there social limits to adaptation
to climate change? Climatic Change, 93 (3-4), 335-
354. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10584-008-9520-z

69. Hallegatte, S., A. Shah, R. Lempert, C. Brown,
and S. Gill, 2012: Investment Decision Making
Under Deep Uncertainty: Application to Climate
Change. Policy Research Working Papers 6193.
World Bank, Washington, DC, 41 pp. http://dx.doi.
org/10.1596/1813-9450-6193

70. Berke, P. and W. Lyles, 2013: Public risks and the
challenges to climate-change adaptation: A proposed
framework for planning in the age of uncertainty.
Cityscape, 15 (1), 181-208. http://www.jstor.org/
stable/41958963

71. Boyd, E., B. Nykvist, S. Borgström, and I.A. Stacewicz,
2015: Anticipatory governance for social-ecological
resilience. AMBIO, 44 (1), 149-161. http://dx.doi.
org/10.1007/s13280-014-0604-x

72. Stratus Consulting and Denver Water, 2015:
Embracing Uncertainty: A Case Study Examination
of How Climate Change Is Shifting Water Utility
Planning. Prepared for the Water Utility Climate
Alliance (WUCA), the American Water Works
Association (AWWA), the Water Research Foundation
(WRF), and the Association of Metropolitan Water
Agencies (AMWA) by Stratus Consulting Inc., Boulder,
CO (Karen Raucher and Robert Raucher) and Denver
Water, Denver, CO (Laurna Kaatz). Stratus Consulting,
Boulder, CO, various pp. https://www.wucaonline.
org/assets/pdf/pubs-uncertainty

73. Reclamation, 2012: Colorado River Basin Water
Supply and Demand Study. Study Report. December
2012. Prepared by the Colorado River Basin Water
Supply and Demand Study Team. U.S. Department
of the Interior, Bureau of Reclamation, Denver, CO,
95 pp. http://www.usbr.gov/lc/region/programs/
crbstudy/finalreport/studyrpt.html

74. Sankovich, V., S. Gangopadhyay, T. Pruitt, and R.J.
Caldwell, 2013: Los Angeles Basin Stormwater
Conservation Study: Task 3.1. Development of
Climate-Adjusted Hydrologic Model Inputs. Technical
Memorandum No. 86-68210-2013-05. USGS Bureau
of Reclamation, Los Angeles, CA, 41 pp. https://www.
usbr.gov/lc/socal/basinstudies/LA-Basin-Study-
Report_October2013

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2008.07.013

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2008.07.013

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2004.12.005

http://dx.doi.org/10.1146/annurev.energy.32.051807.090348

http://dx.doi.org/10.1146/annurev.energy.32.051807.090348

http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10464-007-9156-6

http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10464-007-9156-6

http://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol11/iss1/art13/

http://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol11/iss1/art13/

http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/08941920903305674

http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/08941920903305674

http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/pam.1001

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2012.12.006

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2012.12.006

http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10584-008-9520-z

http://dx.doi.org/10.1596/1813-9450-6193

http://dx.doi.org/10.1596/1813-9450-6193

http://www.jstor.org/stable/41958963

http://www.jstor.org/stable/41958963

http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s13280-014-0604-x

http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s13280-014-0604-x

https://www.wucaonline.org/assets/pdf/pubs-uncertainty

https://www.wucaonline.org/assets/pdf/pubs-uncertainty

http://www.usbr.gov/lc/region/programs/crbstudy/finalreport/studyrpt.html

http://www.usbr.gov/lc/region/programs/crbstudy/finalreport/studyrpt.html

https://www.usbr.gov/lc/socal/basinstudies/LA-Basin-Study-Report_October2013

https://www.usbr.gov/lc/socal/basinstudies/LA-Basin-Study-Report_October2013

https://www.usbr.gov/lc/socal/basinstudies/LA-Basin-Study-Report_October2013

1340 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions – References

75. Groves, D.G., E. Bloom, R.J. Lempert, J.R. Fischbach,
J. Nevills, and B. Goshi, 2015: Developing Key
Indicators for Adaptive Water Planning. Journal of
Water Resources Planning and Management, 141
(7), 05014008. http://dx.doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)
WR.1943-5452.0000471

76. Zeff, H.B., J.D. Herman, P.M. Reed, and G.W. Characklis,
2016: Cooperative drought adaptation: Integrating
infrastructure development, conservation, and
water transfers into adaptive policy pathways. Water
Resources Research, 52 (9), 7327-7346. http://dx.doi.
org/10.1002/2016WR018771

77. EPA, 2018: CREAT Risk Assessment
Application for Water Utilities [web site].
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency,
Washington, DC. https://www.epa.gov/crwu/
creat-risk-assessment-application-water-utilities

78. Sussman, F., N. Krishnan, K. Maher, R. Miller, C. Mack,
P. Stewart, K. Shouse, and B. Perkins, 2014: Climate
change adaptation cost in the US: What do we know?
Climate Policy, 14 (2), 242-282. http://dx.doi.org/10.1
080/14693062.2013.777604

79. World Bank, 2010: Economics of Adaptation to
Climate Change. Synthesis Report. World Bank,
The International Bank for Reconstruction
and Development, Washington, DC, 101 pp.
h t t p : //d o c u m e n t s .w o r l d b a n k . o r g /c u r a t e d /
en/646291468171244256/Economics-of-adaptation-
to-climate-change-Synthesis-report

80. EPA, 2015: Climate Change in the United States:
Benefits of Global Action. EPA 430-R-15-001. U.S.
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Office of
Atmospheric Programs, Washington, DC, 93 pp.
https://www.epa.gov/cira/downloads-cira-report

81. Li, J., M. Mullan, and J. Helgeson, 2014: Improving
the practice of economic analysis of climate change
adaptation. Journal of Benefit-Cost Analysis, 5 (3),
445-467. http://dx.doi.org/10.1515/jbca-2014-9004

82. Fankhauser, S., 2017: Adaptation to climate
change. Annual Review of Resource Economics,
9 (1), 209-230. http://dx.doi.org/10.1146/
annurev-resource-100516-033554

83. Watkiss, P., Ed. 2015: Costs and Benefits of Adaptation:
Results from the ECONADAPT Project. ECONADAPT
Policy Report 1. ECONADAPT Consortium, Bath, UK,
54 pp. https://www.ecologic.eu/12427

84. Hammer, B., 2015: FEMA finalizes new requirement
for state disaster plans to consider climate change
impacts. NRDC Expert Blog, March 13. National
Resource Defense Council, New York. https://www.
nrdc.org/experts/becky-hammer/fema-finalizes-
new-requirement-state-disaster-plans-consider-
climate-change

85. Multihazard Mitigation Council, 2017: Natural
Hazard Mitigation Saves: 2017 Interim Report—An
Independent Study. National Institute of Building
Sciences, Washington, DC, 340 pp. http://www.wbdg.
org/files/pdfs/MS2_2017Interim%20Report

86. Reguero, B.G., D.N. Bresch, M. Beck, J. Calil, and I.
Meliane, 2014: Coastal risks, nature-based defenses
and the economics of adaptation: An application
in the Gulf of Mexico, USA. Coastal Engineering
Proceedings, (34). http://dx.doi.org/10.9753/icce.
v34.management.25

87. Economics of Climate Adaptation Working Group,
2009: Shaping Climate-Resilient Development: A
Framework for Decision-Making. ClimateWorks
Foundation, Global Environment Facility, European
Commission, McKinsey & Company, The Rockefeller
Foundation, Standard Chartered Bank and Swiss Re,
Zurich, Switzerland, 159 pp. http://ccsl.iccip.net/
climate_resilient

88. AWF, AEC, and Entergy, 2010: Building a Resilient
Energy Gulf Coast: Executive Report. America’s
Wetlands Foundation (AWF) and America’s Energy
Coast (AEC) and Entergy, 11 pp. http://www.entergy.
com/content/our_communi ty/environment/
G u l f C o a s t A d a p t a t i o n/ B u i l d i n g _ a _ R e s i l i e n t _
Gulf_Coast

89. Hilly, G., Z. Vojinovic, S. Weesakul, A. Sanchez, D.
Hoang, S. Djordjevic, A. Chen, and B. Evans, 2018:
Methodological framework for analysing cascading
effects from flood events: The case of Sukhumvit
Area, Bangkok, Thailand. Water, 10 (1), 81. http://
dx.doi.org/10.3390/w10010081

90. Narayan, S., M.W. Beck, B.G. Reguero, I.J. Losada,
B. van Wesenbeeck, N. Pontee, J.N. Sanchirico, J.C.
Ingram, G.-M. Lange, and K.A. Burks-Copes, 2016:
The effectiveness, costs and coastal protection
benefits of natural and nature-based defences. PLOS
ONE, 11 (5), e0154735. http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/
journal.pone.0154735

http://dx.doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)WR.1943-5452.0000471

http://dx.doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)WR.1943-5452.0000471

http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/2016WR018771

http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/2016WR018771

https://www.epa.gov/crwu/creat-risk-assessment-application-water-utilities

https://www.epa.gov/crwu/creat-risk-assessment-application-water-utilities

http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14693062.2013.777604

http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14693062.2013.777604

http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/646291468171244256/Economics-of-adaptation-to-climate-change-Synthesis-report

http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/646291468171244256/Economics-of-adaptation-to-climate-change-Synthesis-report

http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/646291468171244256/Economics-of-adaptation-to-climate-change-Synthesis-report

https://www.epa.gov/cira/downloads-cira-report

http://dx.doi.org/10.1515/jbca-2014-9004

http://dx.doi.org/10.1146/annurev-resource-100516-033554

http://dx.doi.org/10.1146/annurev-resource-100516-033554

https://www.ecologic.eu/12427

https://www.nrdc.org/experts/becky-hammer/fema-finalizes-new-requirement-state-disaster-plans-consider-climate-change

https://www.nrdc.org/experts/becky-hammer/fema-finalizes-new-requirement-state-disaster-plans-consider-climate-change

https://www.nrdc.org/experts/becky-hammer/fema-finalizes-new-requirement-state-disaster-plans-consider-climate-change

https://www.nrdc.org/experts/becky-hammer/fema-finalizes-new-requirement-state-disaster-plans-consider-climate-change

http://www.wbdg.org/files/pdfs/MS2_2017Interim%20Report

http://www.wbdg.org/files/pdfs/MS2_2017Interim%20Report

http://dx.doi.org/10.9753/icce.v34.management.25

http://dx.doi.org/10.9753/icce.v34.management.25

http://ccsl.iccip.net/climate_resilient

http://ccsl.iccip.net/climate_resilient

http://www.entergy.com/content/our_community/environment/GulfCoastAdaptation/Building_a_Resilient_Gulf_Coast

http://www.entergy.com/content/our_community/environment/GulfCoastAdaptation/Building_a_Resilient_Gulf_Coast

http://www.entergy.com/content/our_community/environment/GulfCoastAdaptation/Building_a_Resilient_Gulf_Coast

http://www.entergy.com/content/our_community/environment/GulfCoastAdaptation/Building_a_Resilient_Gulf_Coast

http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/w10010081

http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/w10010081

http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0154735

http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0154735

1341 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions – References

91. EPA, 2017: Green Infrastructure Cost-Benefit
Resources [web site]. U.S. Environmental Protection
Agency (EPA), Washington, DC, accessed September
15. https://www.epa.gov/green-infrastructure/
green-infrastructure-cost-benefit-resources

92. Atkins, 2015: Flood Loss Avoidance Benefits of
Green Infrastructure for Stormwater Management.
Prepared for U.S. EPA. Atkins, Calverton, MD,
various pp. https://www.epa.gov/sites/production/
files/2016-05/documents/flood-avoidance-green-
infrastructure-12-14-2015

93. Estrada, F., W.J.W. Botzen, and R.S.J. Tol, 2017: A global
economic assessment of city policies to reduce
climate change impacts. Nature Climate Change, 7 (6),
403-406. http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nclimate3301

94. Toloo, G., W. Hu, G. FitzGerald, P. Aitken, and S.
Tong, 2015: Projecting excess emergency department
visits and associated costs in Brisbane, Australia,
under population growth and climate change
scenarios. Scientific Reports, 5, 12860. http://dx.doi.
org/10.1038/srep12860

95. Toman, M., 2014: The Need for Multiple Types of
Information to Inform Climate Change Assessment.
Policy Research Working Paper 7094. World Bank
Group, Washington, DC, 17 pp. http://hdl.handle.
net/10986/20622

96. Sen, A., 2011: The Idea of Justice. Belknap Press,
Cambridge, MA, 493 pp.

97. Keeney, R.L. and H. Raiffa, 1993: Decisions with
Multiple Objectives: Preferences and Value Tradeoffs.
Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, 592 pp.

98. Peyronnin, N., M. Green, C.P. Richards, A. Owens, D.
Reed, J. Chamberlain, D.G. Groves, W.K. Rhinehart,
and K. Belhadjali, 2013: Louisiana’s 2012 coastal master
plan: Overview of a science-based and publicly
informed decision-making process. Journal of Coastal
Research, 1-15. http://dx.doi.org/10.2112/SI_67_1.1

99. Shi, L.D., E. Chu, I. Anguelovski, A. Aylett, J. Debats,
K. Goh, T. Schenk, K.C. Seto, D. Dodman, D. Roberts,
J.T. Roberts, and S.D. VanDeveer, 2016: Roadmap
towards justice in urban climate adaptation research.
Nature Climate Change, 6 (2), 131-137. http://dx.doi.
org/10.1038/nclimate2841

100. Burch, S., 2010: Transforming barriers into enablers
of action on climate change: Insights from three
municipal case studies in British Columbia, Canada.
Global Environmental Change, 20 (2), 287-297. http://
dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2009.11.009

101. O’Riordan, T. and A. Jordan, 1999: Institutions,
climate change and cultural theory: Towards a
common analytical framework. Global Environmental
Change, 9 (2), 81-93. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/
S0959-3780(98)00030-2

102. Yohe, G.W., 2001: Mitigative capacity—The mirror
image of adaptive capacity on the emissions side.
Climatic Change, 49 (3), 247-262. http://dx.doi.
org/10.1023/a:1010677916703

103. Runhaar, H., B. Wilk, Å. Persson, C. Uittenbroek, and
C. Wamsler, 2018: Mainstreaming climate adaptation:
Taking stock about “what works” from empirical
research worldwide. Regional Environmental
Change, 18 (4), 1201-1210. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/
s10113-017-1259-5

104. Rauken, T., P.K. Mydske, and M. Winsvold, 2015:
Mainstreaming climate change adaptation at the
local level. Local Environment, 20 (4), 408-423. http://
dx.doi.org/10.1080/13549839.2014.880412

105. Persson, Å., K. Eckerberg, and M. Nilsson, 2016:
Institutionalization or wither away? Twenty-five
years of environmental policy integration under
shifting governance models in Sweden. Environment
and Planning C: Government and Policy, 34 (3), 478-
495. http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0263774×15614726

106. NDRC, 2015: National Disaster Resilience Competition
(NDRC): Phase 2 Fact Sheet. U.S. Department of
Housing and Urban Development, Washington, DC,
[7] pp. https://www.hud.gov/sites/documents/
NDRCFACTSHEETFINAL.PDF

107. Arcadis US, CallisonRTKL, and Wageningen
University, 2016: Mission Creek Sea Level Risk
Adaptation Study: Waterfront Strategies for Long-
Term Urban Resiliency. SPUR Report. San Francisco
Bay Area Planning and Urban Research Association
(SPUR), San Francisco, CA, 72 pp. http://www.
spur.org/publications/spur-report/2016-09-26/
mission-creek-sea-level-rise-adaptation-study

https://www.epa.gov/green-infrastructure/green-infrastructure-cost-benefit-resources

https://www.epa.gov/green-infrastructure/green-infrastructure-cost-benefit-resources

https://www.epa.gov/sites/production/files/2016-05/documents/flood-avoidance-green-infrastructure-12-14-2015

https://www.epa.gov/sites/production/files/2016-05/documents/flood-avoidance-green-infrastructure-12-14-2015

https://www.epa.gov/sites/production/files/2016-05/documents/flood-avoidance-green-infrastructure-12-14-2015

http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nclimate3301

http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/srep12860

http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/srep12860

http://hdl.handle.net/10986/20622

http://hdl.handle.net/10986/20622

http://dx.doi.org/10.2112/SI_67_1.1

http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nclimate2841

http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nclimate2841

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2009.11.009

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2009.11.009

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0959-3780(98)00030-2

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0959-3780(98)00030-2

http://dx.doi.org/10.1023/a:1010677916703

http://dx.doi.org/10.1023/a:1010677916703

http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10113-017-1259-5

http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10113-017-1259-5

http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13549839.2014.880412

http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13549839.2014.880412

http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0263774×15614726

https://www.hud.gov/sites/documents/NDRCFACTSHEETFINAL.PDF

https://www.hud.gov/sites/documents/NDRCFACTSHEETFINAL.PDF

http://www.spur.org/publications/spur-report/2016-09-26/mission-creek-sea-level-rise-adaptation-study

http://www.spur.org/publications/spur-report/2016-09-26/mission-creek-sea-level-rise-adaptation-study

http://www.spur.org/publications/spur-report/2016-09-26/mission-creek-sea-level-rise-adaptation-study

1342 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions – References

108. TCFD, 2016: Draft Report: Recommendations
of the Task Force on Climate-Related Financial
Disclosures. Financial Stability Board, Task Force
on Climate-Related Financial Disclosures (TCFD),
Basel, Switzerland, 66 pp. https://www.fsb-tcfd.org/
publications/recommendations-report/

109. TCFD, 2017: Final Report: Recommendations of
the Task Force on Climate-Related Financial
Disclosures. Task Force on Climate-Related
Financial Disclosures (TCFD), Basel, Switzerland,
66 pp. https://www.fsb-tcfd.org/publications/
final-recommendations-report/

110. Moody’s, 2016: Environmental Risks—Sovereigns:
How Moody’s Assesses the Physical Effects of Climate
Change on Sovereign Issuers. Moody’s Investor’s
Services, London.

111. Petkov, M., M. Wilkins, and X. Xie, 2015: Climate
Change Will Likely Test the Resilience of Corporates’
Creditworthiness to Natural Catastrophes. Standard
& Poor’s Financial Services, New York, 10 pp. http://
w w w.long f inance.net/media/documents/sp_
cccreditworthiness_2015

112. Moody’s, 2017: Environmental Risks: Evaluating
the Impact of Climate Change on US State and
Local Issuers. Moody’s Investor Services, 21 pp.
http://www.southeastf loridaclimatecompact.org/
wp-content/uploads/2017/12/Evaluating-the-
impact-of-climate-change-on-US-state-and-local-
issuers-11-28-17

113. Olsen, J.R., Ed. 2015: Adapting Infrastructure and Civil
Engineering Practice to a Changing Climate. American
Society of Civil Engineers, Reston, VA, 93 pp. http://
dx.doi.org/10.1061/9780784479193

114. Cook, L.M., C.J. Anderson, and C. Samaras, 2017:
Framework for incorporating downscaled climate
output into existing engineering methods:
Application to precipitation frequency curves. Journal
of Infrastructure Systems, 23 (4), 04017027. http://
dx.doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)IS.1943-555X.0000382

115. Radtke Russell, P., 2017: Special report: How engineers
are preparing for sea-level rise. Engineering News-
Record. ht tps://w w w.enr.com/ar ticles/42487-
special-report-how-engineers-are-preparing-for-
sea-level-rise

116. World Economic Forum, 2018: The Global Risks
Report 2018. World Economic Forum, Geneva,
Switzerland, 69 pp. http://www3.weforum.org/
docs/WEF_GRR18_Report

117. DoD, 2016: Climate Change Adaptation and Resilience.
DoD Directive 4715.21. U.S. Department of Defense
(DoD) Washington, DC, 12 pp. https://dod.defense.
gov/Portals/1/Documents/pubs/471521p

118. Hall, J.A., S. Gill, J. Obeysekera, W. Sweet, K. Knuuti,
and J. Marburger, 2016: Regional Sea Level Scenarios
for Coastal Risk Management: Managing the
Uncertainty of Future Sea Level Change and Extreme
Water Levels for Department of Defense Coastal Sites
Worldwide. U.S. Department of Defense, Strategic
Environmental Research and Development Program,
Alexandria VA, 224 pp. https://www.usfsp.edu/icar/
files/2015/08/CARSWG-SLR-FINAL-April-2016

119. Center for Climate & Security, 2017: U.S. Government,
Defense Resource Hub [web site]. Center for Climate &
Security, Washington, DC. https://climateandsecurity.
org/resources/u-s-government/defense/

120. Newton Mann, A., P. Grifman, and J. Finzi Hart, 2017:
The stakes are rising: Lessons on engaging coastal
communities on climate adaptation in Southern
California. Cities and the Environment (CATE), 10
(2), Article 6. http://digitalcommons.lmu.edu/cate/
vol10/iss2/6

121. Moser, S.C., J.A. Ekstrom, J. Kim, and S. Heitsch,
2018: Adaptation Finance Challenges: Characteristic
Patterns Facing California Local Governments and
Ways to Overcome Them. A Report for: California’s
Fourth Climate Change Assessment. CNRA-
CCC4A-2018-007. California Natural Resources
Agency, various pp. http://www.climateassessment.
ca.gov/techreports/docs/20180831-Governance_
CCCA4-CNRA-2018-007

122. Kane, J., 2016: Investing in Water: Comparing
Utility Finances and Economic Concerns Across
U.S. Cities. Brookings Institution, Washington, DC.
https://www.brookings.edu/research/investing-in-
water-comparing-utility-finances-and-economic-
concerns-across-u-s-cities/

123. Hughes, J., 2017: The Financial Impacts of Alternative
Water Project Delivery Models: A Closer Look at Nine
Communities. University of North Carolina at Chapel
Hill, Environmental Finance Center, Chapel Hill,
NC. https://efc.sog.unc.edu/resource/financial-
i m p a c t s – a l t e r n a t i v e – w a t e r – p r o j e c t – d e l i v e r y –
models-closer-look-nine-communities

124. Stults, M. and S. Meerow, 2017: Professional Societies
and Climate Change. The Kresge Foundation, Troy,
MI, 36 pp. https://kresge.org/sites/default/files/
library/env1007-psreport-0117_revised_11917

https://www.fsb-tcfd.org/publications/recommendations-report/

https://www.fsb-tcfd.org/publications/recommendations-report/

https://www.fsb-tcfd.org/publications/final-recommendations-report/

https://www.fsb-tcfd.org/publications/final-recommendations-report/

http://www.longfinance.net/media/documents/sp_cccreditworthiness_2015

http://www.longfinance.net/media/documents/sp_cccreditworthiness_2015

http://www.southeastfloridaclimatecompact.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/Evaluating-the-impact-of-climate-change-on-US-state-and-local-issuers-11-28-17

http://www.southeastfloridaclimatecompact.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/Evaluating-the-impact-of-climate-change-on-US-state-and-local-issuers-11-28-17

http://www.southeastfloridaclimatecompact.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/Evaluating-the-impact-of-climate-change-on-US-state-and-local-issuers-11-28-17

http://www.southeastfloridaclimatecompact.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/Evaluating-the-impact-of-climate-change-on-US-state-and-local-issuers-11-28-17

http://dx.doi.org/10.1061/9780784479193

http://dx.doi.org/10.1061/9780784479193

http://dx.doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)IS.1943-555X.0000382

http://dx.doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)IS.1943-555X.0000382

https://www.enr.com/articles/42487-special-report-how-engineers-are-preparing-for-sea-level-rise

https://www.enr.com/articles/42487-special-report-how-engineers-are-preparing-for-sea-level-rise

https://www.enr.com/articles/42487-special-report-how-engineers-are-preparing-for-sea-level-rise

http://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_GRR18_Report

http://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_GRR18_Report

https://dod.defense.gov/Portals/1/Documents/pubs/471521p

https://dod.defense.gov/Portals/1/Documents/pubs/471521p

https://www.usfsp.edu/icar/files/2015/08/CARSWG-SLR-FINAL-April-2016

https://www.usfsp.edu/icar/files/2015/08/CARSWG-SLR-FINAL-April-2016

Defense

Defense

http://digitalcommons.lmu.edu/cate/vol10/iss2/6

http://digitalcommons.lmu.edu/cate/vol10/iss2/6

http://www.climateassessment.ca.gov/techreports/docs/20180831-Governance_CCCA4-CNRA-2018-007

http://www.climateassessment.ca.gov/techreports/docs/20180831-Governance_CCCA4-CNRA-2018-007

http://www.climateassessment.ca.gov/techreports/docs/20180831-Governance_CCCA4-CNRA-2018-007

https://www.brookings.edu/research/investing-in-water-comparing-utility-finances-and-economic-concerns-across-u-s-cities/

https://www.brookings.edu/research/investing-in-water-comparing-utility-finances-and-economic-concerns-across-u-s-cities/

https://www.brookings.edu/research/investing-in-water-comparing-utility-finances-and-economic-concerns-across-u-s-cities/

https://efc.sog.unc.edu/resource/financial-impacts-alternative-water-project-delivery-models-closer-look-nine-communities

https://efc.sog.unc.edu/resource/financial-impacts-alternative-water-project-delivery-models-closer-look-nine-communities

https://efc.sog.unc.edu/resource/financial-impacts-alternative-water-project-delivery-models-closer-look-nine-communities

https://kresge.org/sites/default/files/library/env1007-psreport-0117_revised_11917

https://kresge.org/sites/default/files/library/env1007-psreport-0117_revised_11917

1343 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions – References

125. CBO, 2015: Public Spending on Transportation and
Water Infrastructure, 1956 to 2014. Publication 49910.
Congressional Budget Office, Washington, DC, 31 pp.
https://www.cbo.gov/publication/49910

126. Wehner, M.F., J.R. Arnold, T. Knutson, K.E. Kunkel, and
A.N. LeGrande, 2017: Droughts, floods, and wildfires.
Climate Science Special Report: Fourth National
Climate Assessment, Volume I. Wuebbles, D.J., D.W.
Fahey, K.A. Hibbard, D.J. Dokken, B.C. Stewart, and
T.K. Maycock, Eds. U.S. Global Change Research
Program, Washington, DC, USA, 231-256. http://
dx.doi.org/10.7930/J0CJ8BNN

127. Kossin, J.P., T. Hall, T. Knutson, K.E. Kunkel, R.J. Trapp,
D.E. Waliser, and M.F. Wehner, 2017: Extreme storms.
Climate Science Special Report: Fourth National
Climate Assessment, Volume I. Wuebbles, D.J., D.W.
Fahey, K.A. Hibbard, D.J. Dokken, B.C. Stewart, and
T.K. Maycock, Eds. U.S. Global Change Research
Program, Washington, DC, USA, 257-276. http://
dx.doi.org/10.7930/J07S7KXX

128. De Neufville, R. and S. Scholtes, 2011: Flexibility in
Engineering Design. Engineering Systems. MIT Press,
Cambridge, MA, 312 pp.

129. Metropolitan Water District of Southern California,
2016: Integrated Water Resources Plan: 2015 Update.
Report No. 1518. Metropolitan Water District of
Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, various pp.
ht tp://w w w.mwdh2o.com/PDF_About_Your_
Water/2015%20IRP%20Update%20Repor t%2 0
(web)

130. Knopman, D. and R.J. Lempert, 2016: Urban Responses
to Climate Change: Framework for Decisionmaking
and Supporting Indicators. RAND Corporation, Santa
Monica. http://www.rand.org/pubs/research_
reports/RR1144.html

131. NRC, 2012: Disaster Resilience: A National Imperative.
National Academies Press, Washington, DC, 244 pp.

132. Kunreuther, H., E. Michel-Kerjan, and M. Pauly,
2013: Making America more resilient toward natural
disasters: A call for action. Environment: Science
and Policy for Sustainable Development, 55 (4), 15-23.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00139157.2013.803884

133. Gerrard, M.B. and K.F. Kuh, Eds., 2012: The Law of
Adaptation to Climate Change: U.S. and International
Aspects. ABA Book Publishing, Chicago, IL, 928 pp.

134. State of Massachusetts, 2012: Massachusetts General
Laws, Part I, Title III, Ch. 30, Section 61. http://
www.malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartI/
TitleIII/Chapter30/Section61

135. New York State Assembly, 2014: Community
Risk and Resiliency Act (CRRA). Bill A06558/
S06617-B. Albany, NY. https://assembly.state.ny.us/
leg/?bn=A06558&term=2013

136. State of California, 2014: Planning for Sea-Level
Rise Database [web site]. State of California,
Ocean Protection Council, Sacramento, CA.
h t t p : // w w w . o p c . c a . g o v/ c l i m a t e – c h a n g e /
planning-for-sea-level-rise-database/

137. Wentz, J.A., 2015: Assessing the impacts of climate
change on the built environment: A framework for
environmental reviews. Environmental Law Reporter,
45, 11015-11031. http://dx.doi.org/10.7916/D870812J

138. Nordgren, J., M. Stults, and S. Meerow, 2016:
Supporting local climate change adaptation: Where
we are and where we need to go. Environmental
Science & Policy, 66, 344-352. http://dx.doi.
org/10.1016/j.envsci.2016.05.006

139. Brody, S.D. and W.E. Highfield, 2005: Does planning
work? Testing the implementation of local
environmental planning in Florida. Journal of the
American Planning Association, 71 (2), 159-175. http://
dx.doi.org/10.1080/01944360508976690

140. Berke, P., G. Smith, and W. Lyles, 2012: Planning for
resiliency: Evaluation of state hazard mitigation plans
under the disaster mitigation act. Natural Hazards
Review, 13 (2), 139-149. http://dx.doi.org/10.1061/
(ASCE)NH.1527-6996.0000063

141. Horney, J.A., A.I. Naimi, W. Lyles, M. Simon, D. Salvesen,
and P. Berke, 2012: Assessing the relationship
between hazard mitigation plan quality and rural
status in a cohort of 57 counties from 3 states in the
southeastern U.S. Challenges, 3 (2), 183. http://dx.doi.
org/10.3390/challe3020183

142. NRC, 2009: Informing Decisions in a Changing
Climate. National Research Council, Panel on
Strategies and Methods for Climate-Related Decision
Support, Committee on the Human Dimensions
of Global Change, Division of Behavioral and Social
Sciences and Education. National Academies Press,
Washington, DC, 200 pp. http://www.nap.edu/
catalog.php?record_id=12626

https://www.cbo.gov/publication/49910

http://dx.doi.org/10.7930/J0CJ8BNN

http://dx.doi.org/10.7930/J0CJ8BNN

http://dx.doi.org/10.7930/J07S7KXX

http://dx.doi.org/10.7930/J07S7KXX

http://www.mwdh2o.com/PDF_About_Your_Water/2015%20IRP%20Update%20Report%20(web)

http://www.mwdh2o.com/PDF_About_Your_Water/2015%20IRP%20Update%20Report%20(web)

http://www.mwdh2o.com/PDF_About_Your_Water/2015%20IRP%20Update%20Report%20(web)

http://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RR1144.html

http://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RR1144.html

http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00139157.2013.803884

http://www.malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartI/TitleIII/Chapter30/Section61

http://www.malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartI/TitleIII/Chapter30/Section61

http://www.malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartI/TitleIII/Chapter30/Section61

https://assembly.state.ny.us/leg/?bn=A06558&term=2013

https://assembly.state.ny.us/leg/?bn=A06558&term=2013

http://www.opc.ca.gov/climate-change/planning-for-sea-level-rise-database/

http://www.opc.ca.gov/climate-change/planning-for-sea-level-rise-database/

http://dx.doi.org/10.7916/D870812J

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.envsci.2016.05.006

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.envsci.2016.05.006

http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01944360508976690

http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01944360508976690

http://dx.doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)NH.1527-6996.0000063

http://dx.doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)NH.1527-6996.0000063

http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/challe3020183

http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/challe3020183

http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=12626

http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=12626

1344 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions – References

143. GAO, 2016: Climate Change: Selected Governments
Have Approached Adaptation Through Laws and
Long-Term Plans. GAO-16-454. U.S. Government
Accountability Office (GAO), Washington, DC, 26 pp.
https://www.gao.gov/assets/680/677075

144. Wilhite, D.A. and R.S. Pulwarty, 2017: Drought and
Water Crises: Integrating Science, Management, and
Policy, 2nd ed. Taylor & Francis Group, CRC Press,
Boca Raton, FL, 582 pp.

145. Bassett, E. and V. Shandas, 2010: Innovation and
climate action planning. Journal of the American
Planning Association, 76 (4), 435-450. http://dx.doi.or
g/10.1080/01944363.2010.509703

146. Lyles, W. and M. Stevens, 2014: Plan quality evaluation
1994–2012: Growth and contributions, limitations,
and new directions. Journal of Planning Education
and Research, 34 (4), 433-450. http://dx.doi.
org/10.1177/0739456×14549752

147. Hughes, S., 2015: A meta-analysis of urban climate
change adaptation planning in the U.S. Urban
Climate, 14, Part 1, 17-29. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.
uclim.2015.06.003

148. Highfield, W.E. and S.D. Brody, 2013: Evaluating
the effectiveness of local mitigation activities in
reducing flood losses. Natural Hazards Review,
14 (4), 229-236. http://dx.doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)
NH.1527-6996.0000114

149. Mimura, N., R.S. Pulwarty, D.M. Duc, I. Elshinnawy,
M.H. Redsteer, H.Q. Huang, J.N. Nkem, and
R.A.S. Rodriguez, 2014: Adaptation planning and
implementation. Climate Change 2014: Impacts,
Adaptation, and Vulnerability. Part A: Global and
Sectoral Aspects. Contribution of Working Group II to
the Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental
Panel of Climate Change. Field, C.B., V.R. Barros,
D.J. Dokken, K.J. Mach, M.D. Mastrandrea, T.E. Bilir,
M. Chatterjee, K.L. Ebi, Y.O. Estrada, R.C. Genova,
B. Girma, E.S. Kissel, A.N. Levy, S. MacCracken,
P.R. Mastrandrea, and L.L. White, Eds. Cambridge
University Press, Cambridge, United Kingdom and
New York, NY, USA, 869-898.

150. Pulwarty, R.S., C. Simpson, and C.R. Nierenberg,
2009: The Regional Integrated Sciences and
Assessments (RISA) program: Crafting effective
assessments for the long haul. Integrated Regional
Assessment of Global Climate Change. Knight, C.G.
and J. Jäger, Eds. Cambridge University Press,
Cambridge, UK, 367-393. http://books.google.com/
books?id=B8O31ILKKOMC

151. Parris, A.S., G.M. Garfin, K. Dow, R. Meyer, and
S.L. Close, Eds., 2016: Climate in Context: Science
and Society Partnering for Adaptation. John Wiley
& Sons, Chichester, UK, 274 pp. http://dx.doi.
org/10.1002/9781118474785

152. Hallegatte, S., 2009: Strategies to adapt to an
uncertain climate change. Global Environmental
Change, 19 (2), 240-247. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.
gloenvcha.2008.12.003

153. Kunreuther, H.C., E.O. Michel-Kerjan, N.A. Doherty,
M.F. Grace, R.W. Klein, and M.V. Pauly, 2011: At War
with the Weather: Managing Large-Scale Risks in a
New Era of Catastrophes. The MIT Press, 440 pp.

154. Kates, R.W., W.R. Travis, and T.J. Wilbanks, 2012:
Transformational adaptation when incremental
adaptations to climate change are insufficient.
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the
United States of America, 109 (19), 7156-7161. http://
dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1115521109

155. Lonsdale, K., P. Pringle, and B.L. Turner, 2015:
Transformative Adaptation: What It Is, Why It Matters
& What Is Needed. UK Climate Impacts Programme,
University of Oxford, Oxford, UK, 40 pp. https://
ukcip.ouce.ox.ac.uk/wp-content/PDFs/UKCIP-
transformational-adaptation-final

156. Pelling, M., 2010: Adaptation to Climate Change: From
Resilience to Transformation. Routledge, Abingdon,
UK, 224 pp.

157. Park, S.E., N.A. Marshall, E. Jakku, A.M. Dowd, S.M.
Howden, E. Mendham, and A. Fleming, 2012: Informing
adaptation responses to climate change through
theories of transformation. Global Environmental
Change, 22 (1), 115-126. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.
gloenvcha.2011.10.003

158. City of Los Angeles, 2018: One water LA [web site].
ht tps://w w w.laci tysan.org/san/faces/home/
portal/s-lsh-es/s-lsh-es-owla

159. Hirokawa, K.H. and J. Rosenbloom, 2013: Climate
change adaptation and land use planning law.
Research Handbook on Climate Change Adaptation
Law. Verschuuren, J., Ed. Edward Elgar Publishing,
Cheltenham, UK and Northampton, MA, 325-354.

160. Flatt, V.B., 2012: Adapting laws for a changing world:
A systemic approach to climate change adaptation.
Florida Law Review, 64 (1), 269-293. https://
scholarship.law.ufl.edu/flr/vol64/iss1/6/

https://www.gao.gov/assets/680/677075

http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01944363.2010.509703

http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01944363.2010.509703

http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0739456×14549752

http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0739456×14549752

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.uclim.2015.06.003

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.uclim.2015.06.003

http://dx.doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)NH.1527-6996.0000114

http://dx.doi.org/10.1061/(ASCE)NH.1527-6996.0000114

http://books.google.com/books?id=B8O31ILKKOMC

http://books.google.com/books?id=B8O31ILKKOMC

http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/9781118474785

http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/9781118474785

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2008.12.003

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2008.12.003

http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1115521109

http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1115521109

https://ukcip.ouce.ox.ac.uk/wp-content/PDFs/UKCIP-transformational-adaptation-final

https://ukcip.ouce.ox.ac.uk/wp-content/PDFs/UKCIP-transformational-adaptation-final

https://ukcip.ouce.ox.ac.uk/wp-content/PDFs/UKCIP-transformational-adaptation-final

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2011.10.003

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2011.10.003

https://www.lacitysan.org/san/faces/home/portal/s-lsh-es/s-lsh-es-owla

https://www.lacitysan.org/san/faces/home/portal/s-lsh-es/s-lsh-es-owla

https://scholarship.law.ufl.edu/flr/vol64/iss1/6/

https://scholarship.law.ufl.edu/flr/vol64/iss1/6/

1345 Fourth National Climate AssessmentU.S. Global Change Research Program

28 | Reducing Risks Through Adaptation Actions – References

161. Moser, S.C. and J.A. Ekstrom, 2010: A framework to
diagnose barriers to climate change adaptation.
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of
the United States of America, 107 (51), 22026-22031.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1007887107

162. Turner, A., S. White, J. Chong, M.A. Dickinson, H.
Cooley, and K. Donnelly, 2016: Managing Drought:
Learning From Australia. University of Technology,
Institute for Sustainable Futures Broadway, NSW,
Australia, 93 pp. http://pacinst.org/publication/
managing-drought-learning-from-australia/

163. Stein, B.A. and M.R. Shaw, 2013: Biodiversity
conservation for a climate-altered future. Successful
Adaptation to Climate Change: Linking Science and
Policy in a Rapidly Changing World. Moser, S. and M.
Boycoff, Eds. Routledge, London, 67-80.

164. Stults, M. and S.C. Woodruff, 2017: Looking under
the hood of local adaptation plans: Shedding light
on the actions prioritized to build local resilience to
climate change. Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies
for Global Change, 22 (8), 1249-1279. http://dx.doi.
org/10.1007/s11027-016-9725-9

165. Olsen, J.R., J. Kiang, and R. Waskom, 2010: Workshop
on Nonstationarity, Hydrologic Frequency Analysis,
and Water Management [Boulder, CO]. Colorado
Water Institute Information Series No. 109. Colorado
State University, Colorado Water Institute, Fort
Collins, CO, 304 pp. http://www.cwi.colostate.edu/
media/publications/is/109

166. Fahey, D.W., S. Doherty, K.A. Hibbard, A. Romanou, and
P.C. Taylor, 2017: Physical drivers of climate change.
Climate Science Special Report: Fourth National
Climate Assessment, Volume I. Wuebbles, D.J., D.W.
Fahey, K.A. Hibbard, D.J. Dokken, B.C. Stewart, and
T.K. Maycock, Eds. U.S. Global Change Research
Program, Washington, DC, USA, 73-113. http://dx.doi.
org/10.7930/J0513WCR

167. Galloway, G.E., 2011: If stationarity is dead, what do
we do now? JAWRA Journal of the American Water
Resources Association, 47 (3), 563-570. http://dx.doi.
org/10.1111/j.1752-1688.2011.00550.x

168. Ray, P.A. and C.M. Brown, 2015: Confronting Climate
Uncertainty in Water Resources Planning and Project
Design: The Decision Tree Framework. World Bank
Group, Washington, DC, 125 pp. http://dx.doi.
org/10.1596/978-1-4648-0477-9

169. Bierbaum, R., J.B. Smith, A. Lee, M. Blair, L. Carter, F.S.
Chapin, P. Fleming, S. Ruffo, M. Stults, S. McNeeley,
E. Wasley, and L. Verduzco, 2013: A comprehensive
review of climate adaptation in the United States:
More than before, but less than needed. Mitigation
and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change, 18 (3), 361-
406. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11027-012-9423-1

170. NRC, 2010: Informing an Effective Response to
Climate Change. America’s Climate Choices: Panel on
Informing Effective Decisions and Actions Related to
Climate Change. National Research Council, Board
on Atmospheric Sciences and Climate, Division on
Earth and Life Studies, National Academies Press,
Washington, DC, 348 pp. http://www.nap.edu/
catalog.php?record_id=12784

171. Kunreuther, H., G. Heal, M. Allen, O. Edenhofer,
C.B. Field, and G. Yohe, 2013: Risk management and
climate change. Nature Climate Change, 3 (5), 447-
450. http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nclimate1740

http://dx.doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1007887107

Managing Drought: Learning from Australia

Managing Drought: Learning from Australia

http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11027-016-9725-9

http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11027-016-9725-9

http://www.cwi.colostate.edu/media/publications/is/109

http://www.cwi.colostate.edu/media/publications/is/109

http://dx.doi.org/10.7930/J0513WCR

http://dx.doi.org/10.7930/J0513WCR

http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1752-1688.2011.00550.x

http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1752-1688.2011.00550.x

http://dx.doi.org/10.1596/978-1-4648-0477-9

http://dx.doi.org/10.1596/978-1-4648-0477-9

http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11027-012-9423-1

http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=12784

http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=12784

http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nclimate1740