CLIMAS UpdateNews from the Climate Assessment for the Southwest Project

Volume 8, Number 2November 2005

Integrating science, policy, and community

CLIMAS MissionCLIMAS was established to assess the impacts of climate variability and longer-term climate change on human and natural systems in the Southwest. Our mission is to improve the ability of the region to respond sufficiently and appropriately to climatic events and climate changes.

Arizona drought plan: communities, collaboration, and challengesB� N���� H��� ��� G���� G�����

The Upper Li�le Colorado River Basin (ULCRB) in northeastern Arizona re-cently endured the same sort of severe sustained drought that has periodi-cally tested the adaptability of south-western societies for more than 10,000 years.

The parched conditions ravaged the ULCRB and prompted CLIMAS graduate researcher Alexa Gilbert to study how this drought-prone rural region might respond to twenty-first century drought planning, mitigation, and adaptation measures outlined by Arizona’s first drought plan.

Completed in October 2004, the Arizona Drought Preparedness Plan (ADPP) is designed to mitigate the impacts of drought through rigorous drought monitoring and improved communication between state agencies and Arizona communities. Though the plan lacks regulatory authority, it pres-ents explicit drought mitigation and response measures associated with four levels of drought status, and rec-ommendations for community moni-toring and drought planning on local and regional levels. One recommenda-tion—that all Arizona water providers submit drought and water conserva-tion plans to the Arizona Department of Water Resources (ADWR)—was included in a 2005 law approved by the Arizona Legislature.

The ADPP also calls for local groups to help monitor the effects of drought, improve local drought planning capacity, and improve communica-tion between localities and the state’s

drought monitoring commi�ee. Suc-cessful drought mitigation hinges on local and state collaboration, which can be tinged with tension, and ham-pered by hidden barriers.

Arriving in the ULCRB in January 2005, Gilbert interviewed sixteen key decision makers from the region to explore potential obstacles to imple-menting the drought plan. These in-clude geographic boundaries, social tensions, and specific drought plan mitigation or response recommen-dations for rural communities. The decision makers included water pro-viders, land managers, staff from non-governmental organizations, irrigation district leaders, municipal officials, and others familiar with the sustained drought that persisted in the region between 1996 and 2004. During that time, reduced rainfall and water levels proved detrimental to forage and crop

Upcoming workshops

USGS Wildland Fire Science Workshop; December 6–9 2005; Tucson, AZ http://www.ag.arizona.edu/srnr/usgs/

Beyond Boxes and Arrows: as-sessing climate change/vari-ability and ecosystem impacts/responses in southwestern rangelands; January 25-26, 2006, San Carlos, AZ; http://azrangelands.org

Association of American Geog-raphers Annual Meeting 2006; March 7–11, 2006; Chicago, ILhttp://www.aag.org/annual-meetings

4th NOAA Climate Predictions and Applications Science; March 21–24, 2006, Tucson, AZhttp://cals.arizona.edu/climate/CPASW2006/

7th International Conference on Dendrochronology; June 11–17, 2006; Beijing, Chinahttp://7thicd.ibcas.ac.cn/pages/index.asp

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CLIMAS Update, page 2

Future climate-driven ecosystem changes in the SouthwestB� A������ D����

Increasing carbon dioxide is expected to raise global temperatures 2.5 °F to 10.5 °F over the next century. This will likely alter the amount, seasonality, and intensity of precipitation on global and regional scales. One of the more susceptible biomes to climate change is the desert grassland, which covers 193,051 square miles and ranges from southeast Arizona to central Texas in the north, and Mexico City, Mexico to the South. Jonathan Overpeck, Director of the UA’s Institute for the Study of Planet Earth and CLIMAS lead principal investigator, and Al-lison Drake, a recent graduate of the Department of Geosciences at the University of Arizona, and have been researching how future climate may drive ecosystem changes in southwest-ern North America.

How southwestern semidesert grass-land may change with rising carbon dioxide, temperature warming, and altered precipitation will depend on the complicated interactions of seasonal climate change and other disturbances, including the spread of nonnative species, grazing, fire, and drought frequency. Overpeck and Drake custom-ized a plant-soil ecosystem model to examine the impacts of a range of pos-sible seasonal changes in temperature and precipitation on the desert grass-land. The results suggest that changing climate will have dramatic conse-quences for desert grassland, surrounding woodlands, and forests, and thus for land management in the southwestern United States.

Warmer and we�er winters combined with periods of drought are perhaps the most likely future climate outcome under doubled carbon dioxide condi-tions. Modeling results indicate this scenario will result in extensively greater grass growth, causing an increase in fire risk during fire season. The grow-ing presence of invasive grasses, such as buffelgrass pictured above, will exacerbate the risk of widespread grass-driven fire, and pose a major threat to rangelands as well as to the saguaro cacti and other Sonoran Desert icons. Alternatively, if future climate is warmer and drier, a loss of vegetation cover will lead to increased erosion and degradation of rangelands.

The magnitude and direction of greenhouse gas-driven climate change is not certain. That uncertainty makes it ever more important that we prepare for all possible ecosystem changes and their consequences to help protect and pre-serve the much-valued vegetation and wildlife of the Southwest. The findings of this research should allow land managers to begin to understand the impacts that climate may have in the Southwest 70 to 100 years from now, so they can begin to develop alternative management strategies for the near future.

growth, domestic water wells, and recreation. Forest health declined with widespread drought-induced tree mortality. And devastating fires swept through the region, displacing many residents and destroying property.

Water supply: perceptions and tensionThe vast majority of Gilbert’s inter-viewees agreed that drought planning is unnecessary because the region re-ceives an ample water supply from the C- and N-groundwater aquifers. Water providers in the region have emer-gency curtailment plans required by the Arizona Corporation Commission, though none of them have drought contingency plans aside from drilling additional wells.

While most participants voiced li�le concern over the water supply, all of them expressed apprehension over pending adjudication involving water rights in the basin. Among those in-volved in the litigation include Native American tribes, businesses, ranches, municipalities, the state of Arizona, and irrigation companies.

Some irrigators saw themselves as vulnerable to losing their livelihood if they lose water rights, while others found it difficult to predict future ir-rigated acreage.

ULCRB decision makers expressed oposition to interbasin water transfers, saying only potential transfers be-tween adjacent towns were acceptable.

Water providers’ concernsAnother concern expressed by study participants was that local water providers lack the funds to carry out drought planning and prepared-ness measures. Some measures, such as improving aging infrastructure, fixing leaks, and collecting data on current use and supply, might be considered routine maintenance, rather than drought planning. The interview results suggest that drought

Drought plan, continued

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Figure 1: Buffelgrass, an invasive spe-cies spreading through desert grasslands. Photo credit: Mark Dimmitt

CLIMAS Update, page 3

Climate variability impacts on parksB� G����� F�������

National parks in the southwestern United States annually a�ract more than 26 million visitors who spend more than $1.3 billion in the surrounding com-munities. According to National Park Service estimates, one local job and more than $18,000 in local personal income is generated for every 1,000 visits. Therefore, changes in nature-based tourism can have significant impacts on the local economies of many rural counties.

Graduate student Srinivasa Ponnaluru and Professor George Frisvold, both of the UA Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics and part of the CLIMAS team, have completed a study of economic and environmental factors affecting the number of annual visits to southwestern national parks. The study tracked park visits in Arizona, New Mexico, and parts of southern California, Nevada, and Utah over 23 years, from 1980 to 2003.

Park visits depend on population, economic growth, gasoline prices, ex-change rates, and the characteristics of the parks themselves, including size, age, facilities, and unique features. The study examined the impacts of climate variability on park visits, using statistical analysis to control for economic, demographic, and other factors. One important way that climate affects recreation demand is through drought impacts on reservoir levels and water-based recreation. Lake Mead National Recreation Area and Glen Can-yon National Recreation Area—home to Lake Powell—account for 40 percent of all visits to Southwest parks. Some key preliminary findings of this study are:

For Lake Powell and Glen Canyon National Recreation Area, annual vis-its fall about 5 percent for every 1 percent drop in reservoir levels.

Annual visits fall by 2.3 percent for every 10 percent increase in the price of gasoline, suggesting that we should see a significant decrease in the number of visits in 2005 and 2006.

The Cerro Grande Fire accounted for a decrease of more than 66,000 visits to Bandelier National Monument in 2000.

Ongoing research will examine how changes in park visits affect local econo-mies in areas around parks and extend the analysis to examine factors affect-ing visits to state parks.

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Recent CLIMAS PublicationsBooks and Book ChaptersColby, B. G., J. Thorson and S. Bri�on. 2005. Negotiating Tribal Water Rights. University of Arizona Press, Tucson, AZ.

Hartmann, H. C. 2005. Use of climate information in water resources man-agement. In Anderson, M. G. (ed.), En-cyclopedia of Hydrological Sciences. John Wiley and Sons Ltd., West Essex, UK.

Pulwarty, R. S., K. L. Jacobs, and R. M. Dole. 2005. The Hardest Working River: Drought and Critical Water Problems in the Colorado River Basin. In Don Wilhite (ed.), Drought and Water Crises: Science, Technology, and Management Is-sues, Marcel Dekker Inc., NY, NY.

JournalsColby, B. G., and P. Orr. 2005. Economic Tradeoffs in Preserving Riparian Habi-tat. Natural Resources Journal, 45(1).

Comrie, A. C., 2005. Climate factors influencing coccidioidomycosis sea-sonality and outbreaks. Environmental Health Perspectives 113:688-692.

Hessburg, P. F., E. E. Kuhlman, and T. W. Swetnam, 2005. Examining the recent climate through the lens of ecology: Inferences from temporal pat-tern analysis. Ecological Applications 15(2):440–457.

Jacobs, K., G. M. Garfin, B. J. More-house. 2005. Climate Science and Drought Planning: the Arizona Experi-ence. Journal of the American Water Re-sources Association 41(2):437–445.

Jacobs, K., G. M. Garfin, and M. Len-art. 2005. More than just talk: Con-necting Science and Decision-making. Environment 47(9):6–21.

Lemos, M. C., and B. J. Morehouse. 2005. The co-production of science and policy in integrated climate assess-ments. Global Environmental Change 15: 57–68.

Park, B. J., K. Sigel, V. Vaz, K. Kom-atsu, C. McRill, M. Phelan, T. Colman,

A. C. Comrie, D. W. Warnock, J. N. Galgiani, and R. A. Hajjeh. 2005. An epidemic of coccidioidomycosis in Ar-izona associated with climate changes, 1998–2001. Journal of Infectious Diseases 191:1981–1987.

Wise, E. K., and A. C. Comrie. 2005. Meteorologically-adjusted urban air quality trends in the southwestern United States. Atmospheric Environment 39:2969–2980.

Wise, E. K. and Comrie A. C., 2005. Extending the KZ filter: application to ozone, particulate ma�er and meteoro-logical trends. Journal of the Air and Waste Management Association 55:1208–1216.

Conference Proceedings Lenart, M., T. Brown, H. Hockenberry, and G. M. Garfin. 2005. National Sea-sonal Assessment Workshop: Eastern & Southern States. January 19–21, 2005, Shepherdstown, WV.

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CLIMAS Update, page 4

Niina Haas is the new CLIMAS core office social scientist and editor of CLIMAS Update. She previously worked as project coordinator for the Tucson Urban Poverty Project in the Univer-sity of Arizona’s Bureau of Applied Research in Anthropology. Haas has a Master of Arts in applied anthropology from Northern Arizona University. Among her many CLIMAS projects, Haas is developing effective measures for evaluation of climate knowledge transfer programs.

Ben Crawford, the new CLIMAS core office climate scientist, has a Master of Science in Geog-raphy from Indiana University’s atmospheric science program. Crawford’s previous research characterized heat and carbon dioxide fluxes in urban Baltimore. Crawford’s CLIMAS respon-sibilities include research on Southwest climate, climate change, and drought impacts.

Alex McCord is a part-time CLIMAS researcher working on the monthly Southwest Climate Outlook and investigations of pre-instrumental precipitation variations in Arizona and New Mexico. McCord recently retired from the Arizona Division of Emergency Management. He earned his PhD in Geosciences at the UA Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research, and has co-au-thored several reports on the geomorphology of the canyon country in Arizona and Utah.

CLIMAS welcomes three new assistant researchers

B� N���� H���

The Planning Workshop to Develop Hydroclimatic Reconstructions for De-cision Support in the Colorado River Basin was held in May. It brought together water managers and paleocli-mate scientists from the western US to discuss and exchange ideas about ap-plications of paleoclimatic data to wa-ter management and decision making.

CLIMAS, with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Na-tional Climatic Data Center (NOAA-NCDC) Paleoclimatology Program, Western Water Assessment, NOAA Climate Diagnostics Center, Univer-sity of Arizona Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research, and National Science Foundation’s center for Sustainable semi-Arid Hydrology and Riparian Areas (SAHRA), convened the work-shop. Two NOAA programs, Climate Change Data and Detection and Hu-

man Dimensions of Global Change Research, funded the event. Stakeholder presentations informed scientists about efforts by major ur-ban water providers to use tree-ring derived streamflow reconstructions in modeling, management, and decision making. Management participants learned how scientists develop the reconstructions, and received updated Colorado River Basin (CRB) stream-flow reconstructions.

The centerpieces of the workshop were breakout sessions during which water managers and scientists identified de-cision and planning issues that could benefit from information on long-term hydroclimatic variability and key gaug-es for hydroclimatic reconstructions.

One exciting workshop outcome is the co-development of a primer on climate variability and change in the CRB by

Western Water Assessment, CLIMAS, the Western Regional Climate Center, and other researchers and water man-agers. The primer project was initi-ated by Jeanine Jones of the California Department of Water Resources and Connie Woodhouse of the NOAA-NCDC Paleoclimatology Program. The primer will be presented at the annual meetings of the Association of Califor-nia Water Agencies and the Colorado River Water Users Association.

Workshop brings together water managers and scientists

Niina Haas

Ben Crawford

Alex McCord

Figure 2: An example of tree-rings. Photo credit: UCAR

CLIMAS Update, page 5

Publications, continued

Lenart, M., T. Brown, H. Hockenberry, and G. M. Garfin. 2005. National Sea-sonal Assessment Workshop: Western States & Alaska. March 28–April 1, 2005. Boulder, CO.

2005 presentationsBark-Hodgins, R. H., and B. G. Colby. Climate variability and change: the eco-nomic vulnerability of the skiing industry and surrounding communities in Arizona, USA. American Meteorological Soci-ety, 15th Conference on Applied Cli-matology. Savannah, GA, June 2005.

Bark-Hodgins, R. H., D. E. Osgood, B. G. Colby. Hedonic valuation of urban riparian amenities using remote sensing data. American Agricultural Econom-ics Association, Annual Meeting. Providence, RI, July 2005.

Bark-Hodgins, R. H., D. E. Osgood, B. G. Colby, G. Katz, J. Stromberg. Do homebuyers care about the quality of natural habitats? American Agricultural Economics Association, Annual Meet-ing. Providence, RI, July 2005.

Comrie, A. C., R. Neff, C. Sorrensen, and B. Yarnal. Grounded Assessment: Using grounded theory and mixed methods in vulnerability assessments. IGU Workshop on Making Sense of Vulnerability: Social and Critical En-gagements. Dundee, Scotland, March 10–11, 2005

Comrie, A. C., R. Neff, C. Sorrensen, and B. Yarnal. Grounded Assessment: Using grounded theory and critical per-spectives in vulnerability assessments. 101st Annual Meeting of the Associa-tion of American Geographers. Den-ver, CO, April 5–9, 2005.

Comrie, A. C. Air Quality Trends in the Southwest US. Cooperative Institute for Research in the Atmosphere, Colorado State Univsity. Ft. Collins, CO, May 2005.

Comrie, A. C. Climate Controls on valley Fever. Mycology Research Unit, Arizo-na Health Sciences Center, University

of Arizona. Tucson, AZ, June 2005.Comrie, A. C., and J. McPhee. Down-scaling Seasonal Climate Predictions for Local Applications. 15th Conference on Applied Climatology, American Me-teorological Society. Savannah, GA, June 19–23, 2005.

Comrie, A. C. Reconciling Supply and Demand for Climate Information in CLI-MAS. SPARC/RISA NSF workshop, East-West Center/University of Hawaii. Honolulu, HI. August 14–17, 2005.

Comrie, A. C. Authors Meet The Editors (Panelist). Association of Pacific CoastGeographers Annual Meeting. Phoe-nix, AZ, October 19–22, 2005.

Garfin, G. M. The CLIMAS Perspective on Climate Services. 15th Conference on Applied Climatology, American Meteorological Society. Savannah, GA, June 19–23, 2005.

Garfin, G. M. Climate, Drought and Wa-ter Management. Arizona Water Sum-mit. Flagstaff, AZ, August 4, 2005.

Garfin, G. M., K. Jacobs, M. Crimmins. Arizona Drought Planning Workshop. Arizona Hydrological Society Sympo-sium, September 21, 2005. Flagstaff, AZ.

Garfin, G. M., and N. Haas. Weathering the Big One: A Review of Coping with Se-vere Sustained Drought in the Southwest. New Mexico Drought Summit. Albu-querque, NM, October 5, 2005. Garfin, G. M., M. Crimmins, J. Weiss. A brief history of Southwest climate changes and a glimpse at the future. The 8th Biennial Conference of Research on the Colorado Plateau. November 9, 2005. Flagstaff, AZ. Lenart, M., G. M. Garfin, B. J. More-house, M. Vasquez-Leon, and A. C. Comrie. Climate Research and Products Relevant to Mountainous Regions: Input from Stakeholders. MTNCLIM. Pray, Montana, March 1–4, 2005.

You can find the most up to date information about recent CLIMAS publications, including down-loadable PDF files of conference proceedings, on the CLIMAS web-site publications page located at http://www.ispe.arizona.edu/cli-mas/pubs.html.

CLIMAS website

Lenart, M. Global Warming: Science, Impacts and Policy. Unitarian Church. Green Valley, AZ, June 12, 2005.

Sonne�, J., B. J. Morehouse, T. Finger, G. M. Garfin, and N. Ra�ray. Discur-sive Framing of Drought in the Desert Southwest. American Sociological As-sociation annual meeting. Philadel-phia, PA, August 2005.

Swetnam, T. Fire history and climate synthesis in western North America.Flagstaff, AZ, April 30–May 3, 2005. Swetnam, T. Postfire conversion of forest to non-forest: Do we need new theory? Ecological Society of America Meet-ings. Montreal, Canada, August 7–12, 2005.

Wise, E. K. Air Quality Impacts of Wild-fires in Southeastern Arizona. American Meteorological Society’s 15th Confer-ence on Applied Climatology. Savan-nah, GA, June 20–24, 2005.

CLIMAS Update, page 6

preparedness funding is weakest for installation of meters, interconnection of adjacent water systems, and public education and conservation programs.

The Water Infrastructure Finance Au-thority (WIFA) of Arizona funds infrastructure improvements and data collection. Gilbert found that there likely will be insufficient WIFA money to meet infrastructure improvement needs for drought mitigation and to comply with the new federal arsenic standard. Several water providers, particularly small private water sys-tems, will require assistance with both.

Resistance to drought plan Interviewees also believed basin residents most likely would resist a number of drought mitigation mea-sures suggested in the ADPP, includ-ing xeriscaping; restrictions on car washing; rate restructuring; the use of treated effluent; aquifer recharge; and use of alternative water sources, such as gray water and rain water harvesting. Some antipathy emerged from the interviews with regard to perceptions of extensive bureaucratic “red tape,” discouraging collabora-tion among municipal water systems managers. While bureaucracy may prevent collaboration between private

and municipal water systems, the lack of regulations regarding local growth and wildcat subdividing (unregulated lot-spli�ing) may hinder local munici-palities from adequately planning for water consumption.

Promise for the futureDespite the barriers, Gilbert’s research results present a silver lining. The resi-dents of the ULCRB possess extensive social capital, which will help build the capacity to plan for and cope with drought and collaborative manage-ment throughout the region.

Cooperation among diverse social groups strengthened in response to the Rodeo-Chediski Fire, and lent mo-mentum to successful multi-objective, multi-stakeholder sustainable forest management initiatives. For instance, a ten-year Apache-Sitgreaves National Forest stewardship project launched in 2004 elicits community input and sup-port for thinning dense stands in the wildland-urban interface, with hopes of reinvigorating the local timber in-dustry by encouraging a sustainable harvest of mostly small-diameter trees.

Gilbert’s work suggests that regional watershed partnerships can form a firm foundation for multi-stakeholder drought planning. For watershed part-nerships in the region to play a central role in local drought planning efforts, though, they must find a consensus for dealing with several issues: the lack of awareness of watershed partnerships’ activities among basin residents, a per-ceived lack of inclusiveness, the need for resources to staff partnership ef-forts and improve data collection, and the need for improved cooperation between partnerships in the basin.

Most importantly, Gilbert found that watershed partnerships improve drought planning by bringing together influential local leaders and securing funding for partnership activities.

Submissions and subscription informationCLIMAS Update is published each fall and spring. We welcome the submis-sion of items of interest. The editorial staff reserves the right to select and edit copy submitted for publication. All material in the newsletter may be reproduced, provided CLIMAS is acknowledged as the source. The newslet-ter is provided through the support of the National Oceanic and Atmospher-ic Administration (NOAA).

CLIMAS Update is distributed electronically through the CLIMAS-News List-serv. To subscribe to the listserv and recieve announcements about this newsletter, CLIMAS-sponsored events, new publications, and the latest drought updates visit http://www.ispe.arizona.edu/climas/subscribe.html

Deadline for next issue: March 15, 2006Send to: Niina Haas at niina@email.arizona.eduCLIMAS, Institute for the Study of Planet Earth,The University of Arizona, PO Box 210156, Tucson, AZ 85721CLIMAS Update is archived at http://www.ispe.arizona.edu/climas/pubs.html

Drought plan, continued

Figure 3. The Upper Little Colorado River Basin region of Arizona in January 2005.Photo credit: Alexa Gilbert