[CANUFNET] Climate change adaptation strategies

[Amber Cantell via CANUFNET]

Good afternoon everyone,

I am with the Trees & Forests Advisory Committee here in London, Ontario,
and our committee is currently exploring ways the City's urban forestry
program could begin preparing for climate change. Projections for our area
for 2050 indicate upwards of 5 degrees in warming; by the end of the
century, it could be as high as 14 (based on some of the newest studies).
Consequently, we're feeling motivated to get to work (and planting) while
we still have some time.

I was curious to know what other municipalities, specifically, are doing to
plan for climate change within their urban forestry program.

It seems that so far, there is widespread acknowledgement of the massive
impacts climate change is going to have on trees and forests, but few
concrete steps being taken to prepare for it. It also seems that most of us
(and other organizations in the national and provincial park systems, etc.)
are at the point where we're all sort of holding our breath with regards to
assisted migration - I've read an enormous number of articles about
organizations preparing for and discussing the idea, but no one seems to
want to be the first to undertake it.... at least not in any official sense
beyond the "research" phase. It was interesting to hear about Andrew Almas'
study that showed that most municipalities are effectively already
unintentionally doing assisted migration (which makes sense in light of how
incredibly easy it is to buy plants from all sorts of places around the
world and the lack of regulation there), but, given the risks it could
involve, it'd be nice to see something being done in a purposeful and
thoughtful fashion. I have to admit to being personally curious about what
the point is where we "pull the trigger" - I imagine many of you have been
having similar thoughts.

In the meantime, our team has been working on coming up with a set of
recommendations for London. So far, we have:

- *Move from a blanket "Non-Native" vs. "Native" classification system* to
one where instead of just using "Native", we would have "Native" (for
plants native to our area pre-European settlement) and "Continentally
Native" (for species not currently native to London, but native to
continental North America, and therefore may potentially expand into our
area), and then using "Non-Native" for anything from elsewhere on the
planet. This approach would recognizing that it is natural for species
ranges to move north or south across the continent in response to climate,
but still allow us to do our best to exclude invasive species from other
continents (by far the bulk of the "invasive" species we deal with).

- *Defining principles for assisted migration* here in London and at what
stage we would consider what option (bringing up southern-adapted seed of
already native species vs. introducing new species, etc.)

- *Selecting a citywide "climate planning scenario" to create consistency
between different departments* in terms of what climate we are planning
for. Ultimately, the choice for what climate to plan for is a political one
(as it's based on what we think people will manage to accomplish in terms
of reducing emissions), but it is one that needs to be made, as it should
particularly bearing on forestry and stormwater infrastructure planning.

We've seen some ad hoc efforts to plan based on a specific scenario (for
example, one stormwater study in 2009 appears to have planned for a
scenario where emissions were assumed to have increased between 2000 and
2009 but then cease in 2009), but nothing citywide as of yet.

As a part of this, we would also likely be recommending that our city set a
schedule for checking on how projections are comparing with the IPCC
updates, and have capacity to move to a worse or better scenario as the
decades progress, based on how successful we are - or aren't - in reducing
emissions.

- *Creating a "Climate Change Sister City" network* to link communities
with "analogous climates" to share resources and suppliers - for example,
linking London to a city in the U.S. that has, today, the climate we might
be expecting for 2050.

By any chance are there any communities out there already undertaking any
of these ideas, or have suggestions for other ideas we may wish to consider
for London?

Many thanks!
Amber

-- 

Amber Cantell

Director of Programs, ReForest London

519-936-9548 x224

reforestlondon.ca <http://www.reforestlondon.ca>




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