Sunday, 28 January 2024
4:00 PM-5:15 PM: Sunday, 28 January 2024
Click here to view the recorded event.
Join us for a compelling fireside chat at the AMS 104th Annual Meeting’s Presidential Forum, exploring the multifaceted challenges and opportunities presented by climate change and emphasizing the importance of scientific advances, policy development, and public engagement.
Climate and environmental change are now altering our daily lives, and will dramatically affect our futures. Climate science is key to how we will all live in this changing environment, helping us understand what is happening and anticipate what is to come. But what can we do as scientists and professionals to ensure that our science is communicated and understood as a public service, and see that it is put to work to help build a solid future? Our 2024 AMS Presidential Forum will discuss how we can work to overcome significant barriers that limit the reach and impact of climate science, and of science-based responses to environmental change.
Moderated by distinguished and broadly recognized atmospheric scientist Dr. Kerry Emanuel, an expert on climate change and hurricane physics, a fireside chat will feature Monica Medina, President and CEO of the Wildlife Conservation Society, and Bob Inglis, Executive Director of RepublicEn.org. Both have fascinating stories to tell and are renowned for their broad and critical impact on advancing the societal response to climate change. AMS President Brad Colman will provide introductory comments.
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Monday, 29 January 2024
10:00 AM-10:45 AM: Monday, 29 January 2024
Coffee Break [Main Terrace (BCC), Camden Lobby (BCC), Hall E (BCC)]
Location: The Baltimore Convention Center
10:45 AM-12:00 PM: Monday, 29 January 2024
The expansion of weather modification activities and the long history of weather modification in this country could serve as a model for the more recently growing interest and research in climate interventions. This panel seeks to provide updates on the current issues that are being debated and discussed in the policy and research communities regarding weather and climate modification.
Extreme weather events as manifestations of the influence of climate stressors, environmental and infrastructure degradation, socioeconomic inequities, and population growth and migration are increasing the potential for natural disasters. These events are complex, dynamic, multi-variate, and non-linear, and operate across natural, constructed, and human systems and include a high degree of uncertainty in predictability. This drives the imperative that shared knowledge and mutual understanding of processes, relationships, and challenges must be part of the transdisciplinary collaborative research and partnership framework aimed at a better understanding of these phenomena while considering the human and social elements that are necessary to reduce vulnerabilities and build resilience to increasing disaster risk. To optimize the effectiveness of these partnerships toward informing solutions, it will be necessary to facilitate convergence of social, disaster, natural, computational, and engineering sciences. Partnerships bring together a diversity of perspectives that can frame and guide research and operations across the weather, water, climate enterprise to address complex problems and find methodologies and solutions that can be employed to manage the consequences of natural disasters. As an essential component of this framework, partners must accept the shared responsibility of ensuring that the next generation of professionals entering the workforce experiences an immersive education that is inherently transdisciplinary in science and engineering, as well as in practice. Institutions that are intentional in developing programs with convergent curricular frameworks, which includes an ethos of diversity, equity, inclusion, and justice, are likely to be at the vanguard of new and innovative approaches to solving some of the most complex problems associated with vulnerability and improving resilience. This set of invited presentations will focus on the value of partnerships in developing convergence research frameworks and, in turn, how convergence strengthens the relationship and cooperation between partners.
The Nation urgently needs a suite of expanded and enhanced Federal climate services to provide timely, easy-to-find, and understandable climate information and resources. A more nationally coherent approach to climate services is necessary to meet the diversity of user needs, coordinate across the Federal enterprise alongside non-Federal partners, and ensure users, including disadvantaged and underserved communities, are centered in this work. First, this session highlights the recently released Federal Framework and Action Plan for Climate Services from the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. The plan clarifies the understanding of the scope of climate services across the Federal Government, provides an initial framework for coordinating Federal agencies through the U.S. Global Change Research Program, and identifies specific actions that can be taken to build a more effective system of climate services for the Nation. Second, the session will also highlight how Federal agencies are already enhancing and expanding climate services to meet the needs of communities and decision makers across the Nation, including through the National Climate Resilience Framework. Agencies will discuss how the Framework is accelerating action to ensure coordinated, effective, and efficient development and delivery of climate services. Through the vigorous and sustained implementation of these important plans, the Federal Government, along with non-Federal partners, will be well-positioned to inform and support actions that build climate resilience.
This panel will discuss the current state of global, coupled climate modeling, the next phases in identifying and reducing model uncertainty, our ability to leverage an ever-increasing flow of environmental data, and the roles of government and industry in post-processing innovation.
The success of climate model projections has been scrutinized extensively over the past decade. Even as past model ensembles begin to show signs of verification as we approach the mid-21st century, the standard of deployable information for decision-makers continually becomes more stringent. The amount of available data through climate simulations and in situ and remote observation infrastructure has exploded. This has given rise to a variety of methods, including machine and deep learning, used to ingest, digest, and investigate the implications of modeling output as it pertains to global down to regional climatic trends and extremes. Across spatial and temporal scales, the predictability of various phenomena is subject to uncertainty introduced by observation gaps and assimilation, ensemble design, model complexity, and computational limitations. Discussion will center around the following key questions:
How do we assess and reduce the uncertainty in the near-term or coming decades? Research gaps in traditional modeling? What role will machine learning and deep learning serve in model initialization, execution, and post-processing? What techniques are available concerning convergent and divergent modeling solutions?
This session focuses on research at the intersections of climate change, extreme weather (e.g., tropical cyclones, wildfire smoke, heat, extreme cold), and public health.
12:00 PM-1:45 PM: Monday, 29 January 2024
Lunch Break
Location: The Baltimore Convention Center
12:15 PM-1:15 PM: Monday, 29 January 2024
3
An Intergenerational Conversation about Education, Training, and Mentorship
Location: 301 (The Baltimore Convention Center)
Over shared food and conversation, Symposium participants will engage in an intergenerational conversation about education, training, and mentorship. This conversation will begin with panel providing Symposium participants with the perspectives of a Panel of Indigenous students and early career scientists who have emerged from programs in colleges, universities, and research centers, including those that are institutional partners in the Rising Voices Center for Indigenous and Earth Sciences and will also include students currently participating in the RVCC Hub project.
1:45 PM-3:00 PM: Monday, 29 January 2024
4:30 PM-6:00 PM: Monday, 29 January 2024
6:00 PM-7:30 PM: Monday, 29 January 2024
Tuesday, 30 January 2024
10:00 AM-10:45 AM: Tuesday, 30 January 2024
Coffee Break [Main Terrace (BCC), Camden Lobby (BCC), Hall E (BCC), Hall F (BCC)]
Location: The Baltimore Convention Center
10:45 AM-12:00 PM: Tuesday, 30 January 2024
This presidential session will focus on the critical scientific challenge of separating anthropogenic signals from those associated with natural variability. Decades of work have delivered increasing clarity in this area and are enabling stronger science-based statements and more compelling advocacy. The Session will start with a keynote lecture by Ben Santer, this year's Rossby Medal winner. His keynote lecture will briefly summarize this scientific progress and the factors that enabled it. The end of the lecture will introduce the subject of event attribution, leading into a panel discussion of how climate scientists attempt to quantify the influence of human-caused climate change on the likelihood, physical properties, and impacts of extreme weather events.
As forecasts continue to improve and their use-inspired applications continue to expand, the urgency for an inclusive, equitable, resilient workforce in the weather, water, and climate enterprise grows. The changing landscape of career opportunities available for atmospheric and climate scientists after graduation must be addressed by broadening access to workforce-relevant training and adapting current educational experiences and training to better prepare students for the wide variety of future jobs. Navigating the changing workforce needs requires a collective effort with strategic intentionality for engaging underserved communities, creating educational experiences that are equitably available to the full spectrum of the future workforce, and to elevate and empower leaders who champion inclusive excellence, equity, and resiliency in the weather, water, and climate enterprise.
This session brings together leaders in the weather, water, and climate enterprise for a meaningful fireside-style discussion about navigating the changing world and to address the who and how of (a) recognizing and defining the changing workforce needs, (b) broadening access and dismantling barriers in education and training the future workforce, (c) creating and advancing novel education and training strategies, and (d) developing and sustaining the onramps to emerging careers.
Addressing the myriad problems posed by climate change requires participation from a diverse slate of actors centering their research questions, approach, and solutions around the communities most burdened by climate change. Yet, investigator-initiated research historically has overlooked this type of stakeholder- and community-driven involvement. The Department of Energy’s Urban Integrated Field Laboratories (IFL) aim to fill this gap and provide knowledge that informs equitable solutions that can strengthen community-scale resilience, and in this presidential session the Baltimore Social-Environmental Collaborative IFL will be highlighted as an example of this research paradigm.
The town and gown approach of the Baltimore Social-Environmental Collaborative IFL leverages the leadership and the lived experience from universities in and around Baltimore, city agencies, and local communities. Agency perspectives provided by the panel will describe how the IFL program will inform climate action, develop a toolkit of solutions, and serve as a magnet for involvement from other government agencies. Local perspectives featured on this panel will discuss work already underway to develop climate mitigation and resiliency efforts in Baltimore, how the IFL program accelerates community goals, and how to build grassroots capacity and power in the face of historical axes of marginalization. The roundtable portion of this presidential session will encourage audience engagement and feedback on the current state and future of the IFL program and Baltimore’s Social-Environmental Collaborative.
People are changing Earth's climate and these changes pose serious danger to humanity and all of life. The changes in climate that people are causing are larger and faster than any humanity is known to have endured. Addressing climate change must be a top priority, if humanity and all life is to thrive. Therefore, the undersigned scientific societies and media organizations commit to working together to inform all audiences about the challenges and opportunities facing humanity at this point in the 21st century by signing a joint pledge to work together on all fronts from a science-based position to mitigate today's prevalent dis/mis-information about climate change.
Confirmed Global Climate-Weather-Ocean Science Organizations:
- International Forum of Meteorological Societies,
- Canadian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society,
- China Meteorological Society,
- Indian Meteorological Society,
- Australian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society,
- Meteorological Society of Japan,
- Korean Meteorological Society,
- Royal Meteorological Society,
- American Geosciences Institute,
- African Meteorological Society,
- More...
12:00 PM-1:45 PM: Tuesday, 30 January 2024
Lunch Break
Location: The Baltimore Convention Center
12:15 PM-1:15 PM: Tuesday, 30 January 2024
Facilitating a Culture Change in Geosciences: Role of Professional Societies
Location: Ballroom I (The Baltimore Convention Center)
Geoscience culture – defined here as the shared values, norms, traditions and practices that result from years of experiences and interactions among scientists, their institutions, their professional societies, and their networks – is fraught with exclusionary and exploitative behaviors toward minoritized and marginalized communities. Professional societies help define and set standards for geoscience professions. Their unique influence flows from their highly visible functions that include: broad membership base, publishing journals, conferring awards and honors, influencing policy decisions, and raising public awareness on a variety of issues that are relevant to scientific disciplines. During a facilitated discussion, this town hall will engage Presidents and President-elects of major geoscience professional and scientific societies like AMS, AGU, TOS, GSA, etc. to reflect on actions that societies are taking to instigate a culture change, and advance diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging.
1:45 PM-3:00 PM: Tuesday, 30 January 2024
Aerosol-cloud interactions make a large but also very uncertain contribution to present-day global climate forcing; they are leveraged locally to induce or suppress precipitation (“cloud seeding”); and they are being considered as a possible mechanism for slowing climate warming through two climate intervention approaches (brightening low-lying marine clouds or thinning high-altitude cirrus clouds). While these categories of aerosol-cloud interactions have differences in being unintentional (the first) or intentional (the latter two), and with very different end-goals, all three share common physics and sources of uncertainty. Further, while cloud seeding is a technology historically used to enhance precipitation over local watersheds, some regions are now deploying larger-scale cloud seeding efforts to have more regional impacts on water resources, bringing the scale at which it would operate closer to that from inadvertent aerosol-cloud interactions or for climate intervention. All three have in common the need to better understand cloud responses to aerosol perturbations across a range of scales, how these responses depend on the background aerosol and meteorological conditions, and on feedbacks from the cloud responses back to the aerosol itself.
This session invites presentations on these processes, spanning climate forcing, regional precipitation enhancement, and regional-to-global climate intervention, using numerical modeling studies, analyses of observations of deliberate cloud seeding (e.g., SNOWIE), and studies of inadvertent analogues (e.g., ship tracks and contrails). This session aims to bring together scientists from both the weather and climate fields to foster dialogue in an area of common interest.
In our rapidly changing environment, climate mitigation and adaptation-related innovations are critical to ensuring future climate resilience. But how can we better foster such innovation? Protecting the intellectual property (IP) that underpins emerging technologies is a necessary step in promoting the sharing of knowledge and putting new innovations into use. Within the U.S. Department of Commerce, the U.S Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) understand how important the connection between IP and innovation is, and are taking steps to strengthen it. This panel brings together leaders from NOAA and USPTO to discuss the importance of protecting IP in the climate and blue economy space and the challenges and opportunities available to help protect it.
Wednesday, 31 January 2024
8:30 AM-10:00 AM: Wednesday, 31 January 2024
Climate Variability and Change exert powerful effects on global circulation, moisture availability, and the evolution of weather systems. In 2022-3 we have seen the impacts that winter weather can have, such as through the persistence of high-impact snowfall in California, where snow totals have broken records. There is high confidence that climate change is contributing to warmer temperatures, heavy precipitation extremes, drought, and heatwaves. There is less confidence in the effects of climate change on winter weather and its extremes. In recent years, research has focused on understanding how cold air outbreaks may be related to changes in high latitude and stratospheric circulation, and to characterize trends in winter weather severity and frequency in a warming world. There are also questions to be explored in the relationship between winter weather, cold waves, and natural variability; the role of both variability and climate change in future winter weather events; changes in winter storm evolutions, such as their intensity, phase type, and durations; and the ability of global and regional models to adequately simulate cool season dynamics, thermodynamics, and planetary circulations. This session aims to explore a broad array of questions related to these and other research areas that examine cool season phenomena, including both core science research, as well as impacts to society, ecosystems, health, and infrastructure. In 2023, we ran the first session in this topic area which was well received, suggesting that there is much more to be explored in this subject area.
10:00 AM-10:45 AM: Wednesday, 31 January 2024
Coffee Break [Main Terrace (BCC), Camden Lobby (BCC), Hall E (BCC), Hall F (BCC)]
Location: The Baltimore Convention Center
10:45 AM-12:00 PM: Wednesday, 31 January 2024
This session provides an overview of recent advances in prediction of atmospheric phenomena beyond the weather scale. Modern skill in short-term weather forecasting and climate-scale projections have increased stakeholder demand and scientific interest in the use of weather and climate data outside of traditional timeframes. The convergence of these interests is no more evident than in the Subseasonal to Seasonal (S2S) range. A myriad of approaches and tools are being implemented to increase skill in temperature, precipitation, and high impact event forecasts beyond two weeks. Traditionally, both climate- and weather-scale methods, primarily statistically-focused, have been ported to this temporal range. Innovative methods are bringing new perspectives and capabilities to this "gray area" of predictability setting the stage for broad dissemination of actionable S2S information across the economy.
Flash drought, characterized by its unusually rapid intensification, has garnered increasing attention in the physical science and impacts communities in recent years due to its compounding and cascading physical causes and socioeconomic effects. We invite submissions that advance our ability to monitor, understand, and predict the complex interactions between terrestrial, atmospheric, and oceanic processes that can be used to anticipate the effects and improve early warning of flash droughts in our changing climate. We also invite submissions that further our understanding of anthropogenic effects on flash drought and our understanding of the linkages between flash drought and impacts on energy, food, health, and water security.
Submitters: Andrew J. Hoell, NOAA/Physical Sciences Laboratory, Boulder, CO; Mike Hobbins, NOAA-Physical Sciences Laboratory, Boulder, CO; Hailan Wang, CPC, College Park, MD; Jason A Otkin, Univ. of Wisconsin-Madison, Space Science and Engineering Center, Madison, WI and Jordan I. Christian, School of Meteorology, Univ. of Oklahoma, NORMAN, OK
The Fifth National Climate Assessment (NCA5)—the preeminent source of climate information in the United States—is led by the US Global Change Research Program and scheduled for release in late 2023. The report is the result of process advancements in a number of areas: ensuring the inclusion of diverse perspectives, developing downscaled climate projections, providing editorial guidance to authors, documenting a transparent process, creating compelling graphics, and engaging with the public. The lessons learned from this work are particularly relevant to scientists and other assessment developers.
In this oral session, NCA5 staff will showcase new process advancements and efforts to evolve the assessment infrastructure.
As the global community grapples with the escalating consequences of climate change, the urgency for sustainable, impactful solutions has never been greater. It is within this context that climate intervention is being considered. Climate intervention refers to deliberate large-scale manipulation of the planetary environment to counteract anthropogenic climate change and includes both large-scale carbon dioxide removal (CDR) and sequestration technologies as well as solar radiation modification (SRM). There are substantial environmental, technical, and cost challenges in using CDR at the scale needed to significantly reduce global warming, and the slow response of the climate system makes it unlikely that CDR could be implemented rapidly enough or at sufficient scale to avoid potentially dangerous levels of climate warming in the coming decades. SRM is thus being considered as the only approach available to rapidly counter near-term climate warming; however, the extent to which SRM can reduce climate change hazards has not been robustly established, nor is there a full understanding of the extent to which SRM may introduce new risks to people and ecosystems. The panel will discuss the potential benefits, drawbacks, and uncertainties of each strategy, as well as the broad policy implications and the ethical dilemmas that arise around climate intervention. We invite attendees to come prepared with questions and a keen interest in this important discussion.
12:00 PM-1:45 PM: Wednesday, 31 January 2024
Lunch Break
Location: The Baltimore Convention Center
4:30 PM-6:00 PM: Wednesday, 31 January 2024
Artificial intelligence (AI) applied to the earth sciences has recently been a rapidly expanding field in both academic and industry spaces, due in part to its ability to extract nonlinear relationships from noisy data. The use of AI, particularly machine learning, can lead to identification of predictable signals from purely data-driven methods. Further, explainable AI techniques allow for opening of the AI “black box” to understand the model’s decision-making strategy. AI-driven advancements in climate predictability on subseasonal through multidecadal timescales, today and in a changing climate, allows for increased predictive skill and lead time, which can improve preparation. The use of AI in climate data analysis has cultivated actionable insights for the purpose of both scientific discovery and for managing climate risk.
We invite abstracts that discuss the use of AI for actionable insights, including high resolution climate forecasting and informing of adaptation and mitigation strategies, as well as using AI to isolate at-risk areas exposed to various climate impacts. This session also welcomes AI approaches applied to climate models and observational data that can be used by decision-makers and stakeholders for planning purposes. Equal consideration will be given to reproducible novel AI techniques, explainable and interpretable AI methods for exploring the climate system, sources of predictability on subseasonal-to-multidecadal timescales, and forecasts of opportunity.
6:00 PM-7:30 PM: Wednesday, 31 January 2024
Thursday, 1 February 2024
8:30 AM-10:00 AM: Thursday, 1 February 2024
This session invites abstracts leveraging AI tools to improve understanding and/or forecasting abilities of extreme rainfall and drought events.
Multiyear to decadal climate variability is a fundamental aspect of the global climate system. Major international efforts are underway to provide predictions that can help decision-maker planning for the next several years to decades, but the key mechanisms driving such long-term variations, and the differing sources of predictability on multiyear vs. decadal timescales, are still not fully understood. Processes both within ocean basins and inter-basin interactions are considered important at these timescales, but to-date the magnitude of these influences remains unknown, as is the impact of atmospheric/terrestrial processes. Separation of natural decadal variability from externally-forced components is also critical but challenging. This session invites contributions examining mechanisms of internal multiyear to decadal variability in the oceans, land, and/or atmosphere, studies attempting to isolate the internal and anthropogenically forced components and their interactions in observational and model datasets, and related prediction efforts using empirical/machine learning, theoretical and modeling approaches.
10:00 AM-10:45 AM: Thursday, 1 February 2024
10:45 AM-12:00 PM: Thursday, 1 February 2024
Dr. Lubchenco will participate in a "fireside chat" style conversation centered around the rollout of the Fifth National Climate Assessment (NCA5) and will also discuss broad Biden Administration climate and global change scientific research and development priorities. The Administration is spearheading new coordination efforts in climate services that will serve as foundational intelligence for strategic imperatives in Climate Linked Economics.
Hosted by AT&T’s Principal Meteorologist, Mark Papier, this conversation includes perspectives from NCA5 Director, Allison Crimmins, NCA5 Chief Environmental Economist, Solomon (Sol) Hsiang, AMS President Brad Colman, and Demex’s Chief Climate Officer and Chair of the Forum on Climate Linked Economics, Stephen Bennett.
Jane Lubchenco is the Deputy Director for Climate and Environment at the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy and the U.S. Sherpa to the Ocean Panel. She leads a stellar team that uses knowledge and innovation to help achieve America’s aspirations of a healthy environment, stable climate, and prosperous, equitable, secure communities. They work on a range of intersecting topics including climate change, nature, the ocean, polar regions, Indigenous Knowledge, equity and environmental justice. Lubchenco is a marine biologist and environmental scientist with leadership experience in academia, civil society, philanthropy, and government. She served on the National Science Board for 10 years (1996-2006), as Under Secretary of Commerce for Oceans and Atmosphere and NOAA Administrator (2009-2013), and the inaugural State Department’s Science Envoy for the Ocean (2014-2016). She began her current role at the White House in early 2021, on loan from Oregon State University (OSU). She is an elected member of numerous academies including the National Academy of Sciences (NAS), Royal Society, and Pontifical Academy of Sciences and has received numerous awards including 24 honorary doctorates, a MacArthur Fellowship, and the highest honors given by the NAS, National Science Board, and the U.S. Coast Guard. She received a B.A. in biology from Colorado College, a M.S. in zoology from University of Washington, and Ph.D. in ecology from Harvard University. She has held faculty appointments at Harvard, Stanford University, and OSU.
Keynote Speaker: Dr. Jane Lubchenco, Deputy Director for Climate and Environment of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP)
Host: Mark Papier
Guests: Allison Crimmins, Solomon Hsiang, Brad Colman, and Stephen Bennett
In an age where dis- and misinformation related to the earth system and global change are rampant, defining truth for the public good and promoting the communication of this truth within the weather-water-climate enterprise are paramount. This session brings together current leaders in the weather-water-climate enterprise and youth changemakers–the leaders of tomorrow. The session will include an opening message from the NOAA Administrator, Dr. Richard Spinrad, on NOAA’s mission of building a climate ready nation and its commitment to engaging youth and community through its newly defined strategic missions and goals. NOAA recognizes the power, knowledge, curiosity and fresh perspective that the young citizens of the world bring together to not only learn but also engage early-on, in the dialogues related to ocean, climate and our environmental crises. The session will also bring perspectives of an environmental education and justice advocate, Dr. Terris King, CEO of Kind Enterprise Group, LLC. and Dr. Brenda Ekwurzel, Director of Climate Science, Union of Concerned Scientists. The session will be moderated by NOAA’s new Youth Changemakers leaders, who will also share their eeBLUE Young Changemakers Fellowship projects related to climate change and its impacts on their local communities.
With the reality of climate change, there is a pressing need to sharply reduce greenhouse gas emissions across the global economy. The lowest-hanging fruit is to transition our energy generation sector from being dominated by fossil fuels to being fueled predominantly (or entirely) by carbon-free sources. However, there are many barriers that have limited the pace of adoption of carbon-free energy generation well below the baseline trend necessary to meet aggressive decarbonization goals set by governments around the world. In this panel discussion, we aim to explore what some of these barriers are and how we can overcome existing constraints as we accelerate the transition toward carbon-free energy generation.
Society is facing impacts from changes in the frequency and availability of two critical, tightly coupled environmental components – fire and water. Fire and associated smoke hazards are a growing problem, with climate science reports regularly noting the increasing frequency and likelihood of such events as the climate warms. Likewise, recent hydrologic droughts have created shocking images of depleted reservoirs and fears of more to come. Elevated temperatures affect trends in snow melt and snowpack, contributing to drought conditions. Increases in fire activity are due, in part, to drought conditions and elevated temperatures, and fire further affects water resources through changes in vegetation and landscape hydrologic response. To manage and adapt to these coupled societal impacts, many U.S. agencies coordinate internally and externally on research, applications, and operations related to the linkages of hydrometeorology, fire and smoke, and their associated feedbacks in our fast-changing environment. This session will bring together representatives from different agencies to discuss how they are responding to the changing fire and water climate, where they see the greatest threats, and the greatest opportunities for scientific cooperation to aid society.
12:00 PM-1:45 PM: Thursday, 1 February 2024
Lunch Break
Location: The Baltimore Convention Center
12:15 PM-1:15 PM: Thursday, 1 February 2024
Impacts of Hydrological Extremes on Marginalized Communities
Location: Holiday 4 (Hilton Baltimore Inner Harbor)
The panel discussion will focus on the impacts of hydrometeorological extremes (e.g. droughts, floods, landslides, and hurricanes) on marginalized communities. These extremes have the potential to exacerbate existing social inequalities and vulnerabilities. Inequities in drinking water access, for example, have been observed between urban and rural areas as well as in many regions globally. Marginalized populations disproportionately inhabit hazard-prone areas and have limited access to coping mechanisms, making them more vulnerable and potentially decreasing their resilience. It is crucial for scientific practices to engage with these communities and consider the social processes that contribute to their vulnerability. Addressing hydrological extremes and their impacts on marginalized communities requires inclusive and equitable policies, disaggregated data, and a comprehensive understanding of the complex interactions between hydrological processes and social dynamics. The panelists will highlight recent or ongoing studies on hazard impacts across various societal or racial classes during extreme events. We are honored to have three distinguished panelists who will join us to share their insights on the impacts of hydrological extremes on marginalized communities. Our panelists encompass a diverse group of experts, including a former member of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, an attorney and mediator specializing in water resource-related laws, and an esteemed urban climate scientist who received the Helmut E. Landsberg Award last year.
1:45 PM-3:00 PM: Thursday, 1 February 2024
4:30 PM-6:00 PM: Thursday, 1 February 2024
Although it is widely agreed that climate change is a severe global issue, the high level of uncertainty in global climate models may make it challenging for decision-makers to act with useful information. Making educated decisions requires quantifying the science and uncertainty to assist and advise federal agencies and/or major infrastructure owners (dams, bridges, levees, etc), especially as it relates to extreme precipitation events. Key to making informed decisions is estimating and developing reliable projections of potential changes in excessive precipitation, runoff, snowmelt, and other hydrologic drivers close to dams.
This session is predicated on the hypothesis that by using cutting-edge data science-based approaches, decision-makers may overcome the biases and other shortcomings of global climate model projections and obtain relevant information.
This session intends to provide decision-makers and experts on climate change with methodology and technical advice so they may use the available global climate models to make climate change informed decisions regarding extremes in water resources.
Submitters: David Paul Keeney, Water Resources Engineering and Management, Bureau of Reclamation, Denver, CO; Miles Yaw, Tennessee Valley Authority, Knoxville, TN; Devan Mahadevan, Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, Washington, DC, DC and Kent Walker, Water Resources Engineering and Management, Bureau of Reclamation, Denver, CO