Increasing the Capacity for Municipal Climate Adaptation Planning in the Missouri River Basin

Increasingly, city leaders across the country are considering climate data and information as a guide for their comprehensive plans. Although there is a great deal of climate and climate change resources available, there unfortunately is an inadequate supply of climatologists available who can properly analyze and interpret the past, present, and future climate of each individual city in a manner that engages urban planners and city officials. Over the past year, High Plains Regional Climate Center staff has worked alongside city managers, planners, and other climatologists to understand climate information needs for different municipality departments in select cities in the Midwest and Great Plains. Preliminary results showed that regardless of broad similarities in climate among these cities, each location had very unique and specific concerns regarding a variety of issues ranging from heat and cold waves and their impacts on human health, cooling degree day requirements and energy needs, and heavy precipitation event frequency for runoff and water management impacts. A new project is coming online that will expand on this preliminary work in order to further delve into the critical precipitation thresholds associated with water resource management of municipalities of all sizes across the Missouri River Basin.