Climate Resilient Floodplains: Bringing Climate Science into Project Design
Presenter: Guillaume Mauger, Climate Impacts Group

Floodplains are home to a wide range of economic, cultural, and natural resources. Recent efforts have emphasized collaborative decision-making across multiple floodplain interests, as well as a more holistic perspective on watershed-scale planning. Although there is a strong desire to include climate change into these planning efforts, very little guidance has been developed to help incorporate climate impacts into risk assessments and project design. This presentation will describe the “Climate Resilient Floodplains” project, funded by NOAA as a first step at addressing this need. In this talk we will discuss two key aspects of the project: (1) a synthesis of climate change impacts on Puget Sound, developed as a resource for stakeholders, and (2) an evaluation of currently-funded projects to identify the specific climate data and research that is needed to inform project design or implementation. A companion presentation will describe the decision-making context, with examples, as well as the results of a series of in-person interviews designed to explore concerns and vulnerabilities of stakeholders.