CLIMATE CHANGE ACROSS THE NORTHEAST US: LOOKING BACK AND LOOKING AHEAD

Climate Changes. It always has and always will. What is unique today is that human activities are the primary driver of our changing climate. A wide variety of climate indicators show that the northeast United States has been warming over the past four-to-five decades and that this warming has already begun to impact a variety of ecosystems and economic sectors. Downscaling of general circulation model output for a range of emissions scenarios shows that New England will continue to get warmer and wetter, both extreme precipitation events and summertime drought will become more frequent, and snow will turn to rain. In addition, sea levels will continue to rise. These changes will continue to impact many sectors across the region, including marine resources, coastal infrastructure, agriculture, forestry, and winter recreation. The Northeast Climate Impacts Assessment concludes that the decisions we make over the next decade regarding how we produce and use energy will determine the future climate of New England.

Over the past decade states have all developed climate action plans that provide a roadmap to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions and serve as a driver of economic development. For example, detailed analysis completed for New Hampshire’s Climate Action Plan shows that improving our energy efficiency and developing local sources of energy can serve to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions, improve our economy and our energy security, and reduce our vulnerability to price spikes for oil and gas in the future. On the adaptation front, climate change impact assessments on the national and broad regional level detail the impacts of future climate change and variability, but are rarely sufficiently detailed to provide municipal and regional decision makers with decision relevant information. To address this, we have recently developed climate change assessements for coastal watersheds in Maine and New Hampshire that serve as the foundation for developing local adaptation planning to a changing climate. In lieu of action at the federal level, state based climate action plans and watershed based climate assessments combined with collaborative efforts on local to regional levels across New England hold promise for dealing with the challenges presented by our changing climate.