Katmai faces a number of unique natural resource and visitor use management challenges. Located in a remote location in the Alaskan Peninsula, the park protects habitats for numerous wildlife species including brown bears and salmon, and it provides exceptional access to undisturbed forests, watersheds, and volcanic areas. As a designated wilderness and backcountry area, park managers must balance the unimpaired quality of these natural and cultural resources with increasing visitor demand and the challenges of managing millions of backcountry acres. Adding to these challenges are the numerous climate impacts projected to occur in the park, and the Wilderness and Backcountry Management plan aimed to use scenario planning to integrate climate information into the decision-making process.

First, experts at the NPS Climate Change Response Program used climate modeling to create “climate futures,” which project how climate drivers like temperature, precipitation, and sea level rise might change into the future. Because of uncertainties in future global greenhouse gas emissions and differences in models, the futures span a range of possible conditions. These differences were grouped into three futures: “warm-wet” (moderate temperature rise and increasing rainfall), “warm-dry” (moderate temperature rise and decreasing rainfall), and “hot-wet” (severe temperature rise and increasing rainfall).

Next, we turned the “climate futures” into “climate scenarios” by analyzing how changes in climate drivers affect park resources. Planners identified key resources, such as brown bear habitat, natural watershed conditions, and opportunities for solitude, and we analyzed the impacts of climate conditions on each. Some resources were affected similarly under each climate future; warmer temperatures, for example are likely to increase the range of invasive species under every scenario. Others have big differences; for example, forests might see higher risk of forest fires under a warm-dry scenario, but higher flooding under wetter scenarios.

We then used these scenarios to refine the goals of the planning process. Plans often begin by establishing “desired conditions,” which are broad statements of what the plan hopes to achieve. I helped to examine the feasibility of each desired condition to make sure it was robust against all possible climate futures. Sometimes goals had to be refined. For example, increasing water temperatures may limit efforts to preserve natural salmon habitats, while increasing forest fire risks might create challenges for managing trails. Finally, we identified potential management actions to address climate impacts. To address changes on bear habitats, for example, managers might increase efforts to monitor bear populations, while visitor limitations, trails, and access areas might be changed to reduce risks to flooding and wildfire. Planners must consider how climate change affects both project goals and proposed actions as they look into the future.

Parks planners have many factors to weigh when thinking about how to manage natural and cultural resources, and climate change often deeply affects of these decisions. Using scenario planning in Katmai helped to ensure that plans are climate-informed, take into account multiple scenarios and consider future changes rather than just historical conditions. I look forward to continuing to develop frameworks for parks to include these considerations in their planning through my SIP fellowship!

Stay tuned for more updates on how climate change is being integrated into NPS planning processes!

These are the kinds of questions I am helping to address in my SIP fellowship. My name is Ben Harper and I am currently getting my master’s in Climate and Society from Columbia University, where I study the science of climate change, its impact on social systems, and policy to address it. I am interested in translating scientific knowledge to help decisionmakers ensure effective and equitable adaptation to climate change, and that is why I am excited to be working with the Denver Service Center (DSC) Planning Division this summer. The DSC provides support around the entire national parks system for a variety of planning processes, including natural and cultural resource stewardship and visitor use management. As a planning assistant, my role is to help with the integration of climate change across this spectrum of planning types. I also serve as a liaison with the NPS Climate Change Response Program, which provides research and technical expertise to help parks address climate change. Working with a variety of planners, natural resource specialists, and park managers, I help to identify how climate change impacts park goals, determine the best adaptation options, and develop plans to put them into practice. 

While parks have been adapting to climate change for some time, there is still a long way to go to fully integrate it into planning processes. In 2021, NPS published the report Planning for a Changing Climate (P4CC) that outlined two main principles for addressing climate change in planning processes. First, parks should establish forward-looking goals. Traditional natural resource management uses historical ranges as a baseline for decision making, but climate change creates “changing baselines” that force managers to rethink what is normal, from the extreme temperatures faced by over three-quarters of parks to the dangerous storm surges that threaten coastal park infrastructure and ecosystems. 

Second, parks should consider future climate conditions by using “scenario planning.” There is often a lot of uncertainty in climate projections–we don’t know what future human emissions will look like or the scale of some climate impacts, which means that  managers must consider a range of climate futures. In White Sands National Park, for example, planners had to find strategies that would be sufficient for both a “warm and wet” scenario with moderately increasing temperatures and increasing precipitation, and a “hot and dry” scenario with severely higher temperatures and decreasing precipitation. In my fellowship, my role is to help incorporate this guidance from P4CC into the entire portfolio of parks planning processes.

At the heart of my position is the integration of science into decision making, translating climate information into useful forms to ensure that park planners can make the best decisions possible. I am excited to be using my background and passion for science translation to help protect the incredible natural and cultural resources of our natural parks. My SIP fellowship is a remote position, which provides me with opportunities to work with park managers, planners, and scientists from across the NPS and learn about many possible actions for adapting to climate change. While climate change poses enormous challenges to the diverse services the national parks provide, I am optimistic that with strategic, long-term, informed planning efforts we can make our parks more resilient to these changes. 

Stay tuned for more updates this summer on how NPS is including climate adaptation in its planning strategies!