Workshops
Past Workshops Sponsored by WWETAC
Vegetation Models and Climate Change – January 23-25, 2008
Portland, Oregon
Lead: Becky Kerns & Terry Shaw
Introduction
National forest managers and planners operate in an uncertain world. To be effective, they have incorporated various forecasting tools such as vegetation management models in their planning and decisionmaking efforts. Managers and planners have incorporated information on new disturbances and have used new quantitative approaches in the past. Climate change is the latest issue to be addressed. The international discussions about climate change have been based on the use of quantitative models to project future climates and the impact of climate change on ecosystems. Public perceptions about climate change therefore are conditioned on these quantitative global projections. More than any other resource issue before, this quantitative context influences how planners and managers can respond to climate change–recognition of the quantitative aspect of climate change needs to be recognized in planning efforts.
Currently, there exist many different ecological models that project vegetation productivity or vegetation type under climate change. Those models produce various results based on different realizations of the ecological processes; similar to the many different global climate models that are available. These ecological models offer planners and managers several pictures of future vegetative landscapes. Determining which model best suits the particular needs of a manager or planner can be overwhelming. A workshop is planned to provide information on how to understand and potentially use the results of these models including ways to work with scientists and modelers. This workshop will provide the avenue to explore the different classes of models that can be used to project future vegetation with climate change and the role that these models can play in increasing the effectiveness and efficiency of decisionmaking in land management and planning. The workshop will also use the expertise and experiences of the attendees to collate generalities of climate change that are potentially independent of models and quantitative approaches but still useful for decisionmaking in planning and management.
Workshop goals and objectives
- Evaluate and document the purposes, limitations, strengths, and weaknesses of the different classes of models that can be used to project future vegetation with climate change.
- Provide a forum for discussion between modelers, planners ,and managers on ways to increase the use and effectiveness of various vegetation management models in a changing climate.
Desired outcomes of the workshop
- Managers and planners will have an improved understanding of the strengths, weaknesses, and limitations of the various models, including a clearer knowledge of the questions that each model can and cannot answer.
- Modelers will have a better sense of the questions being posed by the planning community.
- Modelers will be better able to plan for the improvement of their models to accommodate these needs.
More on the models
Examples of several types of models will be reviewed including
those categorized as GVM, Climate envelope, gap, landscape,
and
growth and
yield. Workshop prework will include literature reviews, syntheses,
survey work and summary tables that will address
model criteria and suitability factors. Questions will revolve
around general model information (for example documentation,
support
options, scale and scope, etc.) and model capabilities (for example
integration, strengths, weaknesses, climate change features
and/or
abilities, etc.).
Audience
Forest Service and other interested scientists, modelers and
technologists, and Forest Service planners and managers from
throughout the United
States, by invitation.
Workshop format
Two-day to two-and one-half-day format with model developers,
participants and users interacting on the capabilities, strengths,
and weaknesses
of various models and model lasses.
Potential products
Potential products include syntheses or other documents that summarize
the various models and their potential for use in the planning
and management arena. In addition, a short course on quantitative
approaches for vegetation management under changing climate scenarios
is envisioned for managers and planners.
Workshop Videos
Scale, Space, Time: Mapping from Climate Models to Vegetation Models
Bioclimatic Envelope Models and Applications
Climate Change and Dynamic Landscape Models
Climate Change and Gap/Stand-level Vegetation Models
Dynamic Global Vegetation and Biogeochemical Models
Uncertainty, Risk, Vulnerability, and Exposure
State of Science Review of Probabilistic Regional Risk Assessment Methodologies for Eastern and Western Wildlands, September, 20-22, 2005 Portland, OR
Lead: Jerry Beatty
This workshop invited 20 scientists from around the United States to present in an open forum the latest methodologies on doing probabilistic risk assessment of the threats to ecosystems. The goals of the workshop were to:
- Identify the methods currently in use that are capable of evaluating the threats to ecosystems from fire and fuels buildup, invasive species, native insects and pathogens, land use change, and climate change.
- Bring to bear the latest technologies in the area on a new set of stressors in a new geographic region.
- Discuss the existing national and regional databases provide the information required by these methodologies.
- Describe existing scientific literature and guidance for evaluating risks to ecosystems
from interactions among these stressors.
Rocky Mountain Region Client Meeting, December 1, 2005 Denver, CO
Lead: Jerry Beatty
To learn what an important set of potential clients in the Rocky Mountain Region think about the research direction the Western Wildland Environmental Threat Assessment Center (WWETAC) should take over the next 5 years. Participants at the meeting discussed with center personnel what they thought would be the most important values of western widlands and what they saw as the greatest threats to those values, how those values and threats interact, and over whish spatial and temporal scales they play out.
Pacific Southwest and California Client Meeting, May 31, 2006, Sacramento, CA
Lead: Jerry Beatty
To learn what an important set of potential clients in the Pacific Southwest and California Regions think about the research direction the Western Wildland Environmental Threat Assessment Center (WWETAC) should take over the next 5 years. Participants at the meeting discussed with center personnel what they thought would be the most important values of western wildlands and what they saw as the greatest threats to those values, how those values and threats interact, and over which spatial and temporal scales they play out.
Advances in Threats Assessment and Their Application to Forest and Ranger Management Conference, July, 18-20, 2006, Boulder, CO
Lead: Jerry Beatty
Sponsored by the Eastern and Western Threat Assessment Centers, held over 3 days and consisting of more than 100 oral and poster presentations, this ground-breaking conference brought together over 50 scientists to discuss the latest findings in threat assessment science and promises to deliver to researchers, land managers, and policymakers the scientific knowledge about environmental threats they need to achieve their objectives. The conference proceedings will be published as a General Technical Report (GTR) by the Pacific Northwest Research Station late in 2007. Fifty of the peer-reviewed papers will form the core of a Forest Environmental Threats module in the Forest Encyclopedia Network, http://threats.forestencyclopedia.net/.
Forests, Insects and Pathogens, and Climate Change Workshop, June 26-28, 2007, Portland, OR
Lead: Becky Kerns & Terry Shaw
Forests, Insects and Pathogens, and Climate Change Workshop Final Report (PDF)
The goals of this workshop were to:
- Explore and advance the state of the science for the integrated analysis and prediction of climate change and native and exotic insect and pathogen processes for risk assessment across multiple spatial and temporal scales.
- Discuss current tools used to assess and quantify climate change, insects and pathogens, and synergistic effects on natural resources and ecosystem services at scales relevant for forest management and planning.
- Assist WWETAC in developing a collaborative RD&A strategy for risk assessment that includes the interaction of climate change and insect and pathogen threats to western wildlands.
Approximately 25 participants discussed a mixture of climate, biological, and human aspects that will likely interact in novel ways over the next century. Participants were shown a series of presentations and then given an ecosystem-focused exercise and a set of questions to stimulate thinking. They were asked to discuss what they thought could be the impacts of the changing climate on the current vegetation and on the insects and pathogens that either are a current part of each ecosystem, or that could become a part of the ecosystem in the future. They were also to identify key issues and research needs. Each subgroup was charged with providing a summary of their discussions. A final report is now available.
ArcFuels Training Workshops
Lead: Alan Ager
- 2/7/2007, Forest Service Region 5–Fuel Planning and Management Specialists, Reno, NV - Approx.
- 2/12/2007, U.S. Geological Survey, Denver, CO - Approx.
- 3/14/2007 and 3/15/2007, Army National Guard, National Environmental Coordinators Training, San Diego, CA
- 3/8/2007 and 3/9/2007, Central Oregon Fuel Planning and Management Specialists from USFS
- 3/19/2007 and 3/20/2007, Klamath National Forest, Yreka, CA Fuel Planing and Management Specialists
- 4/10/2007 and 4/12/2007, Central Oregon Fuel Planning and Management Specialists from BLM, USFS, BIA and The Nature Conservancy
RapidSpot Nov 6-8, 2007, Portland
Portland, OR
Lead: Alan Ager
One of the national, integrated efforts underway to address increasing wildfire risks is the Strategic Placement of Treatments (SPOTS). To increase familiarity with and use of this approach, the Forest Service Washington Office and the Western Wildands Environmental Threat Assessment Center cosponsored the RapidSpot workshop November 4th through 6th in Portland, Oregon. The workshop demonstrated the design and analysis of landscape-scale fuel treatment strategies to maximize effectiveness of treatments while meeting a variety of healthy forest objectives. The workshop also introduced the application of risk analysis concepts to fuel treatment planning. The RapidSpot Workshop was attended by teams from most of the Forest Service Regions. During the workshop, teams deigned and tested treatment patterns for a range of restoration objectives against potential fire behavior using data from ongoing projects at their home unit. The workshop was led by a team of fire modelers, geographic information systems (GIS) experts, and resource specialists with an extensive background in restoration and fuel treatment planning.
Read more information by visiting the ArcFuels page
