Harmful algal blooms and coastal communities: Socioeconomic impacts and actions taken to cope with the 2015 U.S. West Coast domoic acid event.

The 2015 U.S. West Coast domoic acid event was caused by a massive harmful algal bloom (HAB) that consisted mostly of the diatom Pseudo-nitzschia australis. It was unprecedented in its toxicity and geographic extent and resulted in extended and widespread closures of the lucrative commercial Dungeness crab and popular recreational razor clam fisheries. The fishery closures led to federal fisheries disaster declarations and generated an economic shock for coastal communities that depend on access to these marine resources. This study reports on the socioeconomic impacts of the 2015 HAB across 16 fishing communities on the U.S. West Coast using primary survey data. The survey instrument, deployed in the summer of 2017, collected information on sociodemographic and economic factors hypothesized to confer resilience or vulnerability to HABs, data quantifying individual impacts, and the coping and adaptive actions taken by individuals to deal with the event. The vast majority of survey participants (84%) were negatively impacted by the 2015 HAB, but individuals employed in fishing-related occupations experienced greater financial, emotional, and sociocultural impacts than those employed in other sectors. Further, those employed in fishing-related occupations were less likely to recover financial losses suffered as a result of the event. This study identifies the pathways through which HABs affect fishery-dependent and fishery-associated sectors of U.S. West Coast communities. The understanding gained can help inform efforts to prepare for future HABs, mitigate their socioeconomic impacts, and aid recovery.

Examining harmful algal blooms through a disaster risk management lens: A case study of the 2015 U.S. West Coast domoic acid event.

The human dimensions of harmful algal blooms (HABs) are becoming increasingly apparent as they grow in frequency and magnitude in some regions of the world under changing ocean conditions. One such region is the U.S. West Coast, where HABs of toxigenic species of Pseudo-nitzschia have been found to coincide with or closely follow periods of warming. In 2015, the region experienced a massive HAB of Pseudo-nitzschia that was associated with the 2014-16 Northeast Pacific marine heatwave. The HAB event delayed the opening of the lucrative commercial Dungeness crab fishery for up to 5 months and closed the popular recreational razor clam fishery, resulting in fishery failures and disaster declarations and causing significant sociocultural and economic impacts to coastal communities. Here, management actions are examined that were taken by federal and state government agencies and responses of coastal residents to this extreme HAB event using a disaster risk management framework consisting of four phases: 1) prediction and early warning, 2) event response, 3) recovery and reconstruction, and 4) mitigation and prevention. Clear differences in management actions at the state level were evident in California, Oregon, and Washington during every phase, producing vastly different perceptions of management by coastal residents. A history of trusted relationships and coordination among agencies and with the fishing industry in Washington State was associated with more transparent and accepted management responses. The examination found that additional education, outreach, and trust-building exercises would provide benefits to communities affected by extreme HAB events. Our findings contribute to an understanding of climate change adaptation in coastal communities dependent on fishery resources.

Adapting air quality management for a changing climate: Survey of local districts in California.

Air quality can be affected by weather and thus is sensitive to a changing climate. Wildfire (influenced by weather), consecutive high temperature summer days, and other extreme events are projected to become more severe and frequent with climate change. These may create challenging conditions for managing air quality despite policy targets to reduce precursor and pollutant emissions. Although extreme events are becoming more intense and interest in climate adaptation is increasing among public health practitioners, little attention in scholarly literature and policy covers climate adaptation for air quality governance. Understanding the management and managers' perspectives at the local level provides insight about the needs for climate adaptation, including their adaptation status, perspectives, responsibilities, and roles. This study explores local manager perspectives and experiences of managing air quality within a changing climate as one puzzle piece to understand the gap in climate adaptation within the air quality sector. A broader goal is to contribute to the discussion of developing a multi-jurisdictional vision for reducing the impacts of air quality in a changing climate. In 2016 local air quality district managers in California were invited to participate in an online survey of 39 questions focused on extreme event impacts on air quality. The questionnaire focused on present air quality threats and extreme event challenges, adaptation status and strategies, adaptive capacities, perceived barriers to adaptation, and jurisdictional responsibilities and roles. Over 85 percent of the 35 local air districts in California participated in the survey, which represents 80 percent of the state's population. High awareness and knowledge of climate change among local managers indicates they are ready to adopt and take action on policies that would support climate adaptation, but barriers reported suggests they may need policies and adequate funding to take action and make necessary changes. IMPLICATIONS: Downscaled global climate models project an increasing severity and frequency of extreme events. In the southwestern United States, these include wildfire, heat events, and dry periods, among others, all of which can place an extra burden on air quality managers and emitters to achieve air quality standards even as they reduce emissions. Despite climate change presenting increasing challenges to meet air quality standards, in the southwestern United States, policy and action to mitigate these impacts have been surprisingly absent. California presents a valuable case study on the topic because of its historic leadership in air quality management for the United States and also because of its initiatives in combating climate change. Yet still we found that adaptation has not been incorporated into air quality management thus far, but local managers seem sufficiently knowledgeable and willing.

Gauging climate preparedness to inform adaptation needs: local level adaptation in drinking water quality in CA, USA.

Understanding resource managers' perceptions of climate change, analytic capacity, and current adaptation activities can provide insight into what can help support adaptation processes at the local level. In California, where a major drought currently demonstrates some of the hardships that could be regularly encountered under a changing climate, we present results from a survey of drinking water utilities about the perceived threat, analytic capacity, and adaptation actions related to maintaining water quality in the face of climate change. Among surveyed utilities (n = 259), awareness is high in regard to climate change occurring and its potential impacts on water quality globally, but perceived risk is lower with regard to climate impacts on local drinking water quality. Just over half of surveyed utilities report at least some adaptation activity to date. The top three variables that most strongly correlated with reported adaptation action were (1) perceived risk on global and local water quality, (2) surface water reliance, and (3) provision of other services beyond drinking water. Other tested variables significantly correlated with reported adaptation action were (4) degree of impact from the current drought and (5) communication with climate change experts. Findings highlight that smaller groundwater-reliant utilities may need the most assistance to initiate climate adaptation processes. Trusted information sources most frequently used across respondents were state government agencies, followed by colleagues in the same utilities. The finding that frequently used sources of information are similar across utilities presents a promising opportunity for training and disseminating climate information to assist those systems needing the most support.

Institutional misfit and environmental change: A systems approach to address ocean acidification.

Emerging environmental threats often lack sufficient governance to address the full extent of the problem. An example is ocean acidification which is a growing concern in fishing and aquaculture economies worldwide, but has remained a footnote in environmental policy at all governance levels. However, existing legal jurisdictions do account for some aspects of the system relating to ocean acidification and these may be leveraged to support adapting to and mitigating ocean acidification. We refine and apply a methodological framework that helps objectively evaluate governance, from a social-ecological systems perspective. We assess how well a set of extant US institutions fits with the social-ecological interactions pertinent to ocean acidification. The assessment points to measured legal gaps, for which we evaluate the government authorities most appropriate to help fill these gaps. The analysis is conducted on United State federal statutes and regulations. Results show quantitative improvement of institutional fit over time (2006 to 2013), but a substantial number of measured legal gaps persist especially around acknowledging local sources of acidification and adaptation strategies to deal with or avoid impacts. We demonstrate the utility of this framework to evaluate the governance surrounding any emerging environmental threat as a first step to guiding the development of jurisdictionally realistic solutions.

Coral Reefs and People in a High-CO2 World: Where Can Science Make a Difference to People?

REEFS AND PEOPLE AT RISK: Increasing levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere put shallow, warm-water coral reef ecosystems, and the people who depend upon them at risk from two key global environmental stresses: 1) elevated sea surface temperature (that can cause coral bleaching and related mortality), and 2) ocean acidification. These global stressors: cannot be avoided by local management, compound local stressors, and hasten the loss of ecosystem services. Impacts to people will be most grave where a) human dependence on coral reef ecosystems is high, b) sea surface temperature reaches critical levels soonest, and c) ocean acidification levels are most severe. Where these elements align, swift action will be needed to protect people's lives and livelihoods, but such action must be informed by data and science. AN INDICATOR APPROACH: Designing policies to offset potential harm to coral reef ecosystems and people requires a better understanding of where CO2-related global environmental stresses could cause the most severe impacts. Mapping indicators has been proposed as a way of combining natural and social science data to identify policy actions even when the needed science is relatively nascent. To identify where people are at risk and where more science is needed, we map indicators of biological, physical and social science factors to understand how human dependence on coral reef ecosystems will be affected by globally-driven threats to corals expected in a high-CO2 world. Western Mexico, Micronesia, Indonesia and parts of Australia have high human dependence and will likely face severe combined threats. As a region, Southeast Asia is particularly at risk. Many of the countries most dependent upon coral reef ecosystems are places for which we have the least robust data on ocean acidification. These areas require new data and interdisciplinary scientific research to help coral reef-dependent human communities better prepare for a high CO2 world.

A framework to diagnose barriers to climate change adaptation.

This article presents a systematic framework to identify barriers that may impede the process of adaptation to climate change. The framework targets the process of planned adaptation and focuses on potentially challenging but malleable barriers. Three key sets of components create the architecture for the framework. First, a staged depiction of an idealized, rational approach to adaptation decision-making makes up the process component. Second, a set of interconnected structural elements includes the actors, the larger context in which they function (e.g., governance), and the object on which they act (the system of concern that is exposed to climate change). At each of these stages, we ask (i) what could impede the adaptation process and (ii) how do the actors, context, and system of concern contribute to the barrier. To facilitate the identification of barriers, we provide a series of diagnostic questions. Third, the framework is completed by a simple matrix to help locate points of intervention to overcome a given barrier. It provides a systematic starting point for answering critical questions about how to support climate change adaptation at all levels of decision-making.