Reflections on preparing regional chapters for NCA5

Abby G. Frazier (), Allyza R. Lustig, Michael Chang, Emile H. Elias, Renee A. McPherson, Victoria W. Keener, Zena N. Grecni, Henry P. Huntington, Ellen L. Mecray, Kimberly M. Wood, Kathie D. Dello, Patricia Chardón-Maldonado and Dave D. White
Additional contact information
Abby G. Frazier: Clark University
Allyza R. Lustig: ICF
Michael Chang: Cascadia Consulting Group
Emile H. Elias: USDA Agricultural Research Service, Southwest Climate Hub
Renee A. McPherson: University of Oklahoma
Victoria W. Keener: Arizona State University
Zena N. Grecni: Arizona State University
Henry P. Huntington: Ocean Conservancy
Ellen L. Mecray: NOAA/NESDIS/National Centers for Environmental Information
Kimberly M. Wood: The University of Arizona
Kathie D. Dello: North Carolina State University
Patricia Chardón-Maldonado: Caribbean Coastal Ocean Observing System Inc. (CARICOOS)
Dave D. White: Arizona State University

Climatic Change, 2025, vol. 178, issue 4, No 14, 23 pages

Abstract: Abstract Regional chapters in the National Climate Assessment (NCA) report provide a comprehensive synthesis of how climate change is impacting United States regions and are extensively used to support climate change decision-making by local communities and policymakers. The regional chapter author teams are tasked with assessing the climate trends, risks, and responses across a range of sectors and across a vast and diverse geography, while making content locally relevant. Regional chapters have evolved in many ways since the third NCA (NCA3), often shifting from focusing on climate stressors and hazards to addressing more diverse human-centric impacts (e.g., human health), inequities, and other barriers to action. The fifth NCA (NCA5) author teams were constructed to be intentionally diverse, including more social scientists and cultural practitioners. Here, regional chapter authors provide reflections on the assessment process and identify some best practices for developing an effective regional chapter. These include building a diverse and complementary author team, utilizing technical contributors to enhance the technical and geographical expertise of the team, and conducting extensive public engagement with local communities and policymakers throughout the process. To improve future regional NCA chapters, we identify several recommendations: (1) thoughtful analysis and possible revision of regional boundaries, (2) inclusion of authors from underrepresented regions on national-scale topic chapters, (3) structured cross-chapter engagement among regional chapters, (4) a holistic communications plan for the post-release period, and (5) better coordination with sub-national climate assessments.

Keywords: Regional climate change; Equity; Climate assessment; Climate impacts; Actionable science (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10584-025-03874-y Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:climat:v:178:y:2025:i:4:d:10.1007_s10584-025-03874-y

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/economics/journal/10584

DOI: 10.1007/s10584-025-03874-y

Access Statistics for this article

Climatic Change is currently edited by M. Oppenheimer and G. Yohe

More articles in Climatic Change from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().