Bay Area Ecosystems Climate Change Consortium (BAECCC)
BAECCC - Bay Area Ecosystems Climate Change Consortium

BAECCC brings together natural resource managers, scientists and others to collaboratively understand and reduce the negative impacts of climate change on Bay Area ecosystems and communities.

Recent Updates

May: The San Francisco Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve, a BAECCC partner, has received an award from the National Estuarine Research Reserve Science Collaborative to implement their proposal entitled Improving Management Outcomes of Sea-level Rise Modeling Through Standardized Sampling of a Key Model Input: Total Suspended Solids Above Tidal Marshes. BAECCC supported this proposal to enhance our region’s capacity to confidently project sediment accretion in tidal marshes, as this will improve planning and management decisions in our region.

The project will begin in September, 2013, and will continue through August, 2014. Those interested in obtaining more information should contact Matt Ferner at the SF Bay NERR.

May: BAECCC has completed Five-Year Strategic Plan. Starting from a statement of BAECCC's 30-year vision and long-term goals, the plan presents four desired outcomes that will be the focus BAECCC's work in the coming years. This document will be available in hard copy as well, so let us know if you would like a hard copy (or if you would like several in order to distribute to others).

We look forward to working with all BAECCC participants to make our vision a reality: in 30 years the Bay Area will still be one of the world's most beautiful and ecologically diverse metropolitan areas, supporting vibrant and healthy wildlife populations and human communities.

April: The agenda for the April 25th BAECCC meeting is now available. Summaries of previous BAECCC meetings are available here.

April: Dispatches from the Home Front, the ongoing series of articles from Bay Nature, is now available here.

March: The next BAECCC meeting will be on April 25th, from 10 AM - 2 PM, at the offices of the Bay Conservation and Development Commission (50 California Street, 26th Floor, San Francisco, CA)

March: The Bay Institute released has released the research report entitled The Horizontal Levee that was mentioned during the discussion of resilient shorelines at the January 31st BAECCC meeting. It examines the ecological and economic benefits of using restored tidal marshes to protect San Francisco Bay shoreline development against flooding caused by sea level rise. According to the study, horizontal levees, (aka: tidal marshes,) could not only reduce flood control costs in the Bay by almost 50%, but barrier marshes would also restore critical habitat for endangered species such as the California clapper rail and the salt marsh harvest mouse.

The San Jose Mercury News published an article about the study on February 22. Sonoma Index Tribune’s publisher David Bolling recently accompanied The Bay Institute’s Marc Holmes on a tour of Tolay Creek lagoon south of Sonoma, and Bolling’s full story is here.

February: A written summary of the BAECCC meeting held on January 31st is now available. This document contains a detailed description of an excellent discussion about developing resilient shorelines in the Bay Area, including summaries of 14 short presentations made by a diverse array of individuals representing organizations working on wetlands restoration and shoreline resilience in the Bay Area.

February: One of BAECCC's newest participants, the Bay Area Flood Protection Agencies Association, recently prepared a short white paper entitled Sea Level Rise and Our Low Lying Communities: A Flood Control District Perspective. This is a very important initial assessment about a regional vulnerability to climate change that was discussed at the BAECCC meeting on January 31st by Mitch Avalon of the Contra Costa County Flood Control District.

The vulnerability of our low lying communities to flooding during atmospheric river events was recently in evidence in East Palo Alto, where emergency actions were necessary in December 2012 to protect a levee (a description of the event with some photos is available here and here).

January: The latest edition of Estuary News, produced by the San Francisco Estuary Partnership, is focused upon climate change in the Bay Area and will be of great interest to all BAECCC participants. In addition, this edition (February 2013) includes a special insert from the California Landscape Conservation Cooperative entitled Creating Science-based Tools for On-the-ground Climate Change Planning and Adaptation: 9 Tales of Change. On of these tales is a story about BAECCC's November 29th workshop (Climate Smart Actions for Natural Resource Managers). The story (Climate Smart How To?) includes a special PDF version of the Principles for Designing and Implementing Climate Smart Actions and the Bay Area case studies of climate smart natural resource management that were presented at the workshop.

2012

December: The next general BAECCC meeting will be on January 31st. We expect to have an exciting discussion about coordinating the multiple regional efforts seeking to test nature-based solutions for shorelines that are resilient in the face of sea level rise ("green infrastructure'). In addition, the developers of the Climate Commons will be sharing their plans for the future and will be looking for feedback from BAECCC participants.

November: On November 29th BAECCC, in conjunction with the California Landscape Conservation Cooperative and The Nature Conservancy, hosted the workshop Climate Smart Actions for Natural Resources Managers. The workshop, attended by over 130 regional professionals, focused upon steps natural resource managers can take to understand and address the vulnerability of their lands/resources to climate change. The workshop included fascinating and important case studies of managers already taking action in our region to prepare for climate change. Unfortunately, we were unable to provide space to all on the wait list, but the good news is that the materials distributed at the workshop (and several of the presentations) are available on the Climate Commons here, with more to come.

November: On November 16th BAECCC convened the first meeting of its Monitoring Working Group. This group includes representatives from agencies and organizations around the region conducting ecological monitoring, and will be assisting BAECCC identify next steps toward our desired outcome of a coordinated monitoring network for the region. Anybody interested in participating in this effort should contact Executive Coordinator Andy Gunther (andy "at" cemar "dot" org).

October: A written summary of the September 27th BAECCC meeting is now available.

September: The next quarterly meeting of the Bay Area Ecosystems Climate Change Consortium will be on September 27th from 1:30-4:30 at the offices of the Bay Conservation and Development Commission in San Francisco.

In addition to getting updates on several of the exciting projects affiliated with BAECCC, Dr. Julie Ekstrom will be with us to talk about Climate Change Impacts, Vulnerabilities, and Adaptation in the San Francisco Bay Area, the recently completed study by the California Energy Commission’s Public Interest Energy Research (PIER) program. The full agenda is here.

Please note that we will be starting the meeting in the afternoon, and ending it with a social hour from 4:30-6:00. We hope you will be able to stay after the meeting and get to know your colleagues a little better!

August: A written summary of the June 28th BAECCC meeting is now available.

June: The agenda for the June 28th BAECCC meeting, to be held at 10 AM at the Bay Conservation and Development Commission, is now available.

June: On June 6 BAECCC convened 75 environmental scientists and managers from around the Bay Area to summarize scientific knowledge about climate change impacts and adaptation strategies for San Francisco Bay's wetlands. This collaborative project, the Baylands Ecosystem Habitat Goals Technical Update for Climate Change, will complete an authoritative assessment of climate change impacts in the Baylands to inform regional wetlands restoration planning.

May: On May 23rd a workshop on Planning for the Bay of the Future: Resources for Coastal Climate Change Adaptation was conducted at the David Brower Center in Berkeley. The workshop was a collaborative effort among BAECCC participants including the Our Coast Our Future project (Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary, US Geological Survey, PRBO Conservation Science, and the San Francisco Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve), the Adapting to Rising Tides project (lead by the Bay Conservation and Development Commission), and NOAA's Coastal Services Center. Over 60 Bay Area environmental professionals received the latest information about planning for sea level rise, and had the opportunity to provide comments and recommendations for work underway in the region. A meeting summary will be available soon.

May: A written summary of the April 26th BAECCC meeting is now available.

April: The agenda is now available for the BAECCC quarterly meeting that will be held on Thursday, April 26, 2012, from 10:00 AM – 2:00 PM in the 11th floor conference room at the California State Coastal Conservancy, 1330 Broadway (12th Street BART station). If you cannot attend but wish to participate via teleconference, instructions for calling in are found on the agenda. The next quarterly BAECCC meeting will be on June 28, 2012.

February: A written summary of the January 26th BAECCC meeting is now available.

February: Bay Nature has published an article about the BAECCC-affiliated project Innovative Wetland Adaptation Techniques in Lower Corte Madera Creek Watershed. The production of this article was made possible by support from the Coastal Conservancy, PRBO Conservation Science, Pacific Gas and Electric, and the Nature Conservancy. In case you missed it, Bay Nature published an interesting piece in 2009 (authored by Glen Martin) about climate change in the Bay Area called Taking the Heat: Bay Area Ecosystems in the Age of Climate Change.

January: BAECCC and the California State Coastal Conservancy are pleased to announce the hiring of Dr. Letitia Grenier as the Coordinator for the Technical Update of the San Francisco Baylands Ecosystem Habitat Goals Report. The technical update will integrate the projected impacts of climate change and associated adaptation strategies into the Goals report, providing scientific guidance for the Bay Area's efforts to restore wetlands in a warming world.

January: In September 2011 BAECCC organized two sessions at the State of the Estuary Conference on Climate Driven Ecological Change, and the Powerpoint files from those sessions are now available for download as PDFs. A summary of the session is available on pages 10-11 of the December 2011 issue of Estuary News (presently available in hard copy, soon to be available online). BAECCC has also updated this website, including greatly expanding the links page. Remember that BAECCC's next general meeting will be on January 26th from 10 AM – 2 PM at the offices of the State Coastal Conservancy.

2011

November: The final report for the California King Tides Initiative is now available. This project includes several BAECCC partners and collaborators, including NOAA Coastal Services Center, Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary, the San Francisco Bay and Tijuana River National Estuarine Research Reserves, California Coastkeeper Alliance, the San Francisco Bay Conservation and Development Commission.

November: The Summary Report for the scoping workshops conducted by the Our Coast Our Future project are now available.

October: BAECCC partners the Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary, PRBO Conservation Science, US Geological Survey, and the San Francisco Bay NERR are pleased to announce funding has been awarded through the National Estuarine Research Reserve System Science Collaborative to extend the scope of the current outer coast Our Coast–Our Future (OCOF) project into San Francisco Bay, as well as provide increased technical assistance to our decision support tool users, both along the outer coast and in the Bay. More details are available here.

October: A summary of the BAECCC quarterly meeting, held on Wednesday, September 28, 2011, is now available. The meeting included presentations by Dr. Benét Duncan from the Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary (Developing a Set of Linked Environmental and Biological Climate Change Indicators for the North-Central California Coast) and Ms. Wendy Goodfriend of the Bay Conservation and Development Commission (Innovative Wetland Adaptation Techniques in Lower Corte Madera Creek Watershed). The next quarterly BAECCC meeting will be on January 26, 2012.

September: The next BAECCC quarterly meeting that will be held on Wednesday, September 28, 2011, from 10:00 AM – 2:00 PM in the 11th floor conference room at the California State Coastal Conservancy, 1330 Broadway (12th Street BART station). If you cannot attend but wish to participate via teleconference, instructions for calling in are found on the agenda. The next quarterly BAECCC meeting will be on January 26, 2012.

September: As a member of BAECCC, the California State Coastal Conservancy is now requesting Statements of Qualifications for a full-time coordinator to assist develop and implement a process to update the Baylands Ecosystem Habitat Goals Report. The successful contractor will have knowledge about climate change assessments for estuaries in California, as well as a background in environmental laws, policies and programs pertaining to climate change adaptation and impact reduction. Statements of Qualifications are due October 14, 2011.  

July: The next quarterly meetings of BAECCC have been scheduled. The meetings will occur on September 28, 2011, January 26, 2012, April 26, 2012, and June 28, 2012. To receive agenda packets for these meetings and other announcements, please apply to join BAECCC’s Google Group.

June: BAECCC participants met on June 29th at the Bay Conservation and Development Commission. Among the agenda items were a presentations by Dr. Lisa Micheli of the Pepperwood Foundation (A Research Framework for Bay Area Conservation and Climate Adaptation)and Mr. Bruce Riordan of the Joint Policy Committee (Bay Area Climate and Energy Resilience Strategy). A meeting summary can be downloaded here.

May: BAECCC will be organizing two sessions at the 10th biennial State of the Estuary Conference about climate-driven ecological change and its management implications. Save the date for this conference, which will be held September 20-21, 2011, at the Oakland Marriott City Center (near the 12th Street BART station).

May: BAECCC collaborators PRBO Conservation Science, Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary, the San Francisco Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve, and US Geological Survey have been invited to submit a full proposal to the National Estuarine Research Reserve System Science Collaborative for their project “Our Coast–Our Future: Planning for Sea Level Rise and Storm Hazards in the San Francisco Bay Area.”

April: BAECCC participants met on April 11, 2011, at the California State Coastal Conservancy.  Among the agenda items were presentations by Nicole Heller of Climate Central about their work bringing scientists and journalists together to deliver high quality information about climate change to the general public, and by Matt Gerhart of the Coastal Conservancy on the Conservation Lands Network and the Upland Habitat Goals Project. A meeting summary can be downloaded here.