One overcast week in January, Government Relations Director Andrew Condia, Research Associate Dominick Dusseau, and I found ourselves driving along the banks of the Mississippi River. Our road trip took us through Tennessee, Mississippi, and Arkansas to speak with leaders in four small towns about their climate risk. Representing Woodwell’s Just Access program, we wanted to understand what information communities most need to help their towns envision a thriving future in the face of climate change.
The small towns of the Mississippi are interconnected in the challenges they’re facing, but also in their resolve. They are looking for solutions that will help them preserve their way of life, while readying their communities for a changed future. Like patchwork squares in a quilt, our conversations in each town formed a larger pattern: America’s small towns want to adapt. They just need the resources to do so.
Wilmot, Arkansas: population 400
We arrived in Wilmot around midday and were welcomed by Mayor Carolyn Harris, her team, and a spread of baked chicken, green beans with ham, rolls, sweet tea, and her special-recipe salad.
“When I say, ‘let’s do lunch’, we do lunch,” says Harris.
Wilmot’s pink-fronted town hall sits on the old main street facing Lake Enterprise, next to faded or abandoned buildings. Main Street used to have two movie theaters, a drug store, and a grocery, all of which shuttered as the population declined. The town is surrounded by farms, and agriculture drives the economy, though not as much as it used to.
This is a pattern across the Delta. Rural towns have shrunk dramatically over the years as the small family farm became a much harder economic proposition. According to Water Operator Theodis Kitchen, a fourth-generation resident, Wilmot is at its lowest population in decades.
The four communities we visited that week are all members of the DRIVE program, an initiative at the University of Memphis that helps Delta region towns pursue economic revitalization on their own terms. Mayor Harris is envisioning a new economy for Wilmot that will attract newcomers to the town through its recreation opportunities; the natural lands around Lake Enterprise offer fishing, hunting, and camping. But the impacts of climate change could complicate that picture.
The challenge, Water Operator Apprentice Derrick Jackson points out, is pollution from surrounding farms. Industrial agriculture makes common use of pesticides and defoliant sprays, and when it rains or floods, those chemicals travel. While this is already a concern, climate change could make it worse as more extreme floods or wildfires carry harmful chemicals into new areas.
“We would like to know the risk,” says Harris.
Jackson says that kind of information will help more than just Wilmot. Climate change is a shared burden here in the Upper Delta.
“[Climate change] doesn’t just affect this town, you know,” says Jackson. “It goes all the way down [Highway] 165. Pretty much every town has the basics of what we have. So anything that we are able to find that could help us, could help the next towns over.”
Eudora, Arkansas: population 1,700
The next town over is Eudora, Arkansas, led by Mayor Tomeka Butler. Butler assumed office on March 11, 2020. The previous mayor’s assistant introduced her to the office, handed her the keys, and wished her luck.
“I’m looking around like, that’s it? There’s no manual or anything?” says Butler.
Her first day on the job was the day COVID-19 was declared a pandemic. The year that followed, Butler learned quickly that the best way to keep her people safe was to share information and ask for help. Now, she approaches Eudora’s climate challenges in a similar way, joining networks like DRIVE and the Arkansas Black Mayors Association (ABMA) to broaden Eudora’s access to resources.
“I’m not an expert, but I love surrounding myself with the people who are,” says Butler.
Technical expertise on climate adaptation can be hard to come by in towns like Eudora, whose population is largely elderly or aging.
But small towns face the same climate risks as larger municipalities—regardless of whether or not they have the resources to address them. Eudora is the warmest populated area in Arkansas, and heat stroke is a major hazard for outdoor workers during the summer. Flooding also plagues the town.
“Most of the time it doesn’t matter if it’s a little rain or a big rain, particular areas are going to flood, and sadly, these areas are mainly where the elderly people live,” says Butler. “There’s been times where it has rained and I’ve literally had to put people on standby who have boats, because that will be the only way we’ll be able to get to them.”
But Butler tends to focus more on what assets Eudora does have, rather than what they’re lacking. As she drove us through town, pointing out neighbors’ houses that were built over creeks and streets that become impassable during light rain, she told us how the town is making progress because of the networks they’re a part of. Through ABMA, Eudora is participating in a watershed revitalization project, which will help the town abate flooding with green infrastructure. Mutual aid agreements with nearby towns’ fire departments have helped with emergency response. And, with help from a local researcher, the town will be piloting a vertical agriculture system in its old school building.
Woodwell is now also part of Butler’s ever-growing expert network. She hopes information from a risk assessment will inform her plans for a growing Eudora, giving her the information she needs to not only keep her people safe but help them thrive.
“I just be concerned about the people,” says Mayor Butler.
Tunica, Mississippi: population 1,000
With a close-knit community, yearly festivals, and a cheery mural across from town hall welcoming visitors, Tunica, Mississippi resembles what Main Street Program Director Laura Withers calls a “Hallmark movie town.” A few blocks from town hall, there is a central playground with slides and monkey bars. Right now, in the middle of a winter day, it’s pleasantly sunny. In the summer though, the combined heat and humidity make it a dangerous place to play.
“If you want to take your kids to play on the equipment, you can’t. It’s too hot to the touch. Mom cannot stand out there in the dead of summer. It’s too hot,” says Withers. “The bummer is that it’s hottest in the summertime when kids aren’t in school.”
Like much of the region, Tunica struggles with extreme heat. For Withers, whose job involves programming Tunica’s social amenities like the annual Rivergate Festival, extreme heat poses a risk to the features that make the town an inviting place to live.
“When people think about where they want to move or where they want to raise their family, at the end of the day, people want good education, nice parks, you know, quality-of-life type things,” says Withers.
Withers also handles grant-writing for Tunica. She says she’s noticed many applications now place an emphasis on infrastructural sustainability to make sure the money granted represents a long-term investment in the town’s success. Without concrete data on climate risks like flooding or extreme heat, Withers says her applications are not as competitive. For a town of Tunica’s size, grants are an important funding source for municipal projects.
“Anytime you can get the tiniest bit of a crystal ball into what you’re dealing with moving forward, whether it be climate or jobs or the school system or healthcare, whether it be good or bad, you can benefit from it,” says Withers.
Stanton, Tennessee: population 400 and growing
The longer we spent in the region, the more we saw the traditionally agricultural fabric of the Upper Delta interweaving with budding pockets of renewable energy infrastructure.
The uniformity of fallow fields was broken here and there by a towering range of wind turbines or bright rows of solar panels. As we pulled into the town of Stanton, Tennessee, about 50 miles northeast of Memphis, we passed BlueOval City—a 4,000-acre Ford manufacturing facility. The plant was originally established to be a center for electric vehicle manufacturing, but the company has since pulled back those promises, opting instead for “higher-return opportunities” in response to regulatory changes. Ford now plans to manufacture gas-powered trucks there as well as batteries.
Despite the pullback, the plant will still generate a massive influx of people—with some estimates up to 10,000—and accompanying development. Mayor Norman Bauer is trying to navigate the new future it represents.
“That is going to be the economic driver if we let it be, but my intent is for Stanton to grow on its own merit,” says Bauer.
DRIVE cohort members are encouraged to develop tailored solutions to the unique challenges facing their communities. For Stanton, that means getting the town “shovel ready,” as Bauer calls it, with the infrastructure to support a growing population. Stormwater management is top of that list. Flooding is already a concern where a drainage ditch cuts through town and frequently overflows.
“The first of the past dozen 100-year floods was in 1996 and they just kept coming,” says Bauer.
Without an updated land-use plan in place, development could worsen that. And without data on flooding and extreme rainfall risk, it will be much harder for Stanton to develop a plan that carries the town through what the future holds.
“We don’t know how it’s going to change, but we do have to look at the common fact that it is going to change. We do have to have a plan in place. This is one of those things where you can’t be reactionary,” says Bauer.
Chelsea, MA, did everything right. The city had identified flooding as a major climate threat, sought out data on it, mobilized the community, and secured funding to design a solution. They were on their way to building climate resilience, until the change in federal administration forced them to regroup.
In April, 2025, the federal administration announced it was illegally canceling the Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities (BRIC) program—a FEMA initiative that funded local infrastructure projects to protect communities from hazards like flooding and wildfire—on the grounds that it was “wasteful spending.”
The Island End River Flood Resilience Project was among the projects de-funded in the sweep. The project reenvisioned the shoreline of Chelsea and neighboring Everett, MA, with the construction of a flood barrier, tidal gates, and salt marsh restoration to protect both cities from extreme flooding.
The cities are vulnerable to two forms of flooding—storm surge coming up from Boston Harbor and extreme rainfall events.
“This district is already flooding at least once a year to the extent that trucks can’t always pass down the road,” says Chelsea Housing and Community Development Deputy Director Emily Granoff.
Climate change will exacerbate this. According to a 2022 risk assessment conducted by Woodwell Climate’s Just Access program on behalf of the city and local non-profit GreenRoots, over 20% of the city will be at risk of flooding by 2050. Extreme high-intensity rainfall events could become three times as likely by mid-century and become an annual occurrence by 2080.
The irony of the cuts, Granoff says, is that this project was designed to save the cities of Chelsea and Everett millions of dollars. A cost-benefit analysis conducted for the project found that for every dollar spent on flood prevention, they would save more than $30 of repair and recovery spending in the wake of a major disaster. Several pieces of vital industrial infrastructure sit in the floodplain, including a busy commuter rail line, major truck corridors, and the New England Produce Center, which distributes fruit and vegetables to most northeastern U.S. grocery stores.
In addition to the $50 million BRIC grant, the project also lost a $20 million matching grant from the state, which was contingent on the federal funding. Without the project, the city will suffer $3.7 billion in direct damage, in addition to hundreds of millions of dollars in lost wages from employees who can’t get to work, lost sales from businesses forced to close, and health care costs from food insecurity.
“It’s important to realize how one federal program being cut like this can affect so many other things downstream,” says Eli Fenichel, director of communications and environmental policy in the office of Chelsea’s State Senator, Sal DiDomenico. “These projects are so important to protect businesses, communities, people, and save us—taxpayers, cities, states—so much money in future damage costs.”
The Island End River project was in the design phase when the BRIC grant was cancelled. After processing the loss, Granoff says project partners regrouped and identified two paths forward. The first would be completing the design and then putting it on the shelf, waiting for a more favorable funding environment. But that option comes with risks.
“The biggest risk is that we get unlucky,” says Nasser Brahim, director of climate resilience for the Mystic River Watershed Association, a partner on the project. “It’s just a matter of time before that area floods again. Every time there’s a nor’easter, every time there’s a king tide, we roll the dice. The odds are not in our favor in the long run.”
The second option would be to take a phased approach and seek out smaller chunks of funding for each stage. This strategy would still take longer to complete, but would allow the most critical flood mitigation measures to proceed—starting with a floodwall and culvert reconstruction. The later phases would bring in marsh restoration and more waterfront access.
The drawback to a phased approach is that pure infrastructure projects are less attractive to funders than nature restoration. Mystic River Watershed Association identified a possible opportunity to request funding for phase one from the Army Corps of Engineers, under the Water Resources Development Act, which is being re-authorized this year. According to Roseann Bongiovanni, executive director of the Chelsea-based community organization GreenRoots, the data in Woodwell’s Risk Assessment has helped the cities and their partners continue making the case for support for the Island End River project.
“The Woodwell report gave us the science-backed data that helped give weight to our advocacy around coastal resilience. We’ve noticed a change in the response of decision-makers since we were able to provide data about the risks,” says Bongiovanni.
Whether the project takes a phased approach or waits for full funding, the federal cuts represent a delay to a project that could save both lives and money.
“Every year we go without completing this project is another year where our people and critical infrastructure are at risk,” says Bongiovanni.
Flooding is a hallmark of the climate-changed world. Rising sea levels, extreme rainfall, and aging infrastructure systems have left communities across the U.S. facing increasing damages from flooding, making flood insurance an expensive necessity for more and more Americans.
But U.S. flood insurance policy was created on the assumption of a more stable and predictable climate and has struggled to keep up with the rapid pace of change. Two new papers led by Research Associate Dominick Dusseau shine a light on vulnerabilities within the American flood insurance system that will only be exacerbated as climate change advances.
You may be paying for your neighbor’s discount
The National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP), a program of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), was created to help property owners secure affordable flood insurance and encourage communities to manage their flood risk.
One of the ways the NFIP encourages floodplain management is through the Community Rating System. The system rewards communities with discounts on their premiums for implementing certain actions. These actions range from building up the elevation of ground within a floodplain to making local flood maps publicly accessible. Actions are assigned points and the number of points determines how much of a discount the community will receive.
This reduction in price is not a true discount, however, because the NFIP adjusts state-wide premiums to make up the difference. The NFIP calculates the average percentage discount for the entire state and increases all premiums by that amount. This means policyholders in towns that are not even participating in the Community Rating System may be paying more than their risk level requires to subsidize their neighbor’s discounts.
“It’s basically a way for the NFIP to actuarially pay for the Community Rating System,” says Dusseau. “Because otherwise they’d be foregoing that revenue from the discounts. To recoup the lost income they do this cross-subsidization by putting it back into each policy by state. ”
Climate change will exacerbate inequalities
A study from Dusseau, published in the journal One Earth, shows that through the Community Rating System, roughly half of NFIP policyholders subsidize the discounts of the other half. In theory, subsidization ensures the NFIP is collecting enough revenue to pay out all their future obligations. But in reality, this framework presents two flaws. First, not all Community Rating System actions—publishing flood maps, for example— reduce damages. While the action may be beneficial to community awareness, it doesn’t translate directly to dollars saved.
Additionally, existing disparities between communities result in unequal distribution of the burden of subsidization.
“One of the big takeaways that we found was that it’s largely under-resourced rural counties that are subsidizing the more affluent, well-resourced urban counties,” says Dusseau.
Even though many rural communities would be eligible for discounts themselves, they may not have the capacity available to take advantage of them.
“There’s a bureaucracy involved here. There’s paperwork. You have to document all of these things that you’re doing. You have to submit the application. You need someone that’s a certified floodplain manager,” says Dusseau. “Not every town has that capacity, so it just falls through the cracks.”
This means that already resource-strapped communities may be paying more than required for their true risk level.
Dusseau’s study points out that these inequalities will be exacerbated by climate change. The NFIP has long underpriced policies. The rising sea levels and more extreme precipitation caused by climate change has only widened the gap between the program’s revenue and obligated pay-outs. In 2021, FEMA implemented a new framework, called Risk Rating 2.0, that takes the impacts of climate change to date into account, gradually raising premiums year over year to more closely align with the actual risk of damages.
“And what we see is that states with the greatest level of inequality now will experience even worse disparities in the future,” says Dusseau.
How accurate are flood models?
In addition to inequity, flood insurance suffers from a frustrating lack of transparency, with each company and the NFIP employing a proprietary combination of models to decide premium prices. A second paper led by Dusseau, published in the Journal of Catastrophe Risk and Resilience in February, generates some much needed transparency around the data underlying the insurance industries assumptions.
One type of model employed by insurers is called a catastrophe model. These models can estimate the likely damages from both natural and man-made hazard events like wildfires, terror attacks, and hurricanes. Dusseau’s study evaluated the accuracy of seven flood-specific catastrophe models, including three commonly used by the NFIP.
“Insurers rely heavily on these models that have historically been very ‘black-box’—nearly impossible to evaluate their methods,” says Assistant Scientist Zachary Zobel, a co-author on the paper. “Without proper independent review of these models, insurers will continue to misrepresent the risk catastrophes pose on local communities.”
The study found that model accuracy varied widely. Some models overestimated flood losses, while others underestimated losses—by up to 13 times in the most extreme case. This has major implications for the ultimate cost of flood insurance.
“There is a non-trivial difference in the premiums that would be passed on to consumers based on these assumptions,” says Dusseau.
Catastrophe models are also still based upon historical data. Many have not been updated to account for the impacts of climate change, let alone cast forward to how flood risk may change in the future.
“The insurance industry drives using only the rearview mirror. Yesterday’s data to price tomorrow’s risks doesn’t work in a world of more extremes, says Vice President of Science Dr. Christopher Schwalm, who also contributed to the paper. “The past is no longer a reliable guide for the future. To stay ahead, we have to stop guessing based on what happened years ago and start modeling the ‘new extremes’ we are seeing right now.”
Informing policies that protect people
Dusseau along with Woodwell’s risk and policy experts have made science-backed contributions to conversations about improving flood insurance. Dusseau and Senior Policy Analyst Jamie Cummings authored a policy brief last April that advocates for NFIP reforms that help property owners access affordable flood protection, including the creation of a standard national catastrophe model. Dusseau has also briefed congressional staff, highlighting areas where Congress could play a role in bolstering the long-term resilience and insurability of communities.
However, aligning pricing more closely with the realities of climate change is much more complicated—and for many property owners, emotional—than simply incorporating the right data. The increases brought on by Risk Rating 2.0 have already pushed flood insurance out of the range of affordability for many policyholders, forcing them to drop their coverage. The pricing framework is a sticking point in lawmakers’ debates over reauthorizing the NFIP in the long term. The program is currently funded through September 30, 2026.
“How do you balance updating policies to reflect true climate risk with affordability, in a political context? Yes, you want people to know that they’re in a flood zone, but if you price them out of the market, are you really helping them?” says Woodwell Climate Vice President of Policy and Government Relations Laura Uttley. “That’s why the work Woodwell’s risk team does is so vital. The science and modeling they provide adds context for the development and implementation of new policies. We are very pragmatic about the ways we recommend change.”
Additionally, federal policy changes happen much slower than climate ones, making it a challenge to build policy that is both durable and versatile.
“Policy change at the federal level can be incredibly slow. We need to consider policy proposals that build durable systems that enable adaptability, recognizing the urgency posed by rapidly changing conditions,” says Uttley.
Woodwell Climate has been involved in advocacy around the inclusion of flooding from extreme rainfall— called pluvial flooding—in FEMA’s regulatory maps. These maps identify “flood hazard zones” in which property owners are required to have flood insurance. Currently they only represent coastal and riverine flooding hazards. This has led many property owners to mistakenly believe their homes are not at risk.
Though improved data and transparency might ultimately translate to higher costs for some, Dusseau says the alternative, not knowing, hurts people in the long run.
“If people don’t know that they’re at high risk, they won’t know what to do about it so they won’t do anything about it,” says Dusseau.
Climate change is a massive problem, with far-reaching effects that touch every aspect of society. It’s also already here. The impacts long forecast by scientists—heat waves, droughts, encroaching sea levels, thawing Arctic ground, frequent storms, and wildfires—are being felt now by communities from Alaska to the Amazon. But these communities, throughout the hardships being thrown their way, are learning to adapt. While national and international climate efforts take small steps, towns and cities are striding forward, building resilience through community engagement, urban planning, and advocacy.
What resilience looks like is different in every community. It is defined by each place’s unique challenges and ways of life. It requires creativity, trial and error, and unwavering persistence. These five community leaders share lessons learned from lives spent anticipating oncoming obstacles, finding and inventing solutions to each new challenge, and cultivating resilience in the face of climate change.
Resilience is… Proactive planning and learning from others.
Dale Morris
Former Chief Resilience Officer for the City of Charleston, SC and Climate Adaptation Consultant.
Charleston is a coastal city that floods on average 70 days in the year. When Woodwell Climate reached out to offer a free climate risk analysis as part of the Just Access project, Charleston was in the midst of their own comprehensive water plan. Morris recognized the need for expanded risk modeling for the wider County of Charleston, which encompasses three of the four largest cities in South Carolina, and whose upstream flooding risks were less understood but already impacting downstream communities. He facilitated the project, which modeled flood risks out to 2080.
“In the City of Charleston we weren’t at all surprised, but when we shared the results with the other cities, everyone was like ‘whoa, this is worse than we thought.’ Floodplain inundation from rainfall was a big part of it. And when you factor in sea level rise at the outfall of creeks and rivers, there’s less drainage capacity. Where does the water go?”
For Morris, understanding risk is a crucial first step towards building a resilient community. The next is putting that knowledge to use. In Charleston, city and county officials have used the Woodwell report to apply for grant funding to further improve stormwater management.
Though the risks can sometimes seem daunting, Morris says learnings from other communities, even those many thousands of miles away, can offer inspiration and guidance. Earlier in his career, Morris managed outreach for the Dutch government in the United States, helping apply learnings from the Netherlands to community flood programs.
“The Dutch, by necessity, have to know how to live well with water, with the use of different approaches—hard engineering, soft engineering, good spatial planning.”
Morris was at the Dutch Embassy when Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans in 2005. Seeing the devastation there affirmed his belief that planning and governance also play a huge role in how well a community can recover from a disaster.
“I saw very clearly this was a failure of government and governance at all levels. The economic disruption, the family disruption, the devastation across wide swaths of New Orleans and along the Mississippi coast, it made me mad, and it motivated me to do more.”
“More” means more planning, more foresight, tackling future risks before they happen, and pursuing projects that produce multiple benefits.
“These are generational kinds of recoveries. We should think about proactive investments, not reactive responses.”
A resilient Charleston looks like: Clear future flood risk assessment, adaptive management plans for residents in flood zones, smart new development that can receive moving residents, city infrastructure planning that adapts to changing future conditions
Resilience is….Changing mindsets and changing economies.
Ben Robinson
Martha’s Vineyard Commission member and founder of the MVC Climate Action Task Force.
The island of Martha’s Vineyard can be a place of strong contradictions. Transient vacation-goers share the beaches with life-long residents. Multimillion dollar homes are being constructed while local workers struggle to find affordable housing. Rural fields border suburban neighborhoods which, in turn, border both forests and salt marshes.
These complex dynamics are what Robinson grapples with as he leads the island’s climate adaptation planning efforts. As a member of the Martha’s Vineyard Commission, he aided the creation of a climate action plan to identify areas of work across sectors, from food security to transportation. Woodwell Climate worked with the Commission to produce an assessment of the Vineyard’s drought, precipitation, and wildfire risks, as well as a study of existing carbon stores on the Island.
According to Robinson, the Vineyard faces not only increasing climate risks but also challenges in creating the needed social changes for adaptation.
“The social change piece is the one that’s really been the most frustrating, because it entails sacrifice. It entails recognizing the privileges that we’ve had and we still have and taking on a global responsibility.”
One of the trickiest areas to tackle has been the island’s main economic driver: tourism. Summer months are extremely popular with wealthy tourists, and much of the island’s infrastructure is built to serve this influx of temporary residents.
“The Vineyard is really catering more and more every year to a wealthier and wealthier constituency. And they demand more services, more things, a different feel. And that level of over-consumption is one of the primary drivers of climate change.”
It has also made life harder for ordinary residents, driving up property values to an untenable degree, forcing much of the labor force to live off-island and commute.
“Those are really poor trends for a community that wants to be resilient.”
Additionally, reliance on imports undermines food security for residents. Currently, close to 95% of food has to be imported from the mainland.
“Right now there’s no way we would survive without the supply chain to the island, which has just become more and more intertwined with our everyday lives.”
The Vineyard is working to improve its food security by producing more on-island through agriculture and foraging. And despite the challenges in other areas, Robinson reminds himself that the best thing he can do is just keep chipping away at the problem.
“It’s easy to be frustrated in this kind of work, but this is a multi-generational change. I’m only going to see one period of it, and then somebody else is going to pick it up. This is just going to be a slow process of evolving our community. If we can do it right, we’ll be better off in the future.”
A resilient Martha’s Vineyard looks like: A robust, electrified public transit system, a diversified economy with a non-extractive tourism industry, locally produced food, offshore wind
Resilience is…A holistic approach to conservation.
Alexis Bonogofsky
Director of the Sustainable Ranching Initiative for World Wildlife Fund and Yellowstone County Planning Board member.
Being a rancher on the Northern Great Plains can be challenging. Profit margins can be low. Markets can be uncertain. And then there’s the increasing droughts and unpredictability of precipitation caused by climate change. As a resident of Billings, Montana who runs her own family sheep and goat ranch, Bonogofsky is acutely aware of these challenges.
“The larger Northern Great Plains is definitely experiencing impacts from climate change already. Our winters are getting warmer, so we have less snow pack, and we have less water going into the growing season and into the summer.”
Bonogofsky works on programs at World Wildlife Fund (WWF) that provide funding support and guidance for ranchers pursuing regenerative grazing practices which can make ranches more resilient to climate change. Woodwell Climate partners with WWF to analyze ecological data that can help inform those practices and model future outcomes based on changes in land management. When properly managed, grazing animals can actually help mitigate climate change as well, promoting the growth of native plant species that lock away carbon in their deep roots.
“When you think about iconic Western wildlife, grassland ecosystems are where they thrive and where their best habitat is. Ranchers are managing a lot of grass, and the healthier the grasslands are, the more wildlife we have and the cleaner water we have. Grasslands also sequester a lot of carbon, so healthy grasslands that stay intact are necessary to help mitigate the effects of climate change.”
To improve management practices and achieve healthy grasslands, Bonogofsky says, you have to employ solutions that address the entire system holistically— and that includes the people.
“For resilient communities and ecosystems, you can’t separate the people from the land.
For the land and wildlife to be healthy, the people in those communities have to be healthy too.”
That means conservation work isn’t always just protecting plants or animals. It’s also working with community groups to improve housing options in nearby towns or setting up daycare services for ranching families. Strengthening communities, Bonogofsky says, makes people more likely to stay and invest in a place, to do their part in making it better.
“I do this work because it matters. I have a niece and nephew and I want to say to them that I did everything I could to try to make the place better—a place where people can thrive in the future. I’m surrounded by people every day that are making a difference in their communities. And I think if we all do that where we’re from, we actually have an impact.”
Resilient rangeland communities look like: Diverse and intact native grasslands, ranches that are profitable while storing carbon and maintaining ecosystem services, rural communities with services like daycare, housing, and healthcare
Resilience is… Getting creative with your resources.
Sean Hogan
Environmental Sustainability Manager for Barnstable, MA
Hogan’s job is to care about everything climate change, energy, and emissions-related in the town of Barnstable, Massachusetts. He works with the municipal government to identify and pursue funding for projects that could help the town adapt. Barnstable, the largest town on Cape Cod, is one of several Massachusetts communities for which Woodwell Climate conducted a risk assessment, modeling flood risk and stormwater system vulnerability.
Because of his position, Hogan has a clear view into the challenges faced by municipalities in regards to climate resilience. Funding is often short, offices understaffed, and public opinion hard to sway. Hogan has found the best way through is to chase opportunities that combine immediate positive impacts with long-term climate benefits.
“So far, I’ve found in municipal work you have to work opportunistically as to where grants might be available or where there’s institutional interest. We have a finite amount of resources, and if we can husband those resources appropriately, we can spend them in ways that serve the public good.”
Hogan uses the example of electric vehicles, which reduce emissions from transportation, contributing to long-term climate mitigation as well as reducing air pollution for residents in the near term.
“[Climate change is] a problem that’s uniquely designed to foil humans, because we have a hard time grasping those kinds of slow-moving crises. So you either have to change people’s minds, or you find projects that fit into a more favorable psychology.”
Funding opportunities for adaptation projects of all kinds have also become more uncertain with a federal administration slashing climate programs.
“We’re having to come to terms with the change in administration and the financing landscape. We’re gonna have to navigate this period by being a little bit cautious and we’re going to have to become more creative and keep a closer eye on the bottom line so we can create the savings necessary to fund more.”
Resilience will also involve building positive relationships, which for Hogan have been crucial to moving work forward.
“Relationships are important for everything— for building political support, access to resources, expertise, and different perspectives.”
A resilient Barnstable looks like: Electrified systems that don’t depend on fossil fuels, loan programs to help homeowners install solar and resources for renters looking to lower energy bills, public projects that offer both immediate and long-term benefits, dedicated staff time to pursue climate and sustainability solutions.
Resilience is… An uphill battle with a wildfire behind you.
Brooke Woods
Climate Adaptation Specialist for Permafrost Pathways and Tribal Citizen of Rampart, AK.
Woods’ hometown of Rampart, Alaska is a small fishing village on the Yukon River. Here, Alaska Native residents practice a subsistence lifestyle of hunting, fishing, and living off the land. Rampart, like many communities in interior Alaska—and across the Arctic—is feeling the impacts of the warming climate now.
The Arctic is one of the fastest warming places on the planet, and as it heats up, permafrost, or perennially frozen ground, upon which many villages are built, is thawing. This can lead to erosion, ground collapse, and infrastructural damage. Woods’s role on Woodwell Climate’s Permafrost Pathways project is to use her policy expertise to help Tribal partners navigate the tricky landscape of federal and state agencies and funding, as well as uplift tribal sovereignty.
On the Yukon River, one of the biggest concerns is the complete collapse of multiple salmon species. Salmon are suffering heat stress from increased water temperatures, changes in the marine environment, overharvest from bycatch in federal and state fisheries, and competition from hatchery-produced fish.
“We have not been able to fish for five years with an expectation that we will not fish for seven more, and that is a climate and cultural crisis.”
Losing access to these fish cuts off Tribes from a traditional cultural practice as well as a critical food source. Both state and federal agencies are involved in managing fisheries in Alaska, and while there are options for consultation, there is no deference to Tribes in decision making.
Additionally, the threat of permafrost thaw places Tribes in an emotionally challenging position. Community members must decide whether to relocate their villages or stay and shore up crumbling infrastructure, with little guidance or support from government agencies.
“There is no adaptation framework for the crisis tribes are in when it comes to relocation. One big hope of this project and working with our Tribal liaisons is developing that [framework] in any stage. That would be a big success.”
The fight for deference, respect, and resources has not been an easy one. Woods compares it to escaping a wildfire to face an uphill climb. But her people’s history of resilience—of maintaining their connection to the land over 10,000 years in Alaska—gives her strength.
“You get out of the wildfire and you make your way up, and it’s a constant fight. Our ways of life are so connected to our ability to hunt, fish, and gather that Tribes are willing to continue this good fight. When it comes to advocating for our ways of life, our people are so humble and working tirelessly.”
A resilient Yukon River community looks like: Healthy salmon populations, stable permafrost, legal deference to Tribes in decisionmaking around natural resources, federal and state support for relocation, continued traditional ways of life
This year, Las Vegas, Nevada broke its all-time heat record, reaching 120° F.
The temperature was recorded at Harry Reid International Airport on July 7, 2024. That week, between July 6 and July 12, was the new hottest 7-day period on record, with an average high temperature of 117.5° F.
This is the daily reality for Vegas residents in the summer. Record-breaking temperatures are hard to bear, but so were all the hot days and nights that came before. Commuters frequently see temperatures above 120 flash on their vehicle dashboards, and outdoor workers struggle to do their daily tasks under the hot sun.
“There’s a disconnect between climate science and the people who live here,” says Woodwell Climate Research Associate, Monica Caparas. “Vegas residents know our summers are hot and unbearable. Understanding climate change is driving the extreme weather we’re experiencing is where the disconnect lies. ”
Caparas moved to Las Vegas as a child. She grew up there, left for college, and returned to settle into her adult life. Today, she works for Woodwell Climate’s Risk team remotely from her home in the city. Caparas knows the ins and outs of local life. These include Vegas’s rapid population expansion, the groups of people experiencing homelessness sheltering in underground stormwater infrastructure, and the heat that was unbearable before it started making headlines.
Experiencing climate change without shelter
Caparas’s work with the Risk team aims to provide communities like Las Vegas with an accurate picture of the climate-driven changes in their future. These “risk assessments” are provided through Woodwell Climate’s Just Access program, which uses the most accurate climate models, in collaboration with local knowledge, to anticipate future community safety threats. The analyses have brought to light growing threats from flooding, heat, storms, and more. The team provides assessments, free of charge, to states, cities, and countries across the world.
Just Access serves what Risk Program Director Christopher Schwalm calls “frontline communities.” The term describes groups of people who are over-exposed, under-resourced, underserved, historically marginalized, and therefore the most at-risk to the repercussions of climate change. In the risk assessment for Las Vegas, people experiencing homelessness are front and center.
“Between May 20th and the first week in July, about 20 people who were experiencing homelessness died of heat,” says Dr. Catrina Grigsby-Thedford, Executive Director of the Nevada Homeless Alliance (NHA) and community partner in Las Vegas.
The NHA estimates that almost 8,000 people are experiencing homelessness on any given night in southern Nevada. The number is only growing. Grigsby-Thedford says that this year’s unhoused population is up 1,300 people compared to 2023.
“Often our shelters are full,” Grigsby-Thedford says, “We’re limited by shelter beds and space.”
The NHA’s shelters do open all day in extreme heat, but so many people packed tightly together is still unsafe.
With nowhere to go, some seek shelter underground in Las Vegas’s stormwater infrastructure. While the tunnels are cooler out of the sun’s reach, they are at risk from flooding. Across the region, extreme precipitation is expected to increase by 12-14% by 2050, raising flood risk in the city and especially within the tunnels.
To combat lack of space and shelter, the NHA hosts 4-8 one-stop resource fairs per month. The events, called Project Homeless Connect, serve both people experiencing homelessness and low-income residents in Las Vegas. Grigsby-Thedford says these events “fill in gaps”—offering housing assistance, medical care, hygiene care, and other resources.
Despite all of this work, many unhoused people are hesitant to engage with organizations like the NHA. Grigsby-Thedford says “choice is often a challenge,” and that when people grow accustomed to the way things are, they often accept it and choose to stay.
Picturing risk
Building trust with communities, especially those predisposed to mistrust outside actors, is essential in this work. Which is why, Schwalm says, Woodwell Climate approaches risk work with the goal of “meet[ing] people where they are.”
That means “scoping,” the team’s word for listening to what community and government leaders want out of the risk analysis—what concerns they have, weak points they’ve identified, and what help might be needed post-analysis.
“Two-thirds of the time we spend from start to finish falls into this scoping idea, rather than doing analysis itself,” Schwalm says.
Scoping frames the data the risk team collects, as well as who their partners will be during the risk analysis process.
“We find people who are practical and recognize that there’s a problem,” Schwalm says, “We only work with communities who want to work with us.”
Following the scoping process, the Risk team compiles an analysis of extreme weather events and subsequent risks each community will face as climate change progresses.
“We perform a stress test of that particular geography to identify weak points,” Schwalm explains.
Then, the Risk team uses the most up-to-date climate models possible to predict changes in extreme weather and regional climate. By using predictive models, the team focuses efforts on what the future will hold, as opposed to using past strategies.
“We need to use the future to predict the future,” Schwalm says simply.
Making climate risk data accessible to all
Over the past three years, Just Access has provided 50 communities—that’s about a quarter billion people—with risk analyses. These communities span the U.S., Central and South America, Africa, Asia, and Oceania. They’ve worked with countries, like the Democratic Republic of Congo, where they helped update the country’s National Adaptive Plan, states like Chiapas in Mexico, groups like Cree Nation in Canada, and other communities, now including Las Vegas.
Despite all of this work, though, Schwalm says there is still room to grow.
“Fifty communities is kind of only a drop in the bucket,” he says, “We’re not going to make a huge dent in this unless we move beyond working community-by-community.”
Two major roadblocks for Just Access are finite resources: time and money. Individual risk analyses require a lot of time and communication to address risks in relatively small areas.
The other obstacle, money, is something climate research could always use more of. Grants and donations are crucial in order for analyses to remain free, and those sometimes come with limitations.
“There’s a tension from the funder to work in a specific geography sometimes,” Schwalm says, “It’s a juggling act.”
Climate change can also be a politicized topic. In order to meet people where they are, sometimes the Risk team implements changes in language used to communicate with community leaders. This can be a change as simple as using “extreme weather” instead of “climate change.” As long as everyone in the room is ready to confront what the future holds, they’re all working on the same page towards the same goal.
“We’ve done red states, blue states, rural, urban,” Schwalm continues. “We’ve learned how to read the room.”
Creating the foundations for change
Woodwell Climate’s involvement in Las Vegas brings to light the way justice issues, like homelessness, interact with growing threats from climate change.
“In the Las Vegas risk assessment, we are focusing on the disproportionate impacts of the climate crisis on communities already facing systemic socio-economic inequity,” says Caparas. “We must think about intersectionality in order to address climate justice.”
Not only does climate change represent a current crisis for those experiencing homelessness, communities with fewer resources are now at greater risk of being made homeless by future climate-related disasters. Accurate climate risk information can support organizations like NHA as they develop strategies to serve people experiencing homelessness in a more extreme future.
Grigsby-Thedford says that NHA members, especially those with lived experience of homelessness who work as Lived X Consultants, are always looking to be involved in projects like the one Caparas leads.
“We always talk about weather in our meetings,” she says, “So this is perfect, someone’s actually doing research about this. Anything that impacts [Las Vegas’s homeless population], we want to make sure we’re involved in that.”
For the Las Vegas risk assessment, Caparas is working with the NHA and Southern Nevada Lived X Consultants to understand climate risks around cooling stations in public buildings, which are a vital, air-conditioned shelter when the heat index is too high. Grigsby-Thedford says there were many more cooling stations in 2023 and 2024 compared to previous years.
Caparas also forged a connection with Miguel Dávila Uzcátegui, Southern Nevada’s Regional Transportation Commission (RTC) Senior Planner and board member of Help Hope Home. Together, they are developing a database of flooding infrastructure and updating the city’s flooding model with future climate projections. The RTC will integrate the Risk team’s model into regional planning work, updating Las Vegas’s flooding and transportation infrastructure for community safety.
None of this work would have been possible without Caparas’s diligent bridge building between the scientific resources of Woodwell Climate and the needs of people in her own community. Those connections allow science to be informed first and foremost by those most affected by climate change.
“The people closest to the problem are the people closest to the solution,” says Grigsby-Thedford.
The city of Chelsea, Massachusetts persevered through the American Revolution and two great fires. Now its resilience is being tested by climate change, as rising sea levels and more intense storms have begun sending frequent flood waters into the city.
Woodwell Climate Research Center recently conducted a thorough analysis of flood risk in Chelsea, identifying where flooding is likely to increase with climate change. The picture it paints is one where the city’s most vulnerable citizens get hit the hardest.
Located north of Boston where Chelsea Creek merges into the Mystic River and the Boston Harbor, Chelsea is vulnerable to two forms of flooding— storm surge from the harbor and extreme rainfall events. Currently, 15% of the city falls within an area of potential flooding. That number will more than double to 34% by 2081.
The return interval of high intensity flooding events will also increase. Scientists use the term “1-in-100 year events” to refer to the kind of large-scale flooding that has a 1% likelihood of occurring over the course of a century. Woodwell calculated that today’s 1-in-100 year rainfall events could become three times as likely by mid-century, and 1-in-100 year storm surge events could be annual occurrences by 2081. That would be like the city of Chelsea experiencing flooding proportional to Hurricane Sandy every year.
Heavy Industry, Low Incomes, High Risk
Chelsea was settled on a salt marsh punctuated by five hills. The city was developed from the high ground down, and much of the marsh and wetlands around Island End and Chelsea Creek were filled in over the city’s history. These low lying areas form the city’s vulnerable floodplain.
According to Woodwell’s analysis, that floodplain contains much of the city’s vital industry. Two oil terminals sit on Chelsea’s waterfront— the Chelsea Sandwich and Gulf Oil terminals. Here, petroleum, natural gas, and other petrochemicals are stored before being transported to their final destinations. The southeastern waterfront is also a designated port area for commercial shipping.
On the western side of the floodplain is the New England Produce Center, a massive regional hub for food distribution, as well as a major employer.
“Our waterfront has been industrial for 200 years and will continue to be industrial. But we’re very concerned that industry and flooding aren’t compatible,” says Karl Allen, a planner in Chelsea’s Department of Housing and Community Development who worked with Woodwell on the analysis.
Affordable housing is also at risk. Much of the city’s affordable housing was built in the 50’s and 60’s in the lowest-lying areas of the city, where marshes were filled in to create land for their construction. These communities are already familiar with bearing the burden of environmental damages— a rail line bisects the city through a designated environmental justice corridor. At only a few feet above sea level, the rail line serves as a major inundation pathway. Without adaptation measures, climate change will hit these lower income areas hardest.
Climate-Proofing Chelsea
“I can say that the one thing that’s been very common for municipal and state agencies is a sense of moving goalposts,” says John Walkey, the Director of Waterfront and Climate Justice Initiatives for GreenRoots. GreenRoots is a community organization dedicated to improving urban environmental and public health in Chelsea. Walkey and Greenroots facilitated the collaboration between Woodwell and the city.
“We are now at the stage where climate processes are moving faster than our bureaucracy can,” said Walkey. That could have been a paralyzing realization, especially backed up with analysis results outlining the intensity of increased flooding. Instead, the City’s planning leaders have decided to confront the floodwaters head on, using the analysis to change the way they think about implementing routine infrastructure updates.
Of course, Water doesn’t care where one municipality begins or ends; it will flow into any accessible space. The success of Chelsea’s adaptation measures will depend on collaboration with nearby localities— Everett, Revere, Boston. For example, there are plans in the works to construct a flood defense between Chelsea and nearby Everett that sits across the Island End River. Both cities hope this landscaped wall will protect the area from major flooding until at least 2070.
Having a thorough flood risk analysis also puts the city in a good position to lobby for adaptation on a larger scale. In mid-April, Woodwell and Chelsea hosted a briefing for the offices of Massachusetts Senators Ed Markey and Elizabeth Warren and Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley on the results of the flood analysis and the regional security issue it represents.
“Chelsea is facing a severe threat from climate change over the course of the next 50 years,” said Chelsea City Manager, Tom Ambrosino during the briefing. “So we are working hard to try to be prepared for it. But a lot of these projects are beyond our immediate capability.”
Chelsea is one city of hundreds
There are hundreds of Chelseas across the United States facing similar, and increasingly urgent, threats from flooding, drought, heat, or extreme weather. Many communities are scrambling to adapt as disasters hit, without knowing how much more change is on the horizon. Replicating climate risk analyses like the one in Chelsea could help them get a more specific picture of what they are facing.
“When you tell people well, ‘you’ve got to design for conditions in 2070’, they say ‘what does that mean? What kind of storm are we designing for?” says Allen. “This analysis has given us a better understanding of what kind of disasters we’ll be looking at, and with what frequency, so we have a design target.”
Risk analyses are invaluable to a municipality’s ability to plan for the shifting goalposts of climate change. Yet the availability of these analyses is uneven. Cities with more resources are able to pay private companies for risk assessments, while non-profits like Woodwell work to fill in the gaps. The Center has already partnered with 14 communities in the U.S. and abroad to produce tailored analyses. But there are nearly 20 thousand municipalities in the U.S. alone. Each will experience their own unique version of climate change.
“It really highlights the need for a national climate service,” said Woodwell Research Associate Dominick Dusseau who worked on the analysis for Chelsea, “something that can provide a nationwide standard service, rather than a piecemeal thing.”
Woodwell’s analysis is a prototypical version of what could be possible with more uniform risk assessment services, as well as a model of successful community engagement. Woodwell will continue to grow its partnerships with individual cities, but the scope of climate change will require a larger, more coordinated response.
“We’re doing a lot, there’s just so much more to do,” says Dusseau.
A warmer world means snow, rain will be much less predictable
When and where precipitation falls can determine whether or not people have enough drinking water, aquifers can support agriculture, and rivers keep running. Climate change is breaking down the predictability of weather patterns across the globe. Two new releases this week, from the Woodwell Climate Research Center and Probable Futures, flesh out our understanding of how the shifting seasonality of precipitation might impact our future.
Rainy seasons are fluctuating more
A new volume of maps, data, and educational materials launched on the Probable Futures platform today. The volume provides information that helps readers better understand local, regional, and global precipitation trends, showing how they will change with climate change.
The impact of a warmer world on precipitation patterns is not uniform—in some places dry spells will become more common, in others, intense storms, and some places will fluctuate between both. Rainy seasons may start earlier or later in different parts of the world, which will have impacts on growing seasons and agricultural yields.
“Climate change is reshaping both local precipitation patterns and the global water system—and everyone on Earth will be affected,” said Alison Smar, executive director of Probable Futures. “It may seem counterintuitive, but knowing that the future is less predictable is a valuable forecast. Communities need to be more resilient, adaptable, and prepared. It’s within our power today to prepare for the events that are probable, and prevent those with irreversible impacts.”
Snow is melting earlier
Woodwell Associate Scientist, Dr. Anna Liljedahl and Assistant Scientist Dr. Jenny Watts, were co-authors on a paper also released today that documents the impacts of earlier snowmelt in the Arctic. The Arctic is warming more rapidly than anywhere else on earth, which has led to earlier snow melts and longer growing seasons in the tundra.
Conventional hypotheses have predicted that lengthening summers would allow more time for vegetation to grow and sequester carbon, perhaps offsetting emissions elsewhere.
“Our results show that the expected increased CO2 sequestration arising from Arctic warming and the associated increase in growing length may not materialize if tundra ecosystems are not able to continue capturing CO2 later in the season,” said Dr. Donatella Zona, lead author on the paper from the University of Sheffield’s School of Biosciences and the Department of Biology at San Diego State University.
Dr. Liljedahl says that the results highlight the fact that the impacts of climate change will be complex across ecosystems.
“This work shows how important it is to continually assess our assumptions and terminology on how the Arctic system will respond to warming. We often say that warming will lead to a “longer growing season”. We need to be more careful in making that connection,” said Dr. Liljedahl.
