Accueil

Climate Change: Final Comments


Climate Change
 
Introduction
 
Climate change has potentially catastrophic implications for water quality in the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence River system because it will exacerbate existing chemical, physical, and biological stressors and create new problems on top of the current problems. Warmer water, increased nutrient and sediment loadings from intense storms, increased winter evaporation, and the likelihood of more extreme fluctuations in water levels are all consistent with predicted climate change impacts. These and other climate-related impacts, and their overall effect on the ecosystem– existing and eventual--are not well understood. The Agreement must acknowledge the scope and scale of climate change impacts and the serious gaps in understanding and the need for strategies to mitigate the effects.
 
Recommendations:
  • The GLWQA should be updated to state a commitment to climate change issues.
     
    • It should be specifically referred to as ‘climate change’ not ‘global warming’ to use a more scientifically accepted and widely adopted and understood term by the public and policymakers.
  • The governments should commit to developing a binational Great Lakes and St. Lawrence River visionary guidance and plan for the Great Lakes region to set goals and visions for dealing with climate change.
  • The governments should create a board of experts and stakeholders with a standing reference to assess on a regular basis, perhaps every 2 years (as changes are happening quickly and the science is changing quickly), the state of regional climate change knowledge, models, and adaptation measures to determine priorities for programs and projects and commensurate funding, and to recommend policies and strategies for adaptation, resilience, and mitigation of ecological impacts from a changing climate based on the latest state of knowledge. These priorities should align with and inform national greenhouse gas reduction strategies in both nations.  The program should also include a public education component. At a minimum, educational material should be made available in both English and French. The IJC should form a binational task force to coordinate these efforts and alignment with other binational and international agreements, treaties and research efforts related to climate change and ecological resilience and adaptation.  
  • There is a need for supporting/funding this regional science and a mechanism for communicating the information to stakeholders and managers, therefore, we would like to see strengthened Great Lakes climate change research:
    • Identify priorities for research topics, data gathering and modeling systems that could underpin needed research.
    • Place a significant emphasis on adaptation measures and resilience strategies and their implementation
    • Create a central place for scientists to apply for research support. This would be valuable even if there were no net increase in resources.
    • Additional research we recommend:
       
      • An inventory of threatened habitats and vulnerable species and an analysis of how changing habitat viability in the region will affect the chemical, physical and biological integrity of the Great Lakes, and ecosystem services and functions essential for ecological vitality and human health and safety. This study should include an analysis of the viability of and regional capacity for protecting and restoring connecting habitats for wildlife refuge and how to facilitate transitions for plants and animals as the weather conditions change.
      • Economic impact assessment of loss of habitat, fish and other species. 
      • Impacts of inter-basin and intra-basin transfers of water.
      • Impacts of climate change on existing water and wastewater infrastructure in the Great Lakes Basin and water intakes
      • Climate change monitoring should be expanded to cover the entire Great Lakes-St. Lawrence River Basin.
  • Integrate climate change research into all other GLWQA issue areas in the Agreement 
  • Information Exchange: The governments should commit in the GLWQA to:
     
    • Create a central repository and distribution system for relevant new research related to climate and the integrity of the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence River and the health and safety of its human population.
    • Organize regular conferences on Great Lakes-St. Lawrence River system climate change trends, impacts and adaptation strategies to foster communication among climate change researchers.
    • Create institutional discussion forums for providing input to national and international efforts that are planning new or enhanced sensing networks, so that Great Lakes regional research needs are best met.
    • Provide meteorological or synthetic climate data sets for each of the existing weather stations in the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence River Basin, such that the data sets have been adjusted by incorporating reasonable climate-change assumptions that have been standardized across the Basin. Such adjusted data sets should be:
       
      • Available to planners, consultants, and others who routinely run air dispersion and other types of computer models for regulatory and policy purposes, and would provide these users with modeling predictions under reasonably foreseeable climate conditions.
      • Made available in at least two versions, representing distinct levels of climate change within the range considered likely by experts. The data sets should be based on assumptions that are standardized binationally across the Basin, and should be updated every five years to reflect new information.  Parties should initiate, expand and enhance requirements for Great Lakes-based facility reporting on Greenhouse gas emissions.
  • Communication and Education. The governments should commit in the GLWQA to:
    • Design and implement public education programs including an education program on water conservation as an adaptation strategy.
    • Enhance the region’s global climate change profile by supporting regular participation by Great Lakes-St. Lawrence River system climate change scientists in world climate change forums such that global climate change research projects are designed to better serve Great Lakes-St. Lawrence River system regional research needs
  • Response Actions. The governments should commit in the GLWQA to:
     
    • Protect the public by planning for and responding to extreme events (flood, drought, etc). Extreme events reduce freshwater quality in an instant, therefore the following actions should be committed to:
       
      • Development of both a proactive and reactive plan for dealing with extreme events.
      • Work with local municipal and state authorities to require shoreline development to be able to withstand extreme storm events (including appropriate setback requirements)
      • Monitor weather forecasts. Prioritize improving and maintaining technology infrastructure for observation/data collection that will inform climate modeling and weather forecasting (nowcasting, short term, and long term capacity); this data should be regionally dispersed to inform local communities with relevant information (information downscaling). Past climatic averages are not sufficient for adaptation planning.
      • Implement green infrastructure and practices, including leafy green infrastructure in Great Lakes-St. Lawrence River watersheds to reduce and mitigate large amounts of storm water runoff
      • Re-label ‘100-year storm’ events to make them more understandable by the public.
      • Look into plans such as the Local Governments for Sustainability (ICLEI) Climate Resilient Communities Program and assess application opportunities in the region. 
      • Develop recommendations for growth planning in the face of climate change uncertainty. More specifically, municipal level infrastructure capacity planning, accounting for both population growth and increase in storms/weather events.
 
  • The governments should commit to develop a strategy for reducing bacteria that thrive on warmer temperatures or survive longer seasons as a result of warmer winter water temperatures.
  • The governments should commit to implement an energy efficiency standard to reduce air pollution and deposition into waterways and to emphasize renewable, clean energy to reduce climate change greenhouse gas releases. A full, comprehensive environmental assessment must be completed to ensure the energy system is safe for water quality. 
  • Adaptation to climate change should not be used as an excuse for inaction or poor environmental decision-making. 
  • In order to reduce human use of water, which may become more scarce as a result of climate change, the governments should commit to develop and implement aggressive water conservation and efficiency programs throughout the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence River basin.

 

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