Center News

Lisa Dilling Appointed to the EPA Board of Scientific Counselors

Lisa Dilling has been appointed to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) Board of Scientific Counselors (BOSC), and to the Executive Committee within the BOSC. BOSC was established by the EPA to provide advice, information, and recommendations about the Office of Research and Development (ORD) research program. The mission of the BOSC is to provide advice and recommendations on:

• Evaluating science and engineering research, programs and plans, laboratories, and research-management practices of ORD and recommending actions to improve their quality and/or strengthen their relevance to EPA's mission.
• Evaluating and providing advice concerning the utilization of peer review within ORD to sustain and enhance the quality of science in EPA.
• Reviewing ORD's program development and progress, ORD's research planning process, and research program balance, including implementation of the ORD Strategic Plan.
• Providing peer review including evaluation of ORD's peer review policies, and reviewing ORD Offices, National Laboratories and Centers, and research plans and products.
• Providing advice on human resources planning, such as scientist career development and rotational assignment programs, and the appropriate scope and design of training programs for environmental research professionals.

Saffron O’Neill Visits from Australia

Dr. Saffron O’Neill, a Research Fellow in the National Climate Change Adaptation Research Facility (NCCARF) Social, Economic and Institutional Dimensions (SEID) theme, based at Melbourne University, visited Boulder in May to collaborate with Center researchers. Dr. O’Neill gave a presentation titled “Defining and Assessing Maladaptation“. Using a case study of migration and resettlement in the South Pacific, she spoke about her work that seeks to explore how the risk of maladaptation might change under three types of adaptation strategy: reducing exposure, decreasing sensitivity or increasing adaptive capacity.

CIRES Rendezvous

On April 22 the Center participated in the sixth institute-wide Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES) Rendezvous. The poster highlighting some of our current research projects can be found by clicking on the image below.

Center Research Symposium

The Center held its second internal research symposium in May. This is an opportunity for presentations and discussion of research by CSTPR faculty and students. Topics included:

• Lisa Dilling: “Why do communities respond to risk? How does it matter to adaptation?”
• Max Boykoff: “Who Speaks for the Climate? Exploring media coverage of weather extremes”
• Ben Hale: "Fixing the Wrong Wrong: Geoengineering and the End of the World"
• Roger Pielke: “Raw Fish, Dead Bison and Dim Bulbs”
• Christine Kirchhoff: "Water resources management and planning in five U.S. states: Cross-scale collaborative governance for improved planning to mitigate extremes and other risks to water resources"
• Shali Mohleji: “A New Metric for Gauging Success of the NFIP and NEHRP: Comparing Projections of Pre-Policy Losses to Actual Losses”
• Kelli Archie: “The Role of Information in Climate Change Adaptation on Western Public Lands”
• Saffron O’Neill: “Analysing disaster preparedness: Evidence from the ‘Black Sunday’ bushfires”
• Bill Travis: “Design of a Severe Climate Change Warning System”

New Center Outreach Efforts

The Center recently added a multi-media gallery to its website. There you can find videotapes of talks, presentations and interviews; audiotapes of radio discussions; and a collection of photographs from Center events.

The Center is experimenting with social media through Facebook and Twitter. Please let us know if you view these pages and find them useful. We value your feedback! Send comments to: ami@cires.colorado.edu.