News and Spotlights

National Geographic Daily News

After nearly 10 years serving as Director of the Western Water Assessment, Brad Udall is moving on to become Director of the Getches-Wilkinson Center for Natural Resources, Energy, and the Environment. (More information is available in this press release.) Please join us in congratulating Brad and thanking him for his service! Kristen Averyt will serve as WWA's Interim Director. As always, please contact us at wwa@colorado.edu with any questions or comments.

An author team that included WWA-sponsored researchers James McCutchan and Thomas Detmer concluded that, contrary to expectations, there has been no significant increase in stream nitrate concentrations following widespread pine beetle tree mortality in Colorado. The team's paper, published January 14 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), synthesized findings from several university and federal agency research studies, including the WWA project led by McCutchan. Read the CU-Boulder press release, the Green blog at the New York Times, and the full article at PNAS. Also see the WWA Beetles, Water, and Climate webpages.

NOAA recently announced seven multi-year awards to its RISA (Regional Integrated Sciences and Assessments) programs to encourage collaboration with federal and non-federal partners on climate adaptation. WWA received $100,000 to connect the climate expertise at WWA and sister program CLIMAS (U. of Arizona) with regional conservation planners and decisionmakers, through The Nature Conservancy-led Southwest Climate Change Initiative (SWCCI). The effort is led by WWA team member Bill Travis. See the project description here.

Outside Magazine

The journal Ecology and Society recently published "Climate Change and Western Public Lands: A Survey of U.S. Federal Land Managers on the Status of Adaptation Efforts." This article summarizes and analyzes the results of a survey conducted by WWA team members Kellie Archie and Lisa Dilling, with Jana Milford and Fred Pampel of CU, on the status of climate adaptation efforts being undertaken by federal land managers in the WWA region. Read the full article at Ecology and Society.

The Summary for Decision Makers of the forthcoming report Assessment of Climate Change in the Southwestern United States is now available through the Southwest Climate Science Center. Several WWA team members contributed to the report, which provides a state-of-the-science overview of past, ongoing, and projected climate changes and impacts for the Southwest region, including Utah and Colorado. The full report will be published by Island Press in the near future.

The Denver Post

On Tuesday, November 13, from 10:00-11:00 am, WWA researcher James Meldrum will present "Water, Energy, and Climate Change: Freshwater Use by Power Plants." See the WWA Webinars page for more details and login information.

On October 18, the Western Water Assessment was among the organizations awarded a Department of the Interior's Partners in Conservation Award for their collaborative effort on the Colorado River Basin Water Supply and Demand Study, led by the Bureau of Reclamation. WWA's Joe Barsugli, who helped Reclamation develop the future climate and hydrology scenarios for the Basin Study, accepted the award in Washington, D.C., on behalf of the program. This is the second Partners in Conservation Award in four years that WWA has shared for its work with Reclamation and others on Colorado River climate and hydrology.