"Obama Administration Releases First-Ever Climate Adaptation Plans"

"This year, the Commerce Department will investigate the feasibility of a bicycle share program. The Agriculture Department's Risk Management Agency will redraw planting zone maps for the purposes of insuring nursery-grown plants. And the Department of Defense will scale down its fleet of gas-guzzling Humvees. These are all examples of steps federal agencies will take in 2013 in an effort to deal with the risks of future climate change. The Obama administration released its first climate change adaptation plans Thursday, as part of the annual sustainability reports."



"'It's an expression of the realization that the impacts of climate change aren't something that are going to happen way, way in the future,' said Joe Casola, staff scientist and program director of science and impacts at the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions. 'They're happening now, and in some ways, agencies' missions are put at risk by the threats of climate change, and they need to take action and mainstream considerations of climate into a lot of their decisionmaking.'"

Tifany Stecker, Julia Pyper, and ClimateWire report for Scientific American February 11, 2013.

Source: Scientific American, 02/13/2013