Finding the opportunity in change: Principles for successful Adaptation Planning

National adaptation plans provide direction for sectors, infrastructure and communities - guiding actions over time, with the aim to reduce risk. However, adaptation is fundamentally local in regard to where the benefits of good adaptation planning are felt, and developing a plan without local context to ‘place’ likely means your interventions (or the impacts of potential interventions) will be inappropriate. When I say ‘place’, I mean not just the physical place but also the broader social, environmental and economic context of the place.

For example, when we worked with New Zealand’s Defence Estate on their Adaptation Plans, we started with Devonport Naval Base. Through that process we developed a booklet of factsheets about different options and interventions, and catalogued them based on different hazards. We thought that would be really useful as we created plans across the 17 other major camps and bases. Sometimes that booklet was useful as a jumping off point for conversations, but each location had its own unique requirements. What works on an airfield does not work for an army base, and vice versa.

Airfields cannot have any standing water, as it attracts birds and increases the risk of birdstrike, whereas an army base will have ponds for training exercises, and these can be integrated with stormwater management. Understanding all of the nuances of each place was crucial to select the right place-based solutions to reduce climate risks.
 

Climate adaptation planning can often be highly technical with lots of uncertainty; however, that uncertainty is not a reason to shy away from difficult community conversations. Community members have lived experience, and it’s important not to underestimate their ability to process complex information. Equally, it’s important to meet communities where they are and commit to working together to develop a shared understanding.

Transparency also applies to decision-making. Be up-front: Tell people, “these are the questions we’re asking you, and this is how those questions will inform our decision-making. If we ask you to select your ‘favourite’ option, here’s what we’ll do with that information.”
 
For example, in South Dunedin, which is currently going through an adaptation planning process (which Beca is working on in partnership with WSP, G&T Connect and Tonkin + Taylor), we had community members put sticky dots on their favourite ‘Potential Future’ in an exercise called ‘Dotmocracy’. We made it clear that their preferences, as well as what they thought about how their lives would be different in each of the futures, would be incorporated into decision-making alongside specialist assessments.  We left the dots up between sessions so that people could see how others were voting. That transparency meant people could see the range of viewpoints in their community, and how those different viewpoints will be incorporated into decision-making.
 

Some locations have been studied to death, and there is a heap of data about them. You may have dozens of hazard maps you can pull on, to tell you about a place. Hazard data may or may not be available, but communities can provide useful insights; they will tell you, “Oh this road always floods when the tide is like this”. That has been the case in much of our work in the Pacific – community data is often what’s most interesting and powerful about adaptation planning, and provides the insight into what is most needed to enhance resilience.

For example in the Marshall Islands, there is a lot of data and past studies about sea level rise and the potential impacts. However, in our vulnerability assessments it was apparent through the engagement results that rising temperatures and extreme heat days could also present significant impacts. Communities in the Marshall Islands shared that an important part of their daily lives is meeting in outdoor open areas to discuss pressing issues and to work together to enhance resilience to increasing challenges.

However, these types of open-air meetings will become less possible as extreme heat forces people into shaded areas within their homes. The social cohesion traits that make remote outer atoll communities resilient to climate challenges is therefore at risk (if people can no longer spend the time in communal spaces). In this case – the most appropriate and important adaptation measure may therefore be the provision of cool, shaded community gathering places to allow social cohesion to be maintained.  

These key aspects of how daily lives are changing can serve as the signals and triggers for adaptation. For example, having a signal around when numbers at communal meetings are dropping could indicate an urgent need for the cooled, community shelter.

Through these interactions, you start to identify the bits of place-based information that let us know a change is approaching and can help us develop an appropriate adaptation plan for the location.

We have also developed adaptive plans for water systems, including the Integrated Systems Plans for Dunedin City Council.  Council had a robust evidence base considering how water sources, wastewater discharge and stormwater flows were likely to change over time due to climate change as well as population or behavioural changes and other factors. Working collaboratively with Dunedin City Council and other consultants, we developed an adaptive strategy for the next fifty years, stress testing it using a range of scenarios to understand if our signals would enable adaptive decision-making across a range of futures.

With either data-rich or data-sparse approaches, the key is to remain open to change, and make a plan that is based on the best available information at the time, rather than waiting for the perfect data – because we just don’t have time to waste. You then adapt your plan as you receive more data, over time.



Dr Laura Robichaux is a Climate Adaptation Specialist at Beca.