Morning Breakout Sessions | Day Two: Tuesday, July 20

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11:00 AM - 12:15 PM | Sessions 7, 8, & 9

Session 7: Water Resources and Forest Management Under A Changing Environment

Forests and water are closely connected through complex physical, biological, ecological processes at multiple scales, providing numerous direct hydrological ecosystem services including drinking water to millions of Americans. However, these water-related ecosystem services are threatened by land use change, climate change, and other disturbances. Forest managers, land use planners, and water utilities need tools and data that quantify the importance and value of forests for maintaining clean and abundant water supplies. This session aims to focus on the interactions of forest land management and water supply at watershed to regional scale. We welcome empirical and modeling studies, data, and tools investigating or demonstrating the role of forests in improving local and downstream water quantity and quality under natural and anthropogenic disturbances such as climate change, wildland fires, land use change (e.g., urbanization), forest dynamics, and insects and diseases.

Moderators: 
Peter Caldwell, USDA Forest Service, Southern Research Station, Center for Integrated Forest Science
Ge Sun, USDA Forest Service, Southern Research Station, Eastern Forest Environmental Threat Assessment Center
Travis Warziniack, USDA Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Research Station, Human Dimensions

Presenters:

1. Ning Liu, USDA Forest Service, Southern Research Station, Eastern Forest Environmental Threat Assessment Center, "Quantifying the Role of National Forest Systems Lands in Providing Surface Drinking Water Supply for the conterminous United States"
2. Travis Warziniack, USDA Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Research Station, Human Dimensions, "Increasing demands on forested watersheds: Projections of water use throughout the U.S."
3. Steven McNulty, USDA Southeast Climate Hub, "Managing Forests to Maximize Water Resources"
4. Sally Claggett, USDA Forest Service, State and Private Forestry, Eastern Region, "Forests to Faucets 2.0"
5. Anne Neale, US EPA, Office of Research and Development, Center for Public Health and Environmental Assessment, "EnviroAtlas: Visualizing the Land-Water Relationship 100 Different Ways"
6. Sara Goeking, USDA Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Research Station, Inventory and Monitoring Program, "Streamflow response to forest disturbance in the western US over the past two decades"
7. François-Nicolas Robinne, Natural Resources Canada / Government of Canada, "From Source to Tap: forests, wildfires, and water supply in Canada"
8. Ge Sun, USDA Forest Service, Southern Research Station, Eastern Forest Environmental Threat Assessment Center, "Effects of climate change and urbanization on water balances in the southern U.S."
9. Peter Caldwell, USDA Forest Service, Southern Research Station, Center for Integrated Forest Science, "Developing a multi-scale decision support tool to quantify forest benefits on water quantity and quality in the southern United States"

Session 8: Advancing Water Smart Development & Landscaping with Cross-Sector Collaboration

Western states face the possibility of significant water supply shortfalls within the next few decades, even with aggressive conservation and new water projects. Climate change and population increases only makes this matter more urgent. In addition, response to the COVID-19 crisis has accelerated suburban, single-family housing development, which tends to be less water efficient than dense development. Our legal and environmental constraints open a gap between projected supply and demand in each basin.

Providing private sector developers and land use professionals with the tools, resources, and support to implement water smart development and landscaping will improve our region’s ability to thrive over time despite projected water shortages, population increases, and climate change. This panel will discuss how best to bridge the gap between the public and private sectors to advance best practices in water smart development and support policies that protect our region’s water future.

Moderators: 
Marianne Eppig, ULI Colorado
John Berggren, Western Resources
Presenters:

1. Lee Ferguson, Trammell Crow, "Best practices in water smart development."
2. Bill Vitek, Dig Studio, "Best practices in water efficient landscape design."
3. Bob Howey, Irrigation Analysis, "Certification for installation and ongoing maintenance of water efficient development and landscaping."
4. Jessica Thrasher, Colorado Stormwater Center at Colorado State University, "Water smart policy and systems, and their influence on land use."

Historically, conversations about climate change, water/energy and land use have focused on binary intersections: climate/water; water/land; energy/water; or climate/energy interfaces. We believe that the intersection of the climate/land use/water/energy systems collectively need more attention. For example, climate/land/water nexus discussions have pointed to drought, sea level rise and regional flooding; some attention has also been paid to climate/wildfire and the wildland-urban interface (WUI). However, the failure to consider the broader set of intersections leads to risk and unintended consequences. The challenges include multiple time and space scales, rapidly changing technologies and societal behaviors, and massively different conditions across geographies. There are many lenses through which to evaluate intersections: risk management, finance, biodiversity, social justice. It is important to evaluate the value of co-benefits and multi-benefit solutions, to find out if they are truly useful. We invite others to join us in defining the “virtuous intersection” = minimizing risk while taking a systems approach to analyzing the climate/land/water/energy interface.

Moderator: 
Jim Holway, Babbitt Center for Land and Water Policy

Presenters:

1. Brad Udall, Colorado State University
2. Kathy Jacobs, University of Arizona
3. Ellen Hanak, Public Policy Institute of California
4. Jim Holway, Babbitt Center for Land and Water Policy