Coastal Change: Vulnerability, Mitigation, and Restoration

Coastal storms, rising seas, inundation, flooding, and changing temperatures pose a persistent threat to coastal communities, ecosystems, and the services those ecosystems provide to support our coastal communities and economy.

COL provides timely and actionable science solutions and tools to better understand ecosystem impacts, vulnerability and risks associated with changing climate and weather conditions to support coastal and community resilience

The Coastal Change portfolio at the Cooperative Oxford Laboratory includes three distinct NCCOS sub-priorities: Restoration, Vulnerability and Risk Assessment, and Climate Impacts on Ecosystems.

Coastal ecosystems are vulnerable to habitat loss from impacts such as declining water quality. Habitat restoration offers a way to regain ecosystem services lost as a result of acute or chronic injuries.  

Coastal decision makers need to understand the risks and vulnerabilities facing their communities and ecosystems in order to help them become resilient. Coastal decision makers can include city, county, and state elected officials, coastal and emergency managers and planners, leaders of industry or neighborhood associations. COL develops models and tools that integrate biological, hydrologic, physical, socioeconomic, and other factors to evaluate coastal resilience.

This research and tools can help determine the vulnerability of the collective community, beyond its geographic, economic, or infrastructural vulnerabilities

The below interactive map shows Vibrio risk category assignments for Washington State shellfish growing areas for 2020.

Risk is assigned by the Washington Department of Health based on a 5-year rolling average number of cases: 

1. Risk Category 1 with 0.2 or less
2. Risk Category 2 with 0.3 to 1
3. Risk Category 3 with more than 1

Additionally, we are developing the ability to model and forecast where Vibrio may be present in our marine environments.

The above story map describes tools being developed to provide early warning of potential coastal hazards, this information can make people's lives safer.

We can help communities mitigate and adapt to climate change by detecting and assessing change in coastal ecosystems. By observing the ecological responses of coastal habitats and species to climate change, we can help communities understand ecosystem relationships and develop indicators to evaluate progress towards long-term community resilience.

Understanding and predicting climate-related issues along coastlines is important for management and coastal resiliency. We provide scientific information and tools on connections between climate, weather and coastal impacts from hazards including storms, rising seas, floods, and changing air/water temperatures.

The above link explains the Weather and Water: Using weather data to create models and tools to predict coastal impacts project at the Cooperative Oxford Laboratory.