Introduction to CREVAT

Various studies and reports address the impact of environmental changes on cultural resources in National Park Service (NPS) areas. However, none of the studies address cultural resources in NPS regions 6, 7, & 8 (hereafter referred to as the NPS Intermountain Region; see map), which contains around 250 landmarks in the states of Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, Montana, Oklahoma, Texas, Utah and Wyoming.

Climate projections indicate that the Intermountain Region will experience environmental changes as we approach 2050 ( Fourth National Climate Assessment ). Environmental changes alter the landscape leading to the exposure of cultural resources. Park managers need a way to quickly and easily perform a general, evidence-based impact assessment of environmental factors on their cultural resources, that they can then examine further with site-specific information.

The Cultural Resources Environmental Assessment Toolbox (CREVAT) is a geospatial application that covers the entire NPS Intermountain Region and provides data on multiple environmental exposures. We also provide geospatial layers showing the vulnerability of resource types based on their sensitivity to a given exposure. We designed CREVAT as an entry point for assessing vulnerability and developing climate adaptation strategies.

We define the vulnerability of a building system as the collective effect of environmental exposures compounded by the sensitivity of that building system:

Environmental Exposure x System Sensitivity = System Environmental Vulnerability.

We define exposure as the degree to which environmental factors impact an area. Building off other National Park Service reports we scored our exposure layers into four categories: minimal, very low, low, moderate, high and very high.

The table below shows the exposure layers present on the CREVAT. We scored each exposure layer for ease of understanding and analysis.

We define system sensitivities as the degree to which a cultural resource is impacted by a given exposure. For example, a cultural resource made of adobe has a different sensitivity to fire than a cultural resource built of wood. Sensitivities are scored from 1 (least sensitive) to 10 (most sensitive). More information about the sensitivity scores for each system can be found  here .