By

Principal investigator
Jennifer Balch

Funding
U.S. Geological Survey

Collaboration + support
CIRES; USGS; Great Plains Tribal Water Alliance; Wildlife Conservation Society; Conservation Science Partners; South Dakota State University; University of Montana

Resource managers face mind-boggling challenges: How do you protect an endangered species when the climate is changing around it, or support resilient water management as temperatures rise? Enter the North Central Climate Adaptation Science Center, hosted at CU Boulder since 2018. 

The center is a partnership with the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), and one of eight regional climate adaptation science centers around the country. They’re all focused on science in support of natural resource management, and they work with academic researchers and resource management experts in tribal, federal, state and local governments. 

The new CU Boulder climate center is co-located with Earth Lab, the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES) data analytics innovation hub where scientists use big data to assess environmental challenges. “The key advantage of having Earth Lab and the climate adaptation science center at CU Boulder and CIRES is that we can tightly couple useable science and innovation to better serve resource managers,” said Jennifer Balch, the CU Boulder geographer who directs both.