By Tory Boyd
Before the grant funding the PIE Center’s work with the Florida Water and Climate Alliance comes to an end, researchers joined collaborators in Miami to see firsthand the effects of sea level rise.
The FloridaWCA, funded by a grant from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, is a partnership of the UF Water Institute, Florida Climate Institute, PIE Center, climate change scientists, water management district officials and utility companies working to understand the regional relevance and usability of climate change and sea level rise data.
The PIE Center’s role in the project was to facilitate the conversations between scientists and officials to take complicated data and put it in a usable format to impact change.
“We are developing the capacity of this group to work together to develop tools to translate science into informed decision making,” PIE Center Director Tracy Irani said.
In addition to the workshops, the PIE Center researchers oversaw development of a website that serves as a knowledge management system for the FloridaWCA partners.
Although the grant is ending, the FloridaWCA team of scientists and officials will continue to work together.
The premise of the grant was for all involved partners to participate in quarterly workshops to develop the FloridaWCA and focus on water and climate issues. In October, the quarterly workshop was held for the first time in South Florida, an area coping with the effects of sea level rise.
“Climate change is a complex issue made more complicated by sometimes conflicting perspectives and opinions as to how we should address it,” Irani said. “But to see the direct and measurable impacts of sea level rise on such a large metropolitan area really opened our eyes.”
