About SCIPP
The Southern Climate Impacts Planning Program (SCIPP) is a new climate research initiative whose goal is to help communities better plan for weather and climate-related disasters in the southern United States, particularly in the face of changing climate. Focusing on the six-state study region of Oklahoma, Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, Tennessee, and Mississippi, SCIPP concentrates on the high frequency of hazardous climatological events that plague the region including extremes in precipitation (droughts and floods) as well as other hazards including severe storms and hurricanes.
According to the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), SCIPP states are among the most disaster declared in the United States. As of early 2009, all 6 SCIPP states were ranked within the top 18 most disaster declared states across the country, with 4 of those states being ranked in the top 10. The SCIPP region also suffers from a frequent recurrence of droughts, which are not accounted for in FEMA disaster declarations. Regardless of the methods of designating disasters, SCIPP aims to bring equal attention to all major climate hazards through comprehensive historical datasets.
SCIPP research is conducted through active engagement and partnership with a large community of regional, state, and local stakeholder groups. It is through this two-way dialogue that scientists can learn from stakeholders and vice versa. A main goal of SCIPP is to better determine the needs of users in being more informed about and better prepared for climate hazards in the Southern United States. This is accomplished through a combination of information products, user feedback, and the development of new experimental information tools.
SCIPP is the ninth and newest Regional Integrated Sciences and Assessments (RISA) program supported by the Climate Program Office at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). We strive to continue the successful model developed by other RISA projects across the United States in performing application-based climate research that actively engages participation, interaction, and feedback from a diverse community of stakeholders region-wide.
Mission
The mission of SCIPP is to:
- 1) Increase the awareness of and preparedness for southern U.S. climate hazards for both present day and future climate conditions through improved local hazard mitigation planning;
- 2) Actively engage stakeholder groups to promote increased two-way knowledge transfer between climate scientists and decision-makers;
- 3) Provide local, state, and regional decision-makers with climate hazard data that is comprehensive, accurate, and easily accessible; and
- 4) Identify new, critical areas of applied climate research for the Southern U.S. as technologies, research, and knowledge evolves.
Stakeholders
The Southern Climate Impacts Planning Program (SCIPP) takes an interactive approach to researching and communicating the risks of climate hazards across the southern United States. SCIPP combines the expertise of climate scientists, meteorologists, and geographers with the everyday experience of local-level decision-makers and planners through frequent workshops, brain-storming sessions, and meetings. The goal of the two-way interactions is to allow a transfer of climate science and information to local-level decision-makers, while likewise allowing decision-makers the opportunity to reveal their challenges, concerns, and needs for climate hazard information.
SCIPP will draw from a large pool of stakeholder groups from within the six-state region of Oklahoma, Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, Tennessee, and Mississippi. Collectively, the stakeholder groups represent a wide array of decision makers, city planners, and groups involved with the hazard mitigation and planning process. All SCIPP states will have stakeholder representation and be involved with periodic workshops and activities to help integrate climate science, hazards, and decision making.
SCIPP stakeholder activities will be reviewed on an annual basis by a Stakeholder Services Committee to provide recommendations and guidance for future plans. Through the committee's feedback, SCIPP will have an opportunity to adjust the focus of workshops and stakeholder involvement based on the collective expertise of the committee.
If you would like to know more about becoming involved in SCIPP as an interested stakeholder group, please contact OU program manager James Hocker or the LSU program manager Lynne Carter.
Stakeholder Services Committee (SSC)
The SCIPP Stakeholder Services Committee (SSC) is an advisory board that convenes annually to review the progress of the program, provides recommendations, and refines longer-term plans and goals of SCIPP. The fifteen-person committee is made up of a diverse collection of representatives from state agencies, academic institutions, federal agencies, private sector companies, and non-profit organizations. The SSC is comprised of representatives from each of the SCIPP states (no state having a majority) as well as other experts from across the United States. Meetings are held annually at a location within the six-state study region, with a new state being visited each year.
RISA Program
The Regional Integrated Science Assessments (RISA) Program is a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) funded set of regional projects focused on strengthening the linkage between climate sciences and societal impacts. The program began in the mid 1990s to establish an increased level of communication between climate researchers and decision makers to enhance preparedness and mitigation for climate change. In particular, RISA programs were developed to provide focus to regional climate variability issues such as water availability, agriculture, coastal issues, public health, wildfire vulnerability, coping with drought, energy issues, and many other areas of focus. Through RISA's stakeholder-focused research, scientists and decision makers have successfully come together to openly discuss climate issues, share knowledge, and identify areas requiring more research and attention in the future. As of early 2009, there are nine currently funded RISA projects spanning much of the western and southern United States, as well as Alaska, and Hawaii.
For additional information on the RISA program, please click here.
SCIPP Research Collaboration
The Southern Climate Impacts Planning Program (SCIPP) is a collaborative effort between the University of Oklahoma's Oklahoma Climatological Survey (OCS) and Louisiana State University's College of Geography and Anthropology & the Southern Regional Climate Center (SRCC). Together, these two institutions combine their expertise in climate, outreach, education, data quality and dissemination, and mapping to address the issue of climate hazards across the southern United States.
The Oklahoma Climatological Survey was established in 1980 to serve as the climate office for the state of Oklahoma. In addition to providing climate services, outreach, and data, OCS operates the Oklahoma Mesonet, which is a state-wide network of 119 automated surface observing stations. OCS is a research unit of the College of Atmospheric and Geographic Sciences at the University of Oklahoma (OU) and is located in the National Weather Center (NWC) on the OU research campus. OCS's collocation with numerous federal and university organizations at the NWC allows for numerous collaborative research opportunities with many other experts in the atmospheric sciences.
Collaboration and Interest
If you have an idea for a potential southern climate research collaboration or are interested in becoming involved in our stakeholder network, please contact one of our program managers or one of our SCIPP Principal Investigators for more information:
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James Hocker OU SCIPP Program Manager
EMAIL jhocker@ou.edu
EMAIL lynne@srcc.lsu.edu
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