Abstract
The Third US National Climate Assessment (NCA3) was produced by experts in response to the US Global Change Research Act of 1990. Based on lessons learned from previous domestic and international assessments, the NCA3 was designed to speak to a broad public and inform the concerns of policy- and decision-makers at different scales. The NCA3 was also intended to be the first step in an ongoing assessment process that would build the nation’s capacity to respond to climate change. This concluding paper draws larger lessons from the insights gained throughout the assessment process that are of significance to future US and international assessment designers. We bring attention to process and products delivered, communication and engagement efforts, and how they contributed to the sustained assessment. Based on areas where expectations were exceeded or not fully met, we address four common tensions that all assessment designers must confront and manage: between (1) core assessment ingredients (knowledge base, institutional set-up, principled process, and the people involved), (2) national scope and subnational adaptive management information needs, (3) scope, complexity, and manageability, and (4) deliberate evaluation and ongoing learning approaches. Managing these tensions, amidst the social and political contexts in which assessments are conducted, is critical to ensure that assessments are feasible and productive, while its outcomes are perceived as credible, salient, and legitimate.
All of the authors of this paper played leadership roles in the NCA3, and are therefore not unbiased observers.
This article is part of a special issue on “The National Climate Assessment: Innovations in Science and Engagement” edited by Katharine Jacobs, Susanne Moser, and James Buizer.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2016 Springer International Publishing Switzerland
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Moser, S.C., Melillo, J.M., Jacobs, K.L., Moss, R.H., Buizer, J.L. (2016). Aspirations and common tensions: larger lessons from the third US national climate assessment. In: Jacobs, K., Moser, S., Buizer, J. (eds) The US National Climate Assessment. Springer Climate. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-41802-5_14
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-41802-5_14
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-41801-8
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-41802-5
eBook Packages: Earth and Environmental ScienceEarth and Environmental Science (R0)