Standard Presentation Australian Marine Sciences Association Annual Meeting 2023

Recommendations for climate-smart conservation planning (#234)

Kristine Camille V Buenafe 1 2 , Daniel C Dunn 1 3 , Jason D Everett 2 4 5 , Isaac Brito-Morales 6 7 , David S Schoeman 8 9 , Jeffrey O Hanson 10 , Alvise Dabalà 1 2 11 12 , Sandra Neubert 13 , Stefano Cannicci 14 15 , Kristin Kaschner 16 , Anthony J Richardson 2 4
  1. School of Earth and Environmental Sciences, The University of Queensland, St Lucia, Queensland, Australia
  2. School of Mathematics and Physics, The University of Queensland, St Lucia, Queensland, Australia
  3. Centre for Biodiversity and Conservation Science, The University of Queensland, St Lucia, Queensland, Australia
  4. Queensland Biosciences Precinct, Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO) Environment, St Lucia, Queensland, Australia
  5. Centre for Marine Science and Innovation, The University of New South Wales, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia
  6. Betty and Gordon Moore Center for Science, Conservation International, Arlington, Virginia, USA
  7. Marine Science Institute, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, California, USA
  8. Ocean Futures Research Custer, School of Science, Technology and Engineering, University of the Sunshine Coast, Maroochydore, Queensland, Australia
  9. Centre for African Conservation Ecology, Department of Zoology, Nelson Mandela University, Gqeberha, South Africa
  10. Department of Biology, Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada
  11. Systems Ecology and Resource Management, Department of Organism Biology, Faculté des Sciences, Université Libre de Bruxelles - ULB, Brussels, Belgium
  12. Ecology and Biodiversity, Laboratory of Plant Biology and Nature Management, Biology Department, Vrije Universiteit Brussel - VUB, Brussels, Belgium
  13. Institute of Computer Science, Leipzig University, Leipzig, Saxony, Germany
  14. Department of Biology, University of Florence, Sesto Fiorentino, Italy
  15. The Swire Institute of Marine Science and Area of Ecology and Biodiversity, School of Biological Sciences, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR, PR China
  16. Department of Biometry and Environmental Systems Analysis, Albert-Ludwigs-University of Freiburg, Freiburg im Breisgau, Germany

Climate change adaptation has yet to be fully incorporated into area-based management tools for conserving biodiversity. One main obstacle is the lack of consensus regarding the inclusion of climate change impacts in spatial conservation plans. We propose a metric-based climate-smart framework that prioritizes the protection of climate refugia. We explore four aspects of climate-smart conservation planning: i) climate model ensembles; ii) emission scenarios; iii) climate metrics; and iv) approaches to identifying climate refugia. We found that all four aspects affected the configuration of spatial plans. The choice of metrics and approaches to identifying refugia greatly affected the resulting climate-smart spatial plans. The choice of climate models and emission scenarios produced smaller effects. We recommend using climate metrics most relevant to the biodiversity and region considered. To account for uncertainty in future climate regimes, we recommend using multiple climate models and emission scenarios. Finally, we show that the approaches used to identify climate refugia exhibit trade-offs between: i) degrees by which they are climate-smart; and ii) efficiency in meeting conservation targets. The choice of approach will depend on the stakeholders' priorities regarding climate adaptation. Our framework can design protected areas that help safeguard biodiversity against current and future climate change.