CLIMsystems Climate Services Team Impress Another High-Profile Client

Fresh on the success of modelling extreme heat and wind events for Qatar 2022 and supporting the development of climate-proofed design for Expo 2020 in Dubai, the team at CLIMsystems has assisted one the United States' most at-risk communities to understand its climate risk better.

Broward County on Florida’s Atlantic coast and just north of Miami-Dade County required a thorough assessment of future rainfall patterns to drive regulatory changes and planning. With a population of nearly 2 million and exposure to hurricanes and other extreme rainfall events, the matter of considering climate change in flood modelling was high on their list of priorities. The Southeast Florida Regional Climate Change Compact and strong grass-roots community recognised the issues. The spotlight then fell on Dr Carolina Maran, the then Water Resource Manager for the County, to pull together a respected team to conduct a climate change assessment to support decision making. That is when Geosyntec Consultants who were contracted to do the flood modelling for the County contacted CLIMsystems for assistance. Needless to say, there is intense international interest in Southern Florida and its exposure to climate risks.

Over two months, CLIMsystems interacted closely with staff from Geosyntec Consultants, Dr Maran and more than 20 scientific and government stakeholders. The company's brief was to review all the statistical and dynamically downscaled trends available for the County and assess their applicability for use in modelling future rainfall patterns to drive flood modelling. With considerable diligence and excellent communication between stakeholders, the client and CLIMsystems the company submitted two reports in December 2019. One clearly explained the known biases in all the downscaled models against raw global climate model data. In the second report CLIMsystems devised and defended what is known as a super ensemble approach to output generation representing best industry practice. In the final on-line meeting with the County, Geosyntec Consulting, other stakeholders including representatives of Florida’s climate scientific community, CLIMsystems led the group to the acceptance of a series of actionable outputs for flood modeling that respected future climate risk.

In early January Dr Maran presented the results generated by CLIMsystems to the Broward County Technical Advisory Board. Dr Maran summarised the Board's review with the statement that "its members were very impressed by the results and the recommended steps to incorporate the projections into new standards. I am very confident we have robust science-based results, which constitute significant progress to advance discussions in the South Florida region, and particularly in Broward.”

With over 200 projects delivered around the world and in New Zealand, CLIMsystems is a world leader with vast experience working in the space between complex climate data and critical decision making. The company’s next client meeting is with key Ministers in Botswana. CLIMsystems recently completed a ground-breaking assessment of sectoral tipping points in Botswana with either a 1.5, 2.0- or 3.0-degree Celsius change in their local mean temperature. Following that will be discussions held in France with one of the world’s largest insurance providers on supply chains and climate risks.

CLIMsystems is actively pursuing projects in New Zealand that will apply our extensive international experience. CLIMsystems has fostered a strong relationship with Special Counsel Mark Baker-Jones of Simpson and Grierson and his climate team, and Climate Planning headed by governance expert Donovan Burton. Collectively, and with support from Waikato Regional Council, Toitū Envirocare, Watercare Services Ltd, Prof Catherine Iorns of Victoria University, among others, the trio coordinated and ran the first of a series of workshops In Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch on climate policy, governance and the transition to a zero-carbon economy.

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