Global Centers Track 1: Understanding Climate Change Impacts on Transboundary Waters

全球气候变化对跨界水域的影响中心领导的研究重点是了解和缓解跨界司法管辖区的水危机。北美各地的水资源正受到威胁，因为气候变化加剧了洪水和干旱，恶化了水质，加剧了海岸线侵蚀，并破坏了基础设施和家园。社区必须学会适应日益严重的极端情况，但适应的工具和知识往往不存在，或者在管辖范围内支离破碎。这一问题在跨越多个主权国家，包括土著人民的跨界水系统中是复杂的。在多管辖区环境下管理水资源需要从不同的角度看待治理结构、利益攸关方群体和管理战略以及传播科学资源，包括数据和模型。该中心利用美国和加拿大的专业知识，研究跨越美国和加拿大地缘政治边界的水资源。该中心旨在通过整合三个组织分组的研究来提高脆弱沿海社区的抗灾能力，这些研究集中于1)对气候变化影响的预期频率和强度的可靠预测；2)了解气候变化对生态和社会系统及结果的影响；以及3)建设治理和管理系统的能力，以提高社区在多个尺度上的抗灾能力。该中心是密歇根大学、康奈尔大学、梅诺梅尼民族学院和红湖民族与麦克马斯特大学、多伦多都市大学和大河六国的合作伙伴关系。它还培训研究生和本科生，并支持博士后助理。通过该中心开发的知识具有国际相关性，并将传播以造福世界各地的社区。国际小组的重点是了解和缓解日益加剧的水危机，办法是满足区域对水资源管理指导的需要，并使跨界水系统内的社区和生态系统为应对气候变化带来的危害做好准备。该中心将应用一个独特的社会科学框架，强调与跨国分水岭边界的社区接触，以开发对风险容忍度和管理实践、气候变化监测战略和社区复原力的新见解。跨学科中心将整合来自多个领域的知识，以全面了解进入跨国水域的社区所面临的挑战。该中心使用统计模型、最先进的过程模型和新颖的、数据驱动的观察性研究，可以测试关于未来气候变化轨迹的假设，为我们的利益相关者提供关键的见解。这一办法旨在灵活应对社区需求，确保研究成果对其所服务的社区具有相关性和实用性，并有助于在今后几年制定跨界流域管理的国家模式。该中心开发的科学和社区参与模式最初将侧重于大湖区，并将可复制和推广，扩大该中心在全球跨界水系统和社区中的影响。该奖项由全球中心计划资助，该计划是与澳大利亚、加拿大和英国的资助机构建立的创新合作伙伴关系，旨在共同支持受使用启发的研究，以应对气候变化和清洁能源方面的全球挑战。与英联邦科学与创新研究组织(CSIRO)、加拿大自然科学与工程研究理事会(NSERC)、加拿大社会科学与人文研究理事会(SSHRC)和英国研究与创新(UKRI)的合作伙伴关系利用资源来应对比一个资助机构单独可能面临的更大规模的挑战。该中心由NSF和SSHRC共同支持。NSF奖由国际科学办公室和STEM教育局的部落学院和大学计划共同资助。这一奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The Global Center for Climate Change Impacts on Transboundary Waters leads research focused on understanding and mitigating water crises in transboundary jurisdictions. Water resources around North America are under threat as climate change intensifies floods and droughts, worsens water quality, exacerbates shoreline erosion, and damages infrastructure and homes. Communities must learn to adapt to increased extremes, but the tools and knowledge for adaptation are often non-existent or fragmented across jurisdictional boundaries. This problem is complicated in transboundary water systems which intersect multiple sovereign nations, including those of Indigenous Peoples. Managing water resources in multijurisdictional settings requires a diverse perspective on governance structures, stakeholder groups, and management strategies as well as dissemination of scientific resources, including data and models. The Center studies water resources spanning U.S.-Canada geopolitical boundaries, leveraging U.S. and Canadian expertise. The Center aims to increase the resilience of vulnerable coastal communities by integrating research across three organizing clusters focused on 1) reliable projections of the expected frequency and intensity of climate change impacts; 2) understanding of climate change impacts on ecological and social systems and outcomes; and 3) building capacity for governance and management systems that increase disaster resilience in communities across multiple scales. The Center is a partnership among University of Michigan, Cornell University, College of the Menominee Nation and Red Lake Nation together with McMaster University, Toronto Metropolitan University, and the Six Nations of the Grand River. It also trains graduate and undergraduate students and supports postdoctoral associates. The knowledge developed through the Center has international relevance and will be disseminated to benefit communities around the world. The international team focuses on understanding and mitigating an intensifying water crisis by addressing regional needs for water resources management guidance and preparing communities and ecosystems within transboundary water systems for hazards accompanying climate change. The Center will apply a unique social science framework that emphasizes engagement with communities across transnational watershed boundaries to develop new insights into risk tolerance and management practices, climate change monitoring strategies, and community resilience. The interdisciplinary Center will integrate knowledge from multiple fields to create a comprehensive understanding of the challenges facing communities accessing transnational waters. The Center's use of statistical modeling, state-of-the-art process models, and novel, data-driven observational studies allow for testing of hypotheses about future climate change trajectories, providing critical insights to our stakeholders. This approach is designed to be flexible and responsive to community needs, ensuring that research outcomes are relevant and useful to the communities it serves and enabling for the development of a national model for transboundary watershed management in subsequent years. The scientific and community-engagement models developed by the Center will initially be focused on the Great Lakes region, and will be replicable and scalable, amplifying the Center’s impact across transboundary water systems and communities globally. This award is funded by the Global Centers program, an innovative partnership with funding agencies in Australia, Canada and the United Kingdom, to jointly support use-inspired research addressing global challenges in climate change and clean energy. Partnerships with the Commonwealth Science and Innovation Research Organisation (CSIRO), Natural Science and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC), Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC), and UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) leverage resources to tackle challenges at a larger scale than would be possible for one funding agency alone. This Center is jointly supported by NSF and SSHRC. The NSF award is co-funded by the Office of International Science and the Tribal Colleges and Universities Program in the Directorate for STEM Education.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.