This site is intended to offer basic to intermediate-level guidance about climate change and conservation responses to the U.S. conservation community. Not sure where to get started? Read the introduction to getting started, take a self-assessment, or search key terms.

Reshaping the Energy Future is a new publication from the Land Trust Alliance that articulates how land trusts can play and important role in renewable energy development that meets multiple conservation objectives. The new Practical Pointers: Siting Renewables on Conservation Easements - What Land Trusts Need to Know provides analysis and easement drafting tools to support renewable energy deployment that is appropriately sited, scaled, and consistent with conservation objectives.

Better stewardship of land is needed to achieve the Paris Climate Agreement goal of holding warming to below 2 °C. Griscom et al. have published a seminal report outlining land stewardship options available and their mitigation potential. Read more about natural climate solutions or view the full report here.

Featured Resources: Communicating about Climate

Recommendations, a product inventory, and analysis of examples of climate change outreach materials from Tug Hill Tomorrow, Vermont Land Trust, Maine Coastal Heritage Trust, and Scenic Hudson are now available to support your communications efforts!

Do you have an example of climate communications to share?

Talking about climate change results in increased visibility, relevance, and fundraising for land trusts. In this Climate Change Communication report the Land Trust Alliance and the Open Space Institute provides guidance on how to connect about this issue, and information to help land trusts respond to the greatest challenge of our time. Learn more here.

Conservation and Climate: Saving Resilient Landscapes

Conserving Nature in a Changing Climate offers land conservation practitioners practical steps to strategically increase the chances that plants and animals can adapt as the climate changes. Learn more.

Natural Climate Solutions

Natural climate solutions can help reduce carbon emissions and store more carbon in the landscape. These solutions are often complex and interconnected, and they can deliver significant adaptation and mitigation benefits.

Learn more about how resource management efforts can help mitigate climate change here.

Featured Resources:

Climate Communications

Targeted communication can help effectively deliver messages and promote positive resource management outcomes. Learn more about advocacy and action to support climate responsive community engagement as well as recommendations for communicating about climate change.

Featured Resources:

Renewable Energy

Renewable energy can yield numerous benefits to people and the environment. As with all energy options, the social and ecological impacts of development must be assessed through science-based planning processes with opportunities for robust public involvement. Land trusts can play important roles in these planning and deployment dialogues.

Featured Resources:

About Conservation in a Changing Climate

This website is designed to support on-the-ground conservation efforts of land trusts in the United States. The resources and learning categories are intended to provide basic to intermediate information and to lead to additional resources and tools that can support more advanced levels of understanding about climate change and its implications for the conservation community.

Together we can address these management challenges to save the places people love.

Learn More

Conserving Nature in a Changing Climate offers land conservation practitioners practical steps to strategically increase the chances that plants and animals can adapt as the climate changes.

Browse Here

Latest News

Environment, Business Groups Calling for Sustainable Green Recovery Agenda; Give Budget Mixed Reviews

(TRENTON, NJ) September 29, 2020 — A diverse group of environmental, outdoor recreation, planning and business organizations calling for investments in programs to advance clean energy, create parks and trails, improve water infrastructure and make communities more resilient to climate change generally applauded the budget signed by the governor today, ...

Grow Crops, Not Solar Panels, on NJ’s Best Farmland

By Michele S. Byers, executive director, New Jersey Conservation Foundation If there’s any doubt that New Jersey is the Garden State, visit a local farm stand or farmers’ market. This time of year, you’ll find some of the world’s most delicious produce: fresh Jersey tomatoes, peaches, sweet corn, peppers, blueberries, ...

Cape Canaveral launch sites threatened by rising seas

Click for Larger View of Animation Climate Central examined flood risks facing NASA's active space launch complexes at the John F. Kennedy Space Center and Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Using our proprietary Portfolio Analysis Tool (PAT). We found that the launch pads most vulnerable to ...

Federal Appeals Court Denies PennEast’s Request for Rehearing

The Third Circuit Court of Appeals denied PennEast pipeline’s request for a rehearing on its ruling that PennEast lacks legal authority to seize or condemn state-owned lands for its proposed pipeline. The Third Circuit decision means PennEast no longer has authority to condemn more than 40 properties preserved by the ...

SERIES: Water Ways: Dutch Lessons for a Changing Coast

The series was produced in collaboration with WWNO New Orleans Public Radio and Climate Central, and is part of the Pulitzer Center’s Connected Coastlines reporting initiative exploring how the Netherlands’ climate change adaptation strategies could be a model for the Louisiana coast.

Environmental Groups Oppose PennEast’s Baseless Request for Extension

With less than two weeks before PennEast’s requested in-service date, the pipeline company requested a two-year extension. New Jersey Conservation Foundation, The Watershed Institute, and the Delaware Riverkeeper Network submitted a letter to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) to oppose PennEast’s baseless request for an extension of time. On ...

Climate Change Threatens Homes of Boston’s Most Vulnerable

By Ayurella Horn-Muller (Climate Central) and Christopher Gloninger (NBC Boston) and Ale Zimmermann (NBC Boston) contributed reporting In East Boston, affordable housing units are at risk of flooding as the sea level rises. This video and text story was produced through a collaboration with NBC Boston. Roxanne De Jesus remembers seeing the waves spill out of the ...

NJDEP Deems PennEast’s Application Incomplete

Statement of Tom Gilbert, Campaign Director for New Jersey Conservation Foundation & ReThink Energy NJ The New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection (NJDEP) yesterday told PennEast that it hadn’t met the minimum legal requirements for the agency to be able to begin application review. “It is not surprising that NJDEP ...

Federal Appeals Court Rules PennEast Cannot Condemn State-Owned Lands

PennEast has been dealt a serious setback in its attempt to build an unsafe and unneeded pipeline through Mercer and Hunterdon Counties. Today, the Third Circuit Court of Appeals overturned the lower federal court decision that had allowed PennEast to seize state lands. The Third Circuit ruled that PennEast, as ...

State, NJ Conservation Foundation Urge U.S. Supreme Court to Deny PennEast’s Petition

FAR HILLS, NJ, June 2, 2020 — New Jersey Conservation Foundation today joined the state in asking the U.S. Supreme Court to deny PennEast’s petition to have the Court hear an appeal of a federal court decision barring the company from seizing state-owned land to build a gas pipeline. A ...

New Coastal Risk Screening Tool Supports Sea Level Rise and Flood Mapping by Year, Water Level, and Elevation Dataset

March 12, 2020 Climate Central today announced the release of its global Coastal Risk Screening Tool to generate customizable, localized maps of projected sea level rise and coastal flood risks by year, water level, and elevation. Climate Central’s new ...

News Highlights

Natural Climate Solutions

Climate Communications

Renewable Energy

About Conservation in a Changing Climate

Latest News

Environment, Business Groups Calling for Sustainable Green Recovery Agenda; Give Budget Mixed Reviews

Grow Crops, Not Solar Panels, on NJ’s Best Farmland

Cape Canaveral launch sites threatened by rising seas

Federal Appeals Court Denies PennEast’s Request for Rehearing

SERIES: Water Ways: Dutch Lessons for a Changing Coast

Environmental Groups Oppose PennEast’s Baseless Request for Extension

Climate Change Threatens Homes of Boston’s Most Vulnerable

NJDEP Deems PennEast’s Application Incomplete

Federal Appeals Court Rules PennEast Cannot Condemn State-Owned Lands

State, NJ Conservation Foundation Urge U.S. Supreme Court to Deny PennEast’s Petition

New Coastal Risk Screening Tool Supports Sea Level Rise and Flood Mapping by Year, Water Level, and Elevation Dataset

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