ABOUT SWISLR*
*SWISLR is short for Saltwater Intrusion and Sea Level Rise
Nearly all of the North American Coastal Plain (NACP) is subject to rising sea levels, land subsidence, more severe hurricanes, and more intense droughts. All four of these trajectories of change are leading to more frequent and higher magnitude inputs of marine salts into coastal plain soils. The penetration of salinity into the coastal interior is exacerbated by groundwater extraction and the high density of agricultural canals and ditches throughout much of the rural landscape. The resulting SaltWater Intrusion and Sea Level Rise (SWISLR) represent significant challenges for the largely rural landscape and small communities throughout the NACP. Loss of agricultural productivity and rapidly changing habitats in conservation areas may differentially impact disadvantaged rural populations and communities. These environmental justice issues are multi-generational, involving land availability, bank and agency lending practices, and race. The community of scholars and practitioners engaged in SWISLR research and management is both eager and poised to make rapid progress in our understanding of this rapidly expanding environmental change through a research coordination network. These rapid ecological changes are both a product of and a cause of correspondingly rapid demographic and economic change in rural coastal plain communities. The decisions, or lack of decisions, that coastal communities make in response to rapid environmental change will shape the future socioecological trajectory of US coastal plain landscapes
The primary focus of the Saltwater Intrusion and Sea Level Rise (SWISLR) Research Coordinating Network is to conduct convergence research by building a connective intellectual network and an integrated conceptual scaffolding to rapidly expand our capacity to forecast and prepare for SWISLR impacts throughout the rural communities of the Atlantic and Gulf coasts of North America. In addition to variable rates of SLR across the outer coastal plain, differences in geomorphic setting, water resources infrastructure and management, and climate extremes are generating very different patterns of saltwater intrusion. Understanding both the absolute magnitude of this rapid environmental change, and the causes and consequences for its spatial and temporal variation represents an opportunity to build and challenge new mechanistic models that link directional climate change to temporally and spatially dynamic socio-environmental impacts. The diverse trajectories of change offer rich opportunities to test and refine modern theories of ecosystem state change in systems with exceptionally strong socioecological feedbacks.
We have developed a series of key interdisciplinary questions that will be addressed by thematic working groups within the RCN.
The primary focus of the Saltwater Intrusion and Sea Level Rise (SWISLR) Research Coordinating Network is to conduct convergence research by building a connective intellectual network and an integrated conceptual scaffolding to rapidly expand our capacity to forecast and prepare for SWISLR impacts throughout the rural communities of the Atlantic and Gulf coasts of North America. In addition to variable rates of SLR across the outer coastal plain, differences in geomorphic setting, water resources infrastructure and management, and climate extremes are generating very different patterns of saltwater intrusion. Understanding both the absolute magnitude of this rapid environmental change, and the causes and consequences for its spatial and temporal variation represents an opportunity to build and challenge new mechanistic models that link directional climate change to temporally and spatially dynamic socio-environmental impacts. The diverse trajectories of change offer rich opportunities to test and refine modern theories of ecosystem state change in systems with exceptionally strong socioecological feedbacks.
We have developed a series of key interdisciplinary questions that will be addressed by thematic working groups within the RCN.
- Who is engaged in decisions bout climate risk prevention, climate adaptation and SWISLR mitigation and who is excluded?
- What proportion of the NACP has recently undergone and is currently vulnerable to significant ecosystem transitions as a result of SWISLR?
- How are water management and climate change interacting to determine the magnitude, extent and duration of saltwater intrusion within and across the NACP?
- What are the consequences of SWISLR for farms and coastal fisheries?
- How is SWISLR affecting the structure, biodiversity and function of ecological systems throughout the NACP?
- How are coastal communities interpreting, responding to and managing for SWISLR impacts and risk?
Ecosystem and Social vulnerabilities in the Coastal Plain ecoregion. This compilation of maps shows flood hazard (top) and poverty (bottom) for the (Aa) entire North American Coastal Plain, (Bb) Gulf Coast of Louisiana, (Cc) southwest coast of Florida, and (Dd) coast of North Carolina. All maps are from NOAAs Coastal Flood Exposure Mapper.
