Idaho, Montana, Oregon, Washington
Purpose of this paper
The Oregon Health Authority, Public Health Division prepared this paper in response to inquiries from the Oregon Governor’s Carbon Policy Office regarding health risks of climate hazards and co-pollutants of greenhouse gas emissions. This paper seeks to answer the five questions below with the best information currently available.
Questions
This vulnerability assessment is intended to inform public health professionals and community partners engaged in climate change adaptation and resilience planning. It focuses specifically on social vulnerability as a way to integrate the concepts of social determinants of health and environmental justice into climate change planning.
Health departments of all capacities can incorporate climate change considerations into existing planning and programming. For those with higher capacity, this toolkit can serve as a resource for developing a Climate and Health Resilience Plan (also called an "adaptation plan" or a "climate change preparedness plan.")
This document, Preparing for a Changing Climate: Washington State’s Integrated Climate Change Response Strategy, lays out a framework to protect our communities, natural resources, and economy from the impacts of climate change and build our capacity to adapt to expected climate changes. It describes how existing and new state policies and programs can better prepare Washington to respond to the impacts of climate change.
The purpose of the Oregon NHMP Risk Assessment is to identify and characterize Oregon’s natural hazards, determine which jurisdictions are most vulnerable to each hazard and estimate potential losses to vulnerable structures and infrastructure and to state facilities from those hazards.
Assessing the state’s level of risk involves three components: characterizing natural hazards, assessing vulnerabilities, and analyzing risk. Characterization involves determining cause and characteristics, documenting historic events, and evaluating future probability of occurrence.
Historical, racial and economic injustices have led to health disparities in Oregon. Certain populations, including communities of color, have been forced to shoulder an unfair share of stressors, while having less access to the resources and opportunities to cope and adapt. These disparities are symptoms of social and environmental conditions that ultimately affect us all, no matter who we are or where we live. They inhibit our ability to reach our public health goals and build resilient communities.
This Climate Protection and Energy Conservation Action describes the efforts Whatcom County is taking reduce its emissions by 10% below 2001 levels by 2020. It descrbies the County's: emissions Inventory, forecast for greenhouse gas emissions , greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets, existing and proposed measures, and guide for future steps.
The Thurston Regional Planning Council (TRPC) prepared the Thurston Climate Adaptation Plan — which recommends actions to help Thurston County and the broader South Puget Sound region prepare for and adjust to adverse climate change impacts (adaptation) and bolster resilience. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) provided a National Estuary Program grant for the project. The Washington Department of Commerce administered the funding, and TRPC hired Thurston County and Earth Economics as subcontractors.
