Welcome
Natural Resources & Climate Adaptation
impact-driven thinking for applied resource management goals
From initial scoping to stakeholder engagement, modeling, and policy recommendations, we blend cross-sector expertise for transparent decision-making tools that guide sustainable resource management. Our work goes beyond identification of key areas and proposes strategies and interventions for sustainable and resilient priorities.
Our environmental consulting portfolio helps clients sustainably manage and conserve their natural resources, biodiversity, and ecosystem services for a healthy and resilient environment in the face of climate change and land development. Our analysis and solutions are grounded in local, ecological realities responding to the needs and stressors faced by stakeholders and their institutional capacities. We believe that healthy environments are necessary for sustainable economies and safe communities. Therefore, we’re passionate about finding pathways that conserve the environment while also unlocking or maintaining livelihood opportunities and amplifying social justice.
Our team of ecosystem specialists, geographers, environmental economists, remote sensing technicians, and policy planners possess the necessary lenses to design strategies that are environmentally effective, feasible, locally tailored, and multidisciplinary. Our work responds to existing needs from historical legacies of mismanagement, and predicts future needs given the increasing nature of key threats and stressors.
Our firm is focused on finding solutions to the complex problems facing both terrestrial ecosystems and marine zones. Given that 37% of the planet’s population lives near the coast (UNEP 2024), coastal zones are critical interfaces to build multidisciplinary solutions. We offer analysis of coastlines, nearshore ecosystems, and marine zones as part of a complete worldview on conserving global systems.
Wetlands
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Forest
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Coastal Zone
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Agricultural Zones
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Human-Wildlife Interface
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Desert
Geographies & Landscapes
Areas of Expertise
Although we consider environmental planning to be intensely interconnected both within ecological concepts and with social and economic well-being, we believe a healthily managed environment is commonly approached with 4 goals in mind: conservation planning, climate adaptation, natural resource management, and biodiversity. Over 16 years, our firm has built a core experience across many different geographies in these 4 areas. We help our clients identify priorities, respond to threats, optimize their resources, and engage and consider the needs of stakeholders​
Conservation Planning
GeoAdaptive provides conservation planning assistance across versatile ecosystems at a multitude of scales with spatially explicit, highly granular guidance and strategies. By modeling ecological threats at the human-wildlife interfaces, such as urbanization, deforestation, and the impacts of climate change, as well as ecosystem valuation and habitat suitability models for focal assets, we identify priority areas for conservation depending on the needs of our client. We identify these needs based on stakeholder feedback through participatory dialogue and knowledge events. These needs have previously been based on endangered species, habitat for economically important species, connectivity among fragmented habitats, and zones for sustainable product or agriculture development. Our constructed conservation frameworks include not just an inventory of priority conserved lands, but also recommendations and evaluations of mechanisms in order to implement those conservation goals in the most efficient manner, translating analysis into action.
Specific services, among others, include:
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Land Use Change Modeling
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Landscape Connectivity Analysis
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Policy & Protected Area Gap Identification and Efficacy Assessments
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Maximum Efficiency Resource Allocation Plans
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Monitoring and Management Plans
Climate Adaptation
The mass migration of people, species, and habitats requires a detailed spatial approach towards a new equilibrium. GeoAdaptive takes a holistic approach to designing regional and local climate adaptation strategies for both communities and environmental resources. Our adaptation strategies respond to risk as a product of hazard, exposure, and vulnerability.
We have designed adaptation pathways for coastal & riverine flooding, sea level rise, storm surge, wind, seismic events, landslides, and wildfires, making us experienced for adaptation planning in worldwide geographies. We do this with in-depth analysis of current resources exposed to risks, and modelling the trajectory of these threats to identify at-risk areas, communicated in terms of losses in basic services, economic activity, physical infrastructure, or ecological richness.. Then, working with local stakeholders, we design pathways in line with the concepts of Integrated Coastal Zone Management (ICZM) and featuring nature-based solutions to help our clients mitigate risk.
Specific services, among others, include:
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Climate Scenario Modeling
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Exposure & Risk Impact Assessments
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Nature-based Adaptation Pathways
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Climate Resilience Prioritization for Investment Portfolios
Natural Resource Management
The management of natural resources, and critically the maintenance of ecosystem services, is becoming increasingly constrained by exploding demand and globalization. GeoAdaptive recognizes the multiscalar needs of resource management, where local communities depend on resources at the same time as global cycles are regulated by healthy stocks of trees and water. Whether focusing on a specific resource or a broader assessment of ecological health, our strategies help clients achieve adaptive management that balances the needs of the environment and communities. We do this by modelling key stocks, prioritizations, and valuations of resources as well as areas that are threatened by stressors like urbanization and climate change, therefore considering both current and future status.
GeoAdaptive has experience with a multitude of natural resource strategies, including water rights, forest disturbances, ecosystem service valuations and protection efficacies, and wetland banking. Across these themes we are able to identify areas with high economic value, critical ecological function, and where mitigation is most achievable or necessary. Our work empowers our clients to make multiuse decisions about the needs of their resources and stakeholders.
Specific services, among others, include:
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Landscape Management & Restoration Assessments
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Ecosystem Service Valuations
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Hazard & Exposure Assessments
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Livelihood Supply & Demand Frameworks
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Resource Prioritization Indicators
Biodiversity
Biodiversity protection, enhancement, and restoration is emerging around the globe as both a threatened need and opportunity for sustainable livelihoods. GeoAdaptive uses habitat suitability modeling and impact assessment from predicted threats to identify protection strategies for threatened or keystone species, as well as selects species as indicators to evaluate larger stressors like shifting habitats or landscape connectivity. We also use a variety of biodiversity indices and statistical modeling, including richness, intactness, endemic significance, and hotspots, to make environmental assessments across large study regions. This allows our clients to view the current efficacy of biodiversity protection, and identify needs for policy protection or monitoring strategies.
Our team is capable of biodiversity-specific initiatives, or incorporating biodiversity as a cross-cutting priority or indicator, in order to help our clients understand the richness of their regions, and the need or results of on-the-ground actions. This flexible approach allows us and our clients to understand biodiversity as an output of policy and investment, as well as an opportunity for sustainability.
Specific services, among others, include:
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Habitat Suitability Modeling
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Species Distribution Shifts
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Landscape Intactness
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Regional-scale Analysis
Our Tool Box
We use a variety of tools to serve our clients, and are always exploring and integrating new methods to be on the cutting edge of environmental analysis. Here is a sample of our toolkit:
Spatial modelling (GIS)
Construction of multidimensional databases and interactive user interfaces
Statistical indicator design
Remote Sensing
Community and management stakeholder consultation
Literature, method, and case study synthesis
Policy and regulation review
Framework construction of interventions, recommendations, investments, and tipping points
Related Projects
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Conservation Planning: Landscape Conservation and Climate Change Scenarios for the State of Florida
This study modeled three conservation planning scenarios derived from community input, climate change and land use change modeling, habitat suitability for sensitive species, and ecosystem service evaluations to identify where land should be conserved to most efficiently use limited state resources.
Using current rates of population growth and climate change, land cover conditions for 2020 through 2060 were modeled with three conservation scenarios varying by rate of land acquisition, land prioritization frameworks, and acquisition mechanisms (fee-simple, easements, payments for services, etc.). These scenarios generated interactive visualizations identifying specific regions and parcels for conservation planning, with focal zones in Apalachee Bay, the Lake Wales Ridge, and endangered Florida panther habitat.
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Conservation Planning: Central Florida Collaborative Opportunities in Central Florida’s Working Lands
This study used predictive modeling on the likelihood of agricultural parcels in Central Florida’s Lake Wales Ridge region converting to either developed or conserved states to predict habitat changes for 6 state-endangered species.
The study utilized GeoAdaptive’s unique brand of Consensus and Conflict Mapping to identify where incentives for environmental protection, human development, and agriculture aligned for conservation, and where conflicts would be most likely to arise. The end result presented areas of habitat change at a highly granular level for the 6 sensitive species, guided conservation mechanisms in a cost-efficient manner, and identified where conflict is most likely to arise.
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Climate Adaptation: KeysMAP, Implementation of a Scenario-based Model of Adaptation Planning for the South Florida Marine Environment
This project encompassed the full scope of climate adaptation planning, from identification of future scenarios to monitoring strategies, for declining species stocks, increasing habitat vulnerability, and nearshore eutrophication.
Climate change scenario modeling was used to conduct a habitat exposure analysis for sensitive, economically important, and flagship species that each represented critical aquatic ecosystems. Adaptation measures were ranked according to their protection of these species and managers of the Florida Fish & Wildlife Conservation Commission participated in knowledge events to identify the tipping points of climate indicators at which each adaptation strategy would be best employed. Finally, to enable long-term adaptation planning, monitoring tools were developed for each adaptation strategy in the event a tipping point is reached.
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Climate Adaptation: Long-term Climate Adaptation in the Marshall Islands
In this project, a series of scenario models with different levels of sea level rise and storm surge flooding were carried out to understand the level of impacts and what adaptive measures could be considered. This study used Dynamic Adaptive Policy Pathways to suggest adaptation strategies capable of responding to climate-related uncertainties. The specific conditions of the urban atolls Majuro and Ebeye, where 76% of people live, were addressed with several pathways combining nature-based solutions and gray infrastructure.
GeoAdaptive also has ample project experience responding to a broad set of environmental and climate-related hazards, including inundation, sea level rise, storm surge, high winds, seismic events, and landslides.
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Climate Adaptation: Managing Sea Level Rise in Florida
Given the diverse land-ocean interface and varying levels of vulnerability and adaptability, the project categorized four influential coastal typologies: wetland, ocean, bay, and estuarine. For each typology, the project formulated a set of toolkits with different interventions taking into account nature-based solutions to enhance the process of creating a more resilient and sustainable coastal region. Four main actions are identified and located: Protect, Restore, Enhance, and (De)Construct.
This study also classified Florida’s coastline into 9 regions using a taxonomic approach built from ecosystem attributes and built-up area densities. These classes provided a qualitative framework to localize causes and solutions to vulnerability and adaptation, as well as an ideal analytical unit to assess the impact of sea level rise across both rural and metropolitan zones.
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Natural Resource Management: Chile Wetlands Identification and Prioritization
Wetlands are one of the most critical habitats to protect for their provision of ecosystem services that greatly benefit both local communities and balance global environmental cycles. This study identified and prioritized wetlands for their provision of ecosystem services across the entire country of Chile.
Drawing on best practices from a literature review of studies within and beyond Chile, this study constructed a stakeholder goal framework and designed indicators with participatory validation and remote sensing. Conservation and climate scenarios were analyzed to produce prioritization grids across the entire country, incorporating 5 different management objectives for flexible management . Our knowledge products are capable of providing insights at multiple scales: this study produced a management guide at local levels that could also be used as a national-level knowledge product of the country’s natural resources and ecosystem services provided by wetlands.
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Natural Resource Management: Navigating the Wake of Municipal Water Sales: Alternative to Improve Agricultural and Ecological Outcomes on the Bessemer Ditch
Water management is poised to be one of the most significant human development issues in the 21st century and beyond. In the western US, demand is quickly outpacing supply, and growing cities are turning to acquiring water rights from productive farmlands which also threatens environmental conservation areas.
This study proposed to maintain a critical balance between municipal and agricultural demand to avoid dry-up and preserve sustainable ecological outcomes in the Arkansas River Basin near Pueblo, Colorado. It resulted in land and water-share estimates for potential transfers through alternatives to typical buy-and-dry practices. This result was achieved through farmland protection priority modeling, identifying riparian corridor conservation management zones, water quality management zones, economic analyses of historical transactions, and grassland revegetation suitability. A dry-up land bank and conservation land bank synthesized the analysis into a priority guiding tool for water resource managers and stakeholders.
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Biodiversity: Impact Assessment for the Florida Panther National Wildlife Refuge Contextual Landscape
The Florida panther, an iconic and endangered flagship species, has seen its range greatly reduced to the Florida Panther National Wildlife Refuge and surrounding lands in southwestern Florida. This study predicted increases in human development and climate change stressors to panther habitat that informed the refuge’s updated Comprehensive Conservation Plan.
The impact assessment employed a Strategic Habitat Conservation approach focusing on outcome-based objectives, i.e. Florida panther population size, rather than output-based objectives such as total acres conserved. By scenario modeling future trends of suburban growth, climate impacts on hydrology, and alternative conservation strategies, the study was able to present the total acreage of habitat change spatially across Southwest Florida. All models and outcomes were validated and workshopped with stakeholders and managers as well as a dynamic data visualization platform. This study enabled habitat managers to prevent loss of vulnerable habitat as well as shift strategies in marginal regions that may become critical habitat in the face of changes on the landscape.
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Biodiversity: Territorial Framework for Inclusive, Sustainable, and Green Development of the Andean Amazon Region
The Amazon Rainforest, one of the globe’s most critical biodiversity hotspots, presents challenges of regional coordination at such a massive scale. As part of a comprehensive gap analysis of 8 Amazonian countries, areas of lagging protective policies were identified to make biodiversity investment strategies informed by landscape connectivity across more than 14 million square kilometers.
By looking beyond political boundaries and focusing on key biodiversity movement corridors, the study was able to view the biome as a continuous landscape to assess the performance of protected areas. In this study, biodiversity was valued not only for its intrinsic value and indicator of a healthy Amazonian ecosystem, but also as potential groundwork for sustainable livelihoods in bioeconomic sectors.