Protecting species threatened by climate change under the U.S. Endangered Species Act: Opportunities and challenges

Background/Question/Methods

Climate change is predicted to significantly increase the extinction risk for many species, underscoring the need for effective mitigation (greenhouse gas reduction) and adaptation (increasing resilience) measures to reduce this risk. The U.S. Endangered Species Act has been identified as an existing tool with the potential to provide mitigation and adaptation benefits to species threatened by climate change, particularly through its requirements for designating critical habitat and developing recovery plans for listed species, both of which can address climate change threats. We examined the extent to which the ESA has been applied to list new species as threatened or endangered because of climate change threats, and the extent to which critical habitat designations and recovery plans address climate change threats to listed species. We first analyzed the percentage of species (where “species” includes both species and subspecies) that have been petitioned for listing since January 2000 for which climate change was identified as a principal threat, and report the current status of the listing determination for those species. We then reviewed the latest versions of critical habitat designations and recovery plans (as of December 2011) for all listed species and subspecies to determine whether climate change was described as a threat, and if so, whether knowledge of climate change threats informed the delineation of critical habitat or recovery actions, respectively.  

Results/Conclusions

A small fraction of species that have been petitioned for listing since January 2000 were petitioned because of climate change threats, and very few of those species have been listed to date. Listing petitions have been submitted for 11 species for which climate change was identified as the primary threat, one of which has been listed to date. Of 106 additional petitioned species for which climate change was identified as a principal threat, 11 have been listed. Recovery plans for only 13% of listed species with plans address climate change, 10% identify climate change as a threat, and 5% suggest recovery actions to reduce climate change impacts. Similarly, critical habitat designation is just beginning to address climate change. Although many recent designations mention climate change as a threat to the species, few designations factor knowledge of climate change threats into critical habitat delineation. It appears that there are underutilized opportunities to apply ESA protections to climate-threatened species and we conclude by examining the scientific, institutional, and political challenges to doing so.