The Scaling Climate Change Adaptation in the Northern Great Plains through Regional Climate Summaries and Local Qualitative-Quantitative Scenario Planning Workshops project synthesizes climate data into 3-5 distinct but plausible climate summaries for the northern Great Plains region; crafts quantitative summaries of these climate futures for two focal areas; and applies these local summaries by developing climate-resource-management scenarios through participatory workshops and, where possible, simulation models. The two focal areas are central North Dakota and southwest South Dakota (Figure 1). The primary objective of this project is to help resource managers and scientists in a focal area use scenario planning to make management and planning decisions based on assessments of critical future uncertainties.

This report summarizes project work for public and tribal lands in the southwest South Dakota grasslands focal area, with an emphasis on Badlands National Park and Buffalo Gap National Grassland. The report explains scenario planning as an adaptation tool in general, then describes how it was applied to the focal area in three phases. Priority resource management and climate uncertainties were identified in the orientation phase. Local climate summaries for relevant, divergent, and challenging climate scenarios were developed in the second phase. In the final phase, a two-day scenario planning workshop held January 20-21, 2016 in Rapid City, South Dakota, featured scenario development and implications, testing management decisions, and methods for operationalizing scenario planning outcomes.