Virginia Climate Center

George �鶹��Ƶ's Virginia Climate Center releases first-ever statewide climate assessment

Colleen Rich — Wed, 19 Nov 2025 20:33:34 +0000

George �鶹��Ƶ's Virginia Climate Center releases first-ever statewide climate assessment Colleen Rich Wed, 11/19/2025 - 15:33

�鶹��Ƶ’s Virginia Climate Center (VCC) has unveiled the commonwealth’s first comprehensive, peer-reviewed climate assessment—a landmark report that provides science-based insights into Virginia’s changing climate and its impacts on communities, infrastructure, and the economy.

The First Virginia State Climate Assessment (VCA) synthesizes decades of research into a single, accessible resource for policymakers, businesses, educators, and the public. Developed by a multidisciplinary team across the commonwealth and the region, this report establishes a critical baseline for understanding how past, present, and future climate conditions will shape life in Virginia.

“This groundbreaking statewide assessment gives us what we've never had before: comprehensive, science-based evidence of the risks we face and the information we need to protect our communities, economy, and natural heritage for generations to come,” said Jim Kinter, VCC director and coordinating author of the assessment.

“The Virginia Climate Center brought together the commonwealth's leading scientists and experts to tackle one of the defining challenges of our time. This assessment represents unprecedented collaboration across disciplines and institutions—because a problem this complex demands our best minds working together to deliver rigorous, actionable science that serves all Virginians.”

Why Virginia Needs a State-Level Climate Assessment

While national and global climate reports provide broad trends, they cannot capture Virginia’s unique vulnerabilities. The commonwealth’s geographic diversity—from coastal plains to mountainous terrain—combined with rapid population growth and economic expansion creates region-specific risks that require localized solutions.

The VCA addresses these needs by organizing findings across six climate divisions: Tidewater, Eastern Piedmont, Western Piedmont, Southwestern Mountain, Central Mountain, and Northern Virginia. Each VCA chapter includes key messages and traceable accounts, offering clear, actionable insights backed by scientific evidence and confidence assessments.

“Global reports are essential for understanding broad climate trends, but they do not capture how those trends manifest at regional—or local—scales,” said Viviana Maggioni, chapter lead author and professor in George �鶹��Ƶ’s Sid and Reva Dewberry Department of Civil, Environmental, and Infrastructure Engineering. “Virginia’s wide variation in topography, precipitation regimes, and land-use creates highly localized climate risks. A state climate assessment accounts for such variability and provides insights needed for effective decision-making.”

Three Critical Climate Hazards for Virginia

The report identifies three primary hazards of particular concern for Virginia in the 21st century:

Extreme Heat and Rising Temperatures
Increasing temperatures and more frequent heatwaves pose significant health risks, disrupt labor productivity, and stress agricultural systems.
Extreme Precipitation and Shifting Seasons
Wetter falls and springs increase flood risks, while drier summers and winters heighten drought and wildfire danger. These changes threaten infrastructure and can lead to power grid disruptions and economic losses.
Accelerated Sea Level Rise
Virginia is experiencing faster-than-average sea level rise, compounded by land subsidence and erosion. Coastal flooding and infrastructure damage are growing concerns for Tidewater and other low-lying regions.

“Climate change is already affecting Virginia—from our coastlines to our mountains,” said Kinter. “This assessment empowers every Virginian, from local planners to business leaders to families, with the knowledge to make informed decisions. And as we continue to update and expand this work, we're building a lasting framework for protecting Virginia's future.”

Implications for Virginia’s Economy and Communities

The report underscores the urgent need for integrating climate projections into infrastructure design, land-use planning, and policy development. From transportation networks to energy systems, Virginia’s critical infrastructure must be resilient to evolving climate conditions.

“Weather patterns impact key sectors of the Virginia economy,” said Terry Clower, director of the Center for Regional Analysis at George �鶹��Ƶ’s Schar School of Policy and Government. “Having data that shows changing patterns of rainfall and temperature is essential for industry leaders—from small-hold farmers to those managing billions in international commerce. This landmark achievement will hopefully spark awareness that consistent, dependable, and localized weather data will give Virginia farmers, businesses, and government entities the ability to better compete and succeed.”

The assessment is dedicated to the late Representative Gerry Connolly, whose visionary leadership made it possible. “He understood that investing in climate science isn't partisan—it's pragmatic,” Kinter said. “His commitment to evidence-based solutions and his unwavering support for the Virginia Climate Center helped make this critical work a reality, and his legacy will benefit Virginians for years to come.”

According to Michael Allen, associate professor of climatology at Towson University and contributing author, “The climate challenges outlined in this report transcend geopolitical borders and disciplinary silos. From the hollers of western Virginia to the Chesapeake Bay and Eastern Shore, the assessment meets the needs of the commonwealth—but it also fills a void for the nation, drawing attention to the science of climate change and the vast impacts it has on communities, our economy, and our well-being.”

Looking Ahead: Future Assessments and the Grand Challenge Initiative

This inaugural report is the first in a planned series of VCC-led assessments that will incorporate finer-scale geographic detail, expand coverage of climate impacts across sectors, and evaluate adaptation effectiveness over time. Future editions will integrate stakeholder input to ensure relevance and applicability.

The VCA also highlights the urgent need for a Virginia State Climate Office, a centralized resource for climate services, data collection, and expert assessment. “This role is typically filled by a state climate office that provides accessible, no-cost climate information essential to a state’s most vital sectors,” Kinter explained. “However, Virginia is one of only two states in the U.S. currently without a functioning state climate office.”

Marking an important new chapter in the history of research and scholarship at George �鶹��Ƶ, this effort is part of the university’s Grand Challenge Initiative, which aims to address the greatest threats to humanity’s ability to live a peaceful, healthy, prosperous, and just existence. Through multidisciplinary research strengths in education, public health, space exploration, climate resilience, cybersecurity and digital innovation, and peace and democracy, the initiative aligns talent, infrastructure, resources, and partnerships with new ideas to deliver real-world solutions and prepare the next generation of changemakers.

For more information or to request interviews with experts, contact VAclim@gmu.edu or tmason11@gmu.edu.

Grand Challenge Initiative

Explore George �鶹��Ƶ’s Grand Challenge Initiative addressing the greatest threats to humanity’s ability to live a peaceful, healthy, prosperous, and just existence.

Read the Virginia Climate Assessment

Topics

Campus News

GCI-Grand Challenge Initiative

Virginia Climate Center

College of Science

Schar School of Policy and Government

A $6 million NSF grant will translate research into practice to help local communities become climate-resilient

Colleen Rich — Tue, 23 Jan 2024 18:50:38 +0000

A $6 million NSF grant will translate research into practice to help local communities become climate-resilient Colleen Rich Tue, 01/23/2024 - 13:50

�鶹��Ƶ scientists and partners will leverage their climate expertise and the university’s resources into broader societal implications, thanks to a $6 million grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) that is going to translate research into practice to support the creation of climate-resilient communities across Virginia.

�鶹��Ƶ researcher Celso Ferreira (far right) and President Gregory Washington take Congresswoman Abigail Spanberger on a tour of �鶹��Ƶ's Flood Hazards Research Lab. Photo by Evan Cantwell/Office of University Branding

The funding from the NSF’s Accelerating Research Translation (ART) program will allow �鶹��Ƶ to expand its capabilities and capacity for translating research into real-world practical applications, with the creation of programming that will allow �鶹��Ƶ faculty to serve communities across the commonwealth—especially within the state’s underserved regions—by co-producing science-based solutions that help them increase their resilience to climate change.

The four-year cooperative agreement, “ART: Translating Research to Practice to Create Climate-Ready Communities Across Virginia,” begins Feb. 1, and will allow �鶹��Ƶ faculty and their nonprofit partner, the Center for Climate Strategies, to work with local municipal governments and community partners to produce science-based solutions that will create sustainable, community resilience to the impacts of climate change.

The project proposes two initial seed translational research projects, focusing on the co-production of solutions to mitigate flood hazards and reduce the impacts of urban heat on frontline communities. The latter comes on the heels of the world’s warmest year on record in 2023. Faculty will have the opportunity to propose additional translational research projects that address other climate impacts and response capabilities needed by Virginia communities to become climate-ready.

�鶹��Ƶ’s Jeremy Campbell leads a discussion on local resiliency planning with staff from the Northern Virginia Regional Commission at a workshop held by the Virginia Climate Center in March 2023. Photo by VCC

“This really gives universities a chance to have an impact,” said Leah Nichols, the project’s principal investigator and the executive director of �鶹��Ƶ’s Institute for a Sustainable Earth. “I think it’s going to help us start to institutionalize things that until now had been one-offs.”

�鶹��Ƶ was one of 18 schools to have been awarded an ART cooperative agreement. The NSF overall investment of more than $100 million will enable academic institutions to accelerate the pace and scale of translational research that will grow the nation's economy.

“NSF endeavors to empower academic institutions to build the pathways and structures needed to speed and scale their research into products and services that benefit the nation,” said NSF Director Sethuraman Panchanathan. “The [ART program] identifies and champions institutions positioned to expand their research translation capacity by investing in activities essential to move results to practice.”

�鶹��Ƶ’s ART program leverages the model already created by the Virginia Climate Center (VCC)—which was initially established by a $2 million Community Project grant sponsored by Congressman Gerry Connolly (D-VA) – since its inception in 2022 for the necessary engagement infrastructure. That includes targeted outreach to individual community leaders and other key influencers in the hopes of creating the kind of collaborative relationships necessary to figure out what each community’s specific needs are.

Other co-PIs on the �鶹��Ƶ project include Jim Kinter, a professor in the Climate Dynamics PhD Program and the director of both �鶹��Ƶ’s Center for Ocean-Land-Atmosphere Studies within the College of Science and the Virginia Climate Center; Celso Ferreira, an associate professor within �鶹��Ƶ’s College of Engineering and Computing and the director of the Flood Hazards Research Lab; Luis Ortiz, an assistant professor in the Department of Atmospheric, Oceanic and Earth Sciences within the College of Science; and Tom Peterson, the CEO of the Center for Climate Strategies. Other entities involved include MN Associates Inc., which will monitor’s the program’s implementation and progress, and the University of Kentucky, which is serving as the project’s mentoring institution. Pairing awardees with mentor institutions that have an established translational research ecosystem is one of the unique features of the ART program.

Current research that can be brought to bear on local community concerns includes, but is not limited to risk and vulnerability assessment, the development and deployment of new adaptive capacities through modeling, simulating, predicting and projecting climate variability and change, including downscaled global observational and modeling data sets, and the development of solutions to close vulnerability gaps by assessing needs for action and designing and evaluating new measures for local implementation.

Other aims include supporting faculty who wish to be involved and the creation of specific academic programming, such as specialized courses on key climate issues, a new climate action minor, and a graduate certificate program, for future workforce development.

“One very troubling aspect of the effects of climate change is that it has the biggest impact on underserved people and communities that are least able to address the issue,” Kinter said. “�鶹��Ƶ, being the largest public university in Virginia, owes it to the residents of the commonwealth to understand the risks it faces and create innovative solutions to increase community resilience.”

Virginia bore the brunt of nine climate disasters in 2018 and 2019 alone, resulting in $1.6 billion of negative economic impact, according to the Secretary of Natural and Historic Resources.

Increasing community resilience to the effects of climate change is expected to help mitigate the impact and substantially reduce costs associated with damage from progressive climate change, extreme weather events, and other climate-driven effects, the researchers said.

“We’re really trying to understand what it is that [local communities] need from a scientific, technical, or research point of view through the lens of what is it that a university can provide,” Nichols said. “And once the climate-focused ART programs become well-established, we hope to extend this model to support the translation of research into practice in other sustainability domains as well.”

In This Story

Celso Ferreira

Join the �鶹��Ƶ Nation

�鶹��Ƶ’s Virginia Climate Center delivers vital research knowledge and resources for �鶹��Ƶ and the commonwealth

Colleen Rich — Thu, 12 Oct 2023 18:50:56 +0000

�鶹��Ƶ’s Virginia Climate Center delivers vital research knowledge and resources for �鶹��Ƶ and the commonwealth Colleen Rich Thu, 10/12/2023 - 14:50

The new Virginia Climate Center (VCC) at �鶹��Ƶ is leading research on tackling climate-related challenges, such as energy, vector-borne illnesses, and extreme weather and flooding in Northern Virginia and throughout the commonwealth. Funded through the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and sponsored by U.S. Representative Gerry Connolly (D-VA), this two-year, congressionally directed community project seeks to increase Virginia’s resiliency to the impacts of climate changes and variability.

�鶹��Ƶ researcher Jim Kinter presenting at the Resilient Virginia Conference. Photo by Sophia Whitaker/VCC

“We have high hopes that the Virginia Climate Center will become the go-to resource for communities in the commonwealth to understand their climate risks and find more resilient ways to protect themselves from threats to human health, life, livelihood, and property,” said Jim Kinter, a VCC principal investigator and director of the Center for Ocean-Land-Atmosphere Studies (COLA), a research center within �鶹��Ƶ’s College of Science.

“�鶹��Ƶ’s VCC has a powerful vision for resilient communities that is catalyzed by the university, advanced through partnerships, and powered by community engagement,” said Andre Marshall, vice president of research, innovation, and economic impact. “This boundary-spanning center is bringing together academic disciplines, municipalities, and the business community to form a new university-based cooperative framework that not only addresses the challenge of resilience, but also establishes a community-engaged model for universities to tackle the grand challenges of our time.”

One of VCC’s current projects is with the City of Alexandria staff to address extreme heat in the region through case studies and data collection of successful adaptation strategies in urban settings, such as cooling centers. �鶹��Ƶ experts leading these tasks are Luis Ortiz, Marybeth “MB” Mitcham, Ed Maibach, and Dan Vecellio.

“[This project] will provide my students with the opportunity to explore and contribute to real-time work, as part of exploring public health community assessment and partnership strategies,” said Mitcham, director of �鶹��Ƶ’s online master of public health (MPH) program and assistant professor in the Department of Global and Community Health. “Ultimately, our MPH students will help to improve the quality of life of local community members and help promote an awareness of the relationship between climate change and adverse health outcomes.”

The VCC is also working closely with �鶹��Ƶ’s College of Engineering and Computing and the Northern Virginia Regional Commission (NVRC) to support the installation of flood sensors and the development of a real-time flood forecasting system for the region. Flooding and extreme weather have devastating impacts on our communities and Virginia’s infrastructure and economy. Studies by �鶹��Ƶ researchers predict more intense and stronger storms in our region, stressing our infrastructure and likely increasing the impacts of extreme weather in our area.

P Ruess, a postdoctoral research fellow on the VCC team, is investigating the relationship of road closures and water rescues. “I am excited to work closely with stakeholders in an advisory relationship reliant on direct and intentional stakeholder involvement,” Ruess said.

"My work on the NVRC project holds the potential to greatly benefit our region, the Northern Virginia community, and my own education,” said Zeeshan Khalid, a master’s student in data analytics engineering. “By proactively identifying and addressing road closures during flash floods, we aim to minimize disruption, reduce property losses, and enhance community safety. This project underscores �鶹��Ƶ's commitment to contributing positively to the well-being of our community.”

Looking ahead, the VCC will remain in its partnerships with municipalities in Northern Virginia, including the NVRC, City of Fairfax, and Fairfax County, and will continue to work with them to address climate risks and codevelop adaptation solutions.

With the aid of funding from �鶹��Ƶ’s Strategic Investment Fund, the VCC team in collaboration with �鶹��Ƶ’s Local Climate Action Planning Initiative and the Institute for a Sustainable Earth, is expanding beyond Northern Virginia to aid Virginia’s rural communities in their climate resiliency and, now also, mitigation planning.

Learn about Sustainability at �鶹��Ƶ

In this Story

Engineering with nature: Exploring �鶹��Ƶ's contribution to water conservation

Shayla Brown — Tue, 01 Aug 2023 14:17:13 +0000

Engineering with nature: Exploring �鶹��Ƶ's contribution to water conservation Shayla Brown Tue, 08/01/2023 - 10:17

In This Story

Celso Ferreira

Jennifer Sklarew

Many people at �鶹��Ƶ do not realize that �鶹��Ƶ Pond is actually there for stormwater management.

That bit of news was delivered by �鶹��Ƶ researcher Jennifer Sklarew during her talk at the recent Head Above the Water event in Washington, D.C.

Planned by �鶹��Ƶ Exhibitions in the School of Art, with collaborators including the DC Department of Energy and Environment, City as Living Laboratory, local artists, and guest speakers, Head Above the Water included a walk along D.C.’s Watts Branch and Oxon Run streams to raise awareness about flooding in those neighborhoods and the flood mitigation programs available to residents.

Stream Restoration project by Facilities runs from Patriot Circle/Aquia Creek Lane to �鶹��Ƶ Pond. Photo by Cristian Torres/Office of University Branding

�鶹��Ƶ is deeply committed to pioneering processes that can answer the grand challenges of water, its responsible management, and sustainability. In fact, the university’s interdisciplinary approach and cutting-edge research as part of its strategic direction, has turned �鶹��Ƶ’s campuses into a Living Lab.

Take what Sklarew, an assistant professor in �鶹��Ƶ’s Department of Environmental Science and Policy, said about �鶹��Ƶ Pond.

“The stormwater channels that look like streams are components of the actual stormwater system,” she said. “The pipes outflow into those streams, and then everything goes into the pond.”

But that is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to what �鶹��Ƶ is doing and accomplishing when it comes to handling water resources on its campuses, using research and technologies that can be applied beyond to the broader community.

At �鶹��Ƶ Square, �鶹��Ƶ Innovation Partners encountered a serious infrastructure issue that posed a frequent stormwater challenge for the surrounding area of the new Fuse at �鶹��Ƶ Square in the heart of Arlington’s Rosslyn-Ballston corridor.

Replacing the culvert required precise coordination with the future building foundation design and intricate sequencing to control the constant flow of stormwater as it was diverted from the old culvert pipes to a new 12 feet wide, 6 feet high box culvert.

Facilities also has an extensive list of mitigation protocols it applies to remove pollutants and control storm runoff flow rates, including Illicit discharge detection and elimination, and construction site runoff control.

�鶹��Ƶ’s stormwater system is monitored by Facilities, which can prohibit projects that might interfere with the system. The university recently completed a stream restoration project on the Fairfax Campus that not only improved the flow of the waterways but added asphalt sidewalks and some lighting so the campus community can enjoy the paths.

Stream Restoration project by Facilities runs from Patriot Circle/Aquia Creek Lane to �鶹��Ƶ Pond. Photo by Cristian Torres/Office of University Branding

Also on the Fairfax Campus, the irrigation system has sensors that register rainfall to control landscape watering. The irrigation system on the Science and Technology Campus evaluates local weather data. Additionally, the campus strives to create more vegetated regions, with green roofs, vegetated gardens and swales. There are also plans to design additional dry and wet retention ponds to reduce stormwater runoff and pollution in our waterways.

Celso Ferreira, an associate professor in �鶹��Ƶ’s Sid and Reva Dewberry Department of Civil, Environmental, and Infrastructure Engineering, calls the approach engineering with nature—taking advantage of what nature already provides and using it efficiently in engineering.

“How can we use nature in a way that benefits society for flood protection other than being detrimental to causing more floods,” said Ferreira, who also heads �鶹��Ƶ’s Flood Hazards Research Lab, a collaboration between multiple �鶹��Ƶ colleges and the university’s Institute for Sustainable Earth. “We’re trying to investigate natural features that can help us in engineering design that we can use to smartly prevent flooding.”

Ferreira also co-directs the Virginia Climate Center, which works with local communities across the commonwealth to support climate resilience, action, and planning for communities. Ferreira said he tries to bring those concepts into the classroom “to make sure that the future engineering workforce that we’re graduating design and implement infrastructure in a way that they’re mindful of natural processes. Then we can use them smartly to prevent flooding.”

For Sklarew, the Head Above the Water event was a natural extension of the outreach work she does as a �鶹��Ƶ faculty member.

Participants during the Head Above the Water walk in D.C. Photo by Shayla Brown/Office of University Branding

“I go into rural communities and talk with them about what they think their challenges are for food, energy, water, and climate, and how to develop solutions that emerge from within the community rather than outside the community,” said Sklarew, who connects her research with environmental justice. “The walk on Oxon Run and Watts Branch is a great example of something like that.”

Topics

Sustainability

Department of Environmental Science and Policy (ESP)

civil engineering; stormwater infrastructure; climate variability

Fuse at �鶹��Ƶ Square

Institute for a Sustainable Earth (ISE)

Virginia Climate Center

�鶹��Ƶ Exhibitions

Research

College of Engineering and Computing

Science Series highlights the work of �鶹��Ƶ’s Virginia Climate Center

Colleen Rich — Mon, 10 Jul 2023 17:21:12 +0000

Science Series highlights the work of �鶹��Ƶ’s Virginia Climate Center Colleen Rich Mon, 07/10/2023 - 13:21

On June 28, �鶹��Ƶ College of Science Dean Fernando Miralles-Wilhelm, U.S. Representative Gerry Connolly, and James Kinter, director of �鶹��Ƶ’s Center for Ocean-Land-Atmosphere Studies, discussed how the Virginia Climate Center is helping communities increase resilience to the impacts of climate change.

The event, held at the Country Club of Fairfax, was part of the college’s �鶹��Ƶ Science Series.

The center was established in 2022 with funding from National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration made possible by Rep. Connolly's efforts.

A pilot project will establish the center in partnership with the Northern Virginia Regional Commission, City of Fairfax, County of Fairfax, and other jurisdictions in Northern Virginia. The center will co-produce assessments and planning solutions with Virginia municipalities and firms to adopt risk prevention and mitigation strategies for wise resource management and sustainable entrepreneurship.