From data to decisions: Putting Regional Resource Kit data to work using the PROMOTE and Planscape decision tools

This presentation from Research Forester Dr. Nicholas “Nick” Povak focuses on: 

1. Regional Resource Kits (RRK): a warehouse of high-resolution data layers covering the state of California and characterizing a wide range of social-ecological resources from biodiversity to fire dynamics to economic diversity.
2. Future conditions modeling: various methods exist for determining potential future landscape conditions under climate change including landscape simulation and climate analog approaches.
3. PROMOTE: a decision support modeling framework that integrates an assessment of current resource conditions with future climate change modeling to help direct management to areas where conditions can be tailored to predicted future climate conditions.
4. Planscape: an open-source web-based platform providing a GIS interface to the RRK data and a workflow for managers and stakeholders to develop a portfolio of work for a given project area by exploring outcomes of different management scenarios. 

Dr. Povak has been a Research Forester with the Pacific Southwest Research Station for the past 3 years. His research in the field of landscape ecology is aimed at understanding how natural disturbances shape regional landscapes, how these interactions have changed over time, and how climate change will alter them into the future. His work with decision support models has helped managers identify opportunities to manage for wildfires, invasive species, hydrological functions, and mitigate tropical forest conversions. Most recently, his work on the PROMOTE decision support model is aimed at integrating climate informed strategies into landscape planning.