EASTERN MIDWEST CLIMATE CHANGE WORKSHOP
29-30 June 1998
University Place Conference Center and Hotel
Indianapolis, Indiana

STATEMENT OF PURPOSE

The purpose of the Eastern Midwest Climate Change Workshop is to identify the sensitivities of the region to climate variability and change and consider the opportunities for adaptation and mitigation. The geographical focus is on the states of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, Missouri and Kentucky. Our concern is not deciding whether change will take place, but strategically positioning agriculture and industry in the region to be able to adapt to changes that may occur. This will require building partnerships and developing contingency coping strategies that will be flexible and effective if put into practice. The workshop will be an opportunity to:

• Learn what we do and do not know about climate change for our region,
• Assess and prioritize possible climate change impacts and impacts from other stresses,
• Increase your understanding of the position of other sectors and industries,
• Assess different adaptation and mitigation strategies,
• See the linkages between sectors as they adapt to stress or try to mitigate it,
• Create partnerships where joint action is beneficial.

This region's economy is based on industry and agriculture. Industries include steel, manufacturing, automobiles and automotive parts, and heavy equipment. The agricultural sector includes livestock, feed grains, agricultural processing and agricultural inputs. Both these sectors are also tied into international markets. Forest products and resources also are important in several of these states such as hardwoods in Indiana, Ohio and Kentucky. All these industries are under a variety of stresses. One concern of the workshop will be to identify these stress factors and prioritize them along with the potential stress of climate change. We recognize that climate change is only one of the many challenges facing these sectors.

The region has had to deal with climate change and variability in the past. Examples are the 1988 drought which brought barge traffic to a halt and decimated crops. The flood conditions of 1993 were the other extreme. Events like these have begun to raise issues of water rights, which are critical for the Great Lakes, as well as raise fears of the consequences of increased weather variability. Discussions of mitigation of climate change raise the issue of potentially severe regulation for key industries in the Eastern Midwest such as energy, steel and automobiles. In these cases the direct impact of climate change may not be great. Here, an important issue for discussion in the workshop is impact from mitigation strategies. In addition, many of the climate change or mitigation impacts originating in the region will have spillover to other regions or internationally, and there will be reaction back to the Eastern Midwest that can be important.

This workshop is organized by staff from Indiana University, Purdue University, and the University of Illinois. It is one of eighteen regional workshops under the auspices the United States Global Change Research Program and the Office of Science and Technology Policy in the Executive Office. The U.S. Department of Agriculture is the sponsoring agency for this workshop working with the Department of Energy's Midwestern Regional Center of the National Institute for Global Environmental Change located at Indiana University.

AGENDA

Objectives of Workshop Are to Address the Following Questions:

1. What are the current environmental stresses on a region or sector?
2. How will projected changes in climate and climate variability exacerbate or ameliorate the effects of the existing regional or sectoral stresses, or introduce new stresses?
3. What information is needed to provide better and more certain estimates of the consequences of climate variability and climate change?
4. What strategies may help the region or sector to cope with the anticipated consequences of change in climate, especially in ways that also will help in coping with other stresses? What opportunities exist for "win-win" and "no regrets" responses?

Steering Committee

Becky Doyle--Director, Illinois Department of Agriculture
Burnell C. Fischer--Director, Division of Forestry, Indiana Department of Natural Resources
Maureen Hinkle--National Audubon Society
Eric Kuhn--Director, Environmental Services, Cinergy Corporation
Nat Noland--Indiana Coal Council
Bill Richards--Ohio Farmer; Former Chief, National Resources Conservation Service
Bob White--U.S. Senate Agriculture Committee

Registration

Registration fee is $30. Please make checks payable to Indiana University and return the following information by June 20^th.

To register please print this page and return the completed form along with the $30 registration fee to:

Ms. Becky Snedegar
Indiana University
SPEA - Suite 441
1315 E. Tenth Street
Bloomington, IN 47405-9916

Hotel Information

A block of rooms has been reserved at the University Place Conference Center and Hotel, 850 W. Michigan Street, on the Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis campus. Participants must make their own hotel reservations by calling 1-800-627-2700. Please refer to the Eastern Midwest Climate Change Workshop when making your reservation (reservations recommended by June 10, 1998, to guarantee availability). Group rates for The University Place Conference Center and Hotel will be $91 for a single room, and $106 for a double. All rates are subject to 11% state tax. After the recommended date, rooms will be subject to availability.

Last Update: 27 May 1998
Comments: bsnedega@indiana.edu