Resilient Landscapes Program

Rising sea levels increasingly threaten low-lying development, sensitive habitats, and vital infrastructure along California's shoreline. Our Baylands and Shoreline Resilience team works to advance our understanding of shoreline processes, enabling the development of effective adaptation strategies that work with nature rather than against it. We aim to enhance the resilience of shoreline ecosystems, ensuring they continue to benefit people and wildlife in the face of climate change.

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The Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta faces numerous environmental challenges that threaten its wildlife, the State’s water supply, vulnerable communities, and our climate. To guide decision-making, our Delta Landscapes team conducts vital research on the Delta’s ecology, hydrology, geomorphology and the history and needs and priorities of its communities. We use spatial analysis, historical ecology, collaborative planning, and community engagement to tackle complex issues.

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Modifications to watersheds, streams, and rivers over the past 200 years have caused significant changes to these systems. We assess the current health and functioning of rivers and streams in a scientifically rigorous way to develop management approaches to improve their long-term health and resilience. Our work includes developing landscape restoration visions, modeling flow and sediment dynamics, collecting field data, and conducting quantitative analyses of how these systems have changed through time.

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Cities are wrestling with many interconnected challenges that will only intensify over the coming decades, from adapting to a changing climate to accommodating rapid growth. SFEI’s Urban Nature team advances science and partnerships to generate integrative solutions that make cities more livable and resilient for people and wildlife. Nature in urban spaces has many benefits, including reducing extreme heat, slowing and filtering stormwater, improving physical and mental health, and supporting biodiversity.

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Historical ecology provides foundational information about the past landscape to better understand current conditions and inform planning for the future. We draw on a diverse array of archival data sources to reconstruct and map historical landscape patterns and processes prior to major European and American modification. SFEI's historical ecology studies -- spanning rivers, estuaries, and upland areas -- have contributed to numerous restoration projects throughout California.

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Restoration, conservation, and climate-smart management can enhance carbon sequestration and reduce greenhouse gas emissions on natural and working lands. These nature-based climate solutions can support carbon neutrality goals while conserving biodiversity and building resilience in our ecosystems and communities. Our Ecosystem Carbon team provides carbon cycle science, spatial data, and analysis tools needed to make carbon-smart decisions on our wild and managed lands.

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The Sediment Science team focuses on understanding the source, transport, and fate of sediment, from uplands to the Bay. Projects include sediment source assessments, sediment budgets, sediment sampling in watersheds and the Bay, assessing bayland sediment supply and demand, and developing conceptual and numerical models of sediment transport dynamics. This work is used by regulators and restoration practitioners to inform sediment management approaches that support healthy watershed and Bay ecosystems.

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The habitat monitoring and assessment team develops and implements regional monitoring plans and programs that use core elements of California’s Wetland and Riparian Area Monitoring Plan (WRAMP): a watershed approach to stream and wetland protection and management. We develop and apply monitoring methods, data management processes, and guidance to support the statewide use of WRAMP. We also lead training for the WRAMP framework, including EcoAtlas and the California Rapid Assessment Method (CRAM).

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