Baylands & Shoreline Resilience

Shoreline ecosystems provide valuable services that benefit people and wildlife, including habitat, storm protection, carbon sequestration, and recreation opportunities. Rising sea levels increasingly threaten low-lying development, sensitive habitats, and vital infrastructure along our shoreline, presenting an adaptation challenge.

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. Our goal is to enhance the resilience of shoreline ecosystems, ensuring they continue to benefit people and wildlife in the face of climate change.

From Problem to Solution: Guiding Decision-Makers Through the Adaptation Process

SFEI helps regional agencies, local governments, community-based organizations, and other partners adapt to sea level rise in ways that benefit Bay Area communities and ecosystems. SFEI’s Baylands and Shoreline Resilience team has created tools and data to support nature-based adaptation – our “Adaptation Toolkit.” Our team also provides comprehensive scientific support for every phase of the adaptation process, ensuring decision-makers are informed and involved throughout the process. We use a science-based approach to tackle this daunting challenge, so that our vulnerable shoreline communities and shoreline habitats are more resilient to climate impacts.

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Our Priorities

Latest News

Color coded elevation map of San Francisco Baylands and Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. Courtesy Michelle Stern, Delta Stewardship Council.

Thu, Apr 9 2026

First High-Resolution Elevation Map for Whole Bay-Delta

Fri, Mar 6 2026

To Save the Bay, Save its Sediment

Report cover for the Sunset Natural Resilience Project

Fri, Feb 27 2026

Nature-Based Approaches for a Resilient San Francisco

Thu, Sep 18 2025

The Atlas for Regional Shoreline Adaptation Planning

Thu, Jun 5 2025

San Francisco Baylands Resilience Metrics Mapbook

Mon, Nov 18 2024

Changing Course on San Francisco’s Great Highway

Featured Projects

San Francisco Bay Shoreline Adaptation Atlas

In partnership with SPUR, The Operational Landscape Units project, funded by the SF Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board, will create a new way of looking at the Bay. By using science to define different segments or “units” of the shoreline,… Read More

View of constructed oyster reefs sitting on a mudflat at low tide, with a crane on a barge helping with the reef construction in the background.

Regionally Advancing Living Shorelines

The Regionally Advancing Living Shorelines Project enhances information sharing to boost the scale and speed of living shoreline design and construction in the region. It creates constructability guidance, conducts baseline monitoring, develops engineering concepts,… Read More

Baylands Resilience Framework

The Baylands Resilience Framework provides quantitative data to help planners and managers identify where adaptation and restoration projects can increase baylands resilience to sea level rise. SFEI’s Adaptation Atlas identified places along the San Francisco… Read More

Recent Publications

Restoring Sediment Pathways: A Resilient Landscape Vision for the Adobe Creek Baylands

Restoring Sediment Pathways: A Resilient Landscape Vision for the Adobe Creek Baylands synthesizes science and community priorities into a nature-based approach for improving the resilience and ecological…

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