Protected areas as potential refugia for biodiversity under climatic change

Abstract

Climate change is among the greatest challenges to biodiversity conservation globally. In response to climatic changes, species around the world have already started to shift their ranges along altitudinal and latitudinal gradients. However, it remains unclear whether the areas currently managed for biodiversity protection are optimized for these shifting ranges. Climate velocities represent a method to quantify the rate at which organisms must alter their range to maintain their current climate envelope. Here we use a case study of the Southern Rockies region in the western United States to show how forward and backward climate velocities can be used to quantify potential impacts of climatic changes and delineate abiotic climate refugia. We further illustrate how climate velocities can integrate into a process that simultaneously identifies climate refugia for suites of species while accounting for additional landscape factors contributing to protected area success. These results demonstrate how potential climatic changes may be used to prioritize the efficient selection of climate refugia, potentially aiding multi-target climate adaptation decision-making across broad regions.