Well, thank you. Can you just spell your name and say your title for me first?
Last name is Vavris, V-A-V-R-U-S.
I'm the Wisconsin State Climatologist and also the Co-Director of Wiki, the Wisconsin Initiative on Climate Change Impacts.
Awesome. Can you start by just explaining what a climate haven is?
A climate haven is the idea of a place that's a refuge or a safe spot from the impacts of climate change.
Cool. And then what makes Madison suitable for climate migration?
Madison is similar to the rest of Wisconsin and the Great Lakes.
It's been hypothesized that this area of the country could be a climate haven because it might escape the worst of climate change impacts,
but there are a lot of other factors that need to be considered before we fall into that conclusion.
Cool. And then can you just talk about how we had a lot of water and a cooler climate and that's what might make us more suitable?
A couple of things that make Madison and Wisconsin in general potentially suitable as a place that's safer from climate change.
One is that we have a lot of water and the other is that we are relatively cool climate compared to the rest of the country.
So those are two advantages, but maybe just as important is what we don't have.
We don't have hurricanes. We don't have big wildfires and we're far away from sea level rise.
So the combination of those things has made a lot of people speculate that our region of the country could be very attractive to so-called climate migrants.
Thank you. And then what might make Madison not suitable for climate migration?
We have our own challenges and the idea of a climate haven implies that it's a safe spot, a refuge,
but people should be aware that we have our own climate extremes, our own climate challenges.
We get a lot of heavy rainfalls. We get a lot of flooding.
We often get heat waves too that are hot and humid.
And then last summer we had so much wildfire smoke and that caught people off guard.
So those are three in particular challenges that we face here too.
And then is there anything you're most worried about regarding Madison's climate in the next few years?
I would say most likely it's the flooding and the potentially increased prevalence of heat waves.
For the most part Wisconsin has escaped the upward trend in extreme heat that other parts of the country and the world have been affected by.
But I think our luck is going to run out as the climate keeps warming.
So those are a couple of things that are biggest concerns on my head.
And then what kind of influence do the Great Lakes have on our climate?
The Great Lakes have a buffering effect on our climate, especially if you live really close to the shore.
So in Wisconsin along the Lake Michigan shoreline all the way from about the Illinois state line up to Door County.
Definitely cooler in the summer, definitely cooler in the spring.
So there's moderating effects in both seasons and then similarly along the Lake Superior shoreline in northern Wisconsin.
Thank you.
And then can you talk to me a bit about the uncertainty surrounding the concept of climate havens?
One of the reasons that climate havens are uncertain is because there are so many reasons why people move or don't move.
And climate and weather are just one of them.
The cost of living, the quality of education, the availability of housing.
This is a big issue in Madison with high house prices and rents.
And so that will affect people too.
And also things like how far away they are from family and friends.
Typically people don't move very far when they do decide to relocate.
It's typically in the same general region of the country.
So it's somewhat unusual for people to uproot from say California if they're afraid of wildfires moving all the way to Wisconsin.
And then why should everyday people care about climate change in the concept of climate havens?
Well depending on where you live, climate change is affecting all of us in different ways.
And if it gets too hot for you or you get too concerned about sea level rise or wildfires, you may face a decision yourself.
Is it time to uproot and go somewhere safer?
And so that would be one reason from people affected.
But then for communities who may potentially be climate havens, there's a concern how do we handle a potentially large influx of residents.
And that is something that communities need to be thinking about.
Could we handle a 15, 20, 25% increase in people moving here because they're afraid of climate change impacts in their area of the country?
Thank you. And then can you just expand about a bit about that?
What kind of other things should cities be considering when preparing for climate migration?
Well the ability to have affordable housing I think is a big one.
Can their infrastructure handle a lot more people, those sorts of things?
So these are things that communities need to be thinking about anyway.
But conceivably there could be an uptick in people moving in or out of different communities.
And another thing that certain communities are thinking about in the upper Midwest is promoting themselves as climate havens.
For instance, Buffalo and Duluth are two communities that have gone all in with advertising and encouraging people to come to their communities.
And hopefully they have the ability to take in a lot of residents fairly quickly.
And then Madison hasn't really branded itself like Duluth or Buffalo.
Do you think it should try to brand itself as a climate even?
I think there's pros and cons with promoting yourself as a climate haven.
First of all, you have to be honest because are you really a refuge?
If you're not, I think you're being misleading and you don't want to falsely advertise.
The other thing too is asking yourself the question of can we handle a lot of people coming in at once?
It's potentially good for the economy but it can also be a drain on services and if people have to live outside of Madison,
does that mean, because of affordable housing, does that mean that you're going to have a lot more traffic coming in and out of the city every day?
And then are there any specific places that you think climate migrants might already be leaving or will be leaving soon and how does Madison compare to these places?
Well, a couple of high profile examples in the last 20 years was Hurricane Katrina that devastated New Orleans.
There were a lot of people who permanently moved from New Orleans back then.
And another one was Superstorm Sandy in 2012 that hit the New York, New Jersey, East Coast area badly.
And there were people who did move in both of those instances but there are lessons to be learned.
FEMA statistics show that the people who left New Orleans generally did not move very far away.
They often went to Houston or Mobile somewhat farther away but typically they stayed fairly close to New Orleans and are still susceptible to hurricanes.
So that shows the draw that local culture has and ties to family and friends have.
Thank you. And then when did people start talking about climate havens or when did the ideas start to get on your radar?
This idea of climate havens seems to have taken off from the bottom up.
This is something that I don't think scientists anticipated would draw so much public interest.
I would say in my own experience it's just in the last five, six, seven years that I've been hearing about it a lot.
And it's largely when I go to give public talks.
I hear people asking these questions about climate havens and refuges.
And so it's something that was really kind of a groundswell of interest from the masses and that's caught the attention of a lot of climatologists.
And from your personal perspective, do you think that Madison has the potential to become a climate haven?
I think Madison always will be a popular place to live.
It's always considered one of the best places in the country to live and probably will remain that way.
So in that sense it'll always be a draw and to the extent that Wisconsin's climate change impacts may not be as severe as some other parts of the country.
I think it may have a double draw.
But again, people need to recognize that we've got our own challenges when it comes to climate and extreme weather here too.
That there's really no safe place from the impacts of climate change.
Thank you. And then my last question is just do you think people are already moving because of climate migration?
Or do you think that we'll see an increase soon or in what that time frame might look like?
It's a mixed bag in terms of whether people are moving because of climate change.
You can certainly find anecdotal evidence.
You talk to a person and they say, yeah, I moved because it was too hot in Arizona and I wanted to be somewhere cooler.
But usually people have a mix of reasons for leaving.
Maybe they found a better job.
Maybe they decided that they wanted to be closer to family.
There's all sorts of different reasons and weather and climate may be one of them.
But if it's one of many, how do you decide?
Was it really because of climate change or was it just climate was just one of many factors that motivated them to become, to displace themselves?
Thank you.
That was great.
Is there anything else you want to touch on or expand upon?
I think so. I think we covered quite a bit there.
And then is there any questions you guys want to ask?
No, I think that was a good guy. I have a couple if that's okay.
Sure.
Okay.
Should I look at you there?
Yeah.
Okay.
So my first question and you kind of talked about this.
But is our weather really going to be like that much in 20 years?
Is our weather really going to be that much better than California's or Texas's?
Well, forecasting 20 years in advance is difficult.
But we do expect that the trend toward warmer and wetter conditions in Wisconsin will continue.
That's been the long term trend in every season and it's likely to continue in every season in the future.
Even if it gets hotter here in Wisconsin, it still won't be as hot on average as places like Texas, California and Arizona.
But it will, in many places, it'll be a lot wetter and so potentially flooding problems will be a bigger concern here.
Okay. I got one more too.
Let's say that this kind of migration thing does pan out and people, you know, we do see this phenomenon, you know, solidify, continue, whatever you want to say.
What part of the state do you think would see the most migrants?
Do you think they would go farther north to try to mitigate, you know, concerns as much as possible?
Or do they go towards a more dense, lead populated southeast?
Where people move is going to depend on a lot of things depending, in part, what kind of climate they like.
If you like snow, you might migrate to the snow belt around Lake Superior, which will still have more snow than the rest of the state, most likely.
If you want to avoid the heat of summer, I think areas near the Great Lakes could be very desirable because those areas do stay cooler with lake breezes
and slower warmups in the spring, not as many hot, 90, 100 degree days in those areas.
So if you're wanting to escape heat, that would be a good one.
But again, there's so many different reasons why people might choose to live in one part of the state or another.
If you like urban places, Milwaukee, Madison, Green Bay are more attractive.
If you like rural areas, there's plenty to choose from.
So climate would be one of the reasons, but you certainly could figure out, depending on your own personal taste for weather and climate,
which parts of Wisconsin would be most desirable for you.
All right, I'm sorry, I know a little more.
Sure, I'm so sorry. I like to do this. This probably is not going to end up in her story.
But I like to do this when I'm talking to experts who have kind of a longer view like this.
What does your gut tell you? It's going to happen with climate refugees.
Just gut feeling. Do you think we're going to see people come?
I think that there will be some segment of the population that relocates because of climate change.
And I think probably it will be for reasons that we can anticipate that they don't want to deal with sea level rise problems,
hurricanes, wildfires and the like, stream heat.
But I think it's going to be sort of lost in the mix in many cases because people are going to move to and from Wisconsin and the
Great Lakes areas for all sorts of reasons.
So finding the signal amid that noise of people coming and going all the time anyway, I think it's going to prove difficult.
I actually have one more question.
Sure, as long as we're set up.
Could you talk a bit about the flooding we saw in Dane County or any other disasters like that that we've seen recently?
Sure. So the 20 teens were Wisconsin's wettest decade on record by far.
And we had a lot of flooding events across the state in that decade.
And one of the worst, maybe the worst in that decade was in 2018 in August in Dane County where just about a foot of rain fell in 24 hours,
which was a statewide record.
And it's an incredible amount of rain. It's more like hurricane amounts.
And it certainly caused terrible flooding. It even caused one fatality.
And we do expect in a warmer climate because warmer air can hold more moisture.
But when conditions are right, we'll see heavier doses of rainfall.
And that's one of the big concerns with climate change.
Climate models have been consistent with that expectation for years.
And so we may be seeing some of that signal of climate change being realized already in Wisconsin in terms of these flooding events.
Thank you so much.
We just 20 seconds of room tone of silence if that's okay.
Okay, starting now.
Okay, thank you.