We must cope with climate change, Kempthorne says

The ex-Idaho governor, now Interior secretary, puts together a 90-person task force to figure out what to do.

Federal managers of land, water and wildlife must learn to adapt to climate change, Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne said Friday.

Huge fires burning across the West, droughts in states like Florida and Georgia, and growing water shortages around the nation are placing new burdens on the more than 500 million acres of land managed by Kempthorne and agencies ranging from the Bureau of Land Management to the National Park Service.
Climate change is making wildlife habitat restoration more complicated and water management even harder, he said.

That’s why he has organized a 90-person task force to examine how the 73,000 employees who work in the Interior department can deal with climate change, he said Friday.

“(It’s) not to answer the question if there’s climate change,” Kempthorne said. “There is.”

“We need to focus on adapting to this changing atmosphere,” he said.

The Bush administration initially expressed doubts about climate change but now recognizes it as a global problem linked to human activities. It has invested more than $29 billion in research and development around the issue, Kempthorne said.

Idaho Statesman