Climate change risk management: a Mental Modeling application Todd S. Bridges • Daniel Kovacs • Matthew D. Wood • Kelsie Baker • Gordon Butte • Sarah Thorne • Igor Linkov Published online: 3 September 2013 Ó Springer Science+Business Media New York (outside the USA) 2013 Abstract The potential impacts of climate change are varied and highly uncertain, and pose a significant chal- lenge to agencies charged with managing environmental risks. This paper presents a comprehensive and structured Mental Modeling approach to elicit, organize and present relevant information from experts and stakeholders about the factors influencing environmental risk management in the face of climate change. We present and review an initiative undertaken by the United States Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) to characterize climate change chal- lenges to USACE environmental risk management activi- ties, and to identify gaps with respect to science, engineering, and organizational processes for addressing these challenges. By employing Mental Modeling, the research has characterized the influences of climate change on USACE environmental risk management, and aggre- gating recommendations from 28 experts. In addition, the study identifies the most important opportunities to improve organizational response to climate change, ranging from focused research and development of tech- nical capabilities to broad paradigm shifts and systemic organizational improvements within the USACE environ- mental risk management programs. This study demon- strates that Mental Modeling is a useful tool for understanding complex problems, identifying gaps, and formulating strategies, and can be used by a multitude of organizations and agencies. Keywords Climate change Á Mental Modeling Á Expert Model Á Environmental assessment Á US Army Corps of Engineers Á Risk management Á Risk communication 1 Introduction Climate Change poses a global threat with multiple dimensions and uncertainties (Stern 2006; Peterson et al. 1997). Observations of increasing global ocean and air temperatures, more frequent and intense extreme weather events, and increasing rates of sea level rise caused by ocean thermal expansion and snow and ice melt provide evidence of climate change and indicate some of the potential consequences (IPCC 2007). The Intergovern- mental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) predicts global temperatures to increase by 1.1–6.4 °C and sea levels to rise 18–59 cm from between 1980 and 1999 through the end of the 21st century (IPCC 2007). These changes pose threats to the sustainability of the environment, create risks to human and environmental health and safety (Walker and Steffen 1997; Jones 2001; McMichael et al. 2006; Trivedi et al. 2008a, b; Deschanes and Greenstone 2011), and challenge institutions charged with safeguarding the integrity of the environment, ensuring continued usability of coastal bases, managing water resources, and protecting T. S. Bridges US Army Research and Development Center, Environmental Laboratory, 3909 Halls Ferry Rd., Vicksburg, MS 39180, USA D. Kovacs Á G. Butte Á S. Thorne Decision Partners, LLC, 313 East Carson Street, Suite 200, Pittsburgh, PA 15219, USA M. D. Wood Á K. Baker Á I. Linkov (&) US Army Research and Development Center, Environmental Laboratory, 696 Virginia Rd., Concord, MA 01742, USA e-mail: igor.linkov@usace.army.mil 123 Environ Syst Decis (2013) 33:376–390 DOI 10.1007/s10669-013-9461-6