Climate Velocity Can Inform Conservation in a Warming World

Climate velocity is a simple metric that describes the speed and direction of climate movement at any point in space. Climate velocity is providing information about climate change that is relevant for conservation, including the study of protected areas, novel and/or disappearing climates, rates of endemism, and range shifts. To better inform conservation, climate velocity can be tailored to be more biologically meaningful through the addition of dispersal capabilities, physiological tolerance, and potential routes of movements of species. There is untapped potential for using climate velocity and climate-velocity trajectories in informing the design of protected areas and their networks, conserving ocean biodiversity in 3D, and in informing conservation actions. To stimulate future research using climate velocity, we introduce the R package vocc. Climate change is shifting the ranges of species. Simple predictive metrics of range shifts such as climate velocity, that do not require extensive knowledge or data on individual species, could help to guide conservation. We review research on climate velocity, describing the theory underpinning the concept and its assumptions. We highlight how climate velocity has already been applied in conservation-related research, including climate residence time, climate refugia, endemism, historic and projected range shifts, exposure to climate change, and climate connectivity. Finally, we discuss ways to enhance the use of climate velocity in conservation through tailoring it to be more biologically meaningful, informing design of protected areas, conserving ocean biodiversity in 3D, and informing conservation actions. Climate change is shifting the ranges of species. Simple predictive metrics of range shifts such as climate velocity, that do not require extensive knowledge or data on individual species, could help to guide conservation. We review research on climate velocity, describing the theory underpinning the concept and its assumptions. We highlight how climate velocity has already been applied in conservation-related research, including climate residence time, climate refugia, endemism, historic and projected range shifts, exposure to climate change, and climate connectivity. Finally, we discuss ways to enhance the use of climate velocity in conservation through tailoring it to be more biologically meaningful, informing design of protected areas, conserving ocean biodiversity in 3D, and informing conservation actions. a climate-velocity metric that considers the distance between points at a particular point in time and their future climate analogs, divided by the time difference (Figure 1B). There are two types: forward analog velocity, which is the straight-line speed and direction required to reach a given climate-analog destination at some point in the future (usually a single destination for any origin under consideration), and backward analog velocity, which considers a destination and asks which points (usually several) of origin might eventually feed into the destination. the amount of time necessary for a climate isoline to emerge from a specific area (usually a protected area). It is estimated as the (equivalent) diameter of the area divided by the mean climate velocity within that area [16Loarie S.R. et al.The velocity of climate change.Nature. 2009; 462: 1052-1055Crossref PubMed Scopus (1542) Google Scholar]. a line connecting points of equal value across space. Isoline, isocline, and isopleth are all synonyms. the original climate-velocity metric [16Loarie S.R. et al.The velocity of climate change.Nature. 2009; 462: 1052-1055Crossref PubMed Scopus (1542) Google Scholar] that has two main components in its calculation: a temporal trend and a spatial gradient, both for the same climate variable (Figure 1A). Local climate velocity is an estimate of the instantaneous climate velocity of an isoline at a location.