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UNCLASSIFIED
Climate Change
Impact on National Security
Rich Engel
Maj Gen USAF (Ret.)
Director, Climate Change and State Stability Program
National Intelligence Council
This Briefing is UNCLASSIFIED
Rev 1a
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Overview
• Objective
• National Intelligence Priorities Framework
• National Intelligence Assessment
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Outreach Efforts
Scope Note
Our Process
Summary Observations
• The Arctic
– National Intelligence Assessment
– NIC 2025 Assessment
• Planned Follow-On Research
• Challenges for the Intelligence Community
– Process Perspective
– (Draft) Wish List
– Final Thoughts
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Objective
To provide Insights:
• From a National Intelligence Assessment (NIA)
on the national security ramifications of global
climate change, and from the NIC’s Global
Trends 2025, on the significance of an opening
Arctic
• Into the plans and challenges of the Intelligence
Community (IC) related to climate change
research. (U)
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National Intelligence
Priorities Framework
Environment and Natural Resources
Definition: Production, development, transport, and consumption of
strategic natural resources—excluding energy resources—critical to
the economy and/or associated with production of militarily
significant items. Access to water supplies to sustain national
economies. Production, release, illicit sale and disposal of pollutants
and hazardous materials including their potential human health
effects. Compliance with international environmental or resource
sharing agreements. Activity impacting international oceanic and
atmospheric environments, including activities in space. Policies and
positions of state and non-state actors relative to environmental and
resource issues. Indications and warning of environmental warfare,
crime or “ecoterrorism” or attacks against critical infrastructure—
excluding energy—and water production, transport and
distribution facilities. Physical environment conditions including
weather, climate, geography, terrain, and urbanization. (U)
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National Intelligence Assessment
Outreach Efforts
• Joint Global Change Research Institute
– Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
– Current Peer Reviewed Literature
• US Climate Change Research Program
• Center for Naval Analysis
• Center for International Earth Science Information
Network at Columbia University
• RAND Corporation
• Global Business Network
• Arizona State University
• Naval Post Graduate School
• Center for Strategic and International Studies
• Center for New American Security (U)
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National Intelligence Assessment
Scope Note
• This National Intelligence Assessment focuses on the
implications of global climate change for US national
security interests by 2030. (U)
• The Intelligence Community does not evaluate the
science of climate change per se, nor do we
independently analyze what the underlying drivers of
climate change are or to what degree climate change
will occur.
– Instead, the Intelligence Community is reliant for this
Assessment upon the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change and other peer-reviewed or contracted research
for projections of climate change and its impacts. (U)
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National Intelligence Assessment
Our Process
• Research
• Develop a Scientific Scene Setter
• Request State Specific Data
– Climate Vulnerability
– Water Scarcity
– Sea Level Rise
• External Conference w/ Regional Experts
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Science Scene Setter
IPCC WG II Technical Summary
Sections of the State Specific Data
Extracts on Agricultural Impacts
• Review the Reports from Regional Experts
• Craft the Document
• Coordinate within the Intelligence Community
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National Intelligence Assessment
Summary Observations
• Overall we judge that global climate change will have wideranging implications for US national security interests over
the next 20 years because it will aggravate existing
problems—such as poverty, social tensions, environmental
degradation, ineffectual leadership, and weak political
institutions—that threaten state stability.
– However, climate change alone is highly unlikely to trigger failure in
any state out to 2030 but it will potentially contribute to intra- or, less
likely, interstate conflict, possibly over access to scarce water resources.
– We judge that economic migrants will perceive additional reasons to
migrate because of harsh climates, both within nations and from
disadvantaged into richer countries. (U)
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National Intelligence Assessment
Summary Observations
• The United States will be less affected and better equipped
than the vast majority of nations to deal with climate
change, and may even enjoy a slight net benefit from
climate change over the next few decades largely due to
increased agricultural yield; however, infrastructure repair
and replacement, emissions mitigation, and emergency
response will be costly. Impacts on other states will vary:
– Sub-Saharan Africa, because of its limited coping capacity is the
most vulnerable region to the impact of climate change, with
resulting challenges to its economic development and political
stability. For Africa in general, higher rainfall anomalies and more
intense and widespread droughts are projected. Climate change
probably will cause agricultural losses of up to 50 percent for some
rain fed grain crops in some North African countries. (U)
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National Intelligence Assessment
Summary Observations
• To summarize, we observed three principle paths
through which climate change would adversely
impact national security
– Changes in water availability which in turn would force
migration of people first within states then potentially
between states
– Changes in agriculture productivity caused by a
combination of climate factors (temperature,
precipitation) that would likewise motivate people to
move
• In both of these cases the movements themselves may or may
not be significant to state stability and hence US security
interests, it will depend upon local circumstances.
– Damages to economically significant infrastructure from
extreme weather events. (U)
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The Arctic
NIA Assessment
• Estimates vary as to when the Arctic is likely to be
“ice free”
– Seasonally adjusted by 2060 according to National Snow
and Ice Center
– More current research suggests as soon as ~ 2015
• Key benefits of an open Arctic
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Improved access to energy
Improved access to mineral resources
Potentially shorter maritime shipping routes
Other strategic considerations
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Arctic as an area for Naval Operations
Northern borders requiring more Homeland Security defense
Access to different Fisheries
Risk of environmental degradation (U)
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The Arctic
NIA Assessment
• Shorter Maritime Routes
– The Northern Sea Route – above Russia
between the North Atlantic and North
Pacific
• Trims 5000 miles and a week off a journey
through the Suez Canal
– Voyage between Europe and Asia through
the Canada’s Northwest Passage
• Trims 4000 miles off a journey through the
Panama Canal (U)
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The Arctic
NIC 2025 Assessment
• Resource and shipping benefits are unlikely
to fully materialize before 2030
– Experts do not expect the technology for
exploitation in the harsh Arctic environment will
be available until after 2050
– There will remain plenty of winter ice, Canada
will experience large sea-ice variability, and
there will be more mobile sea-ice. (U)
Specialized vessels and supporting infrastructure
have yet to be built
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The Arctic
NIC 2025 Assessment
• While there is a risk of near-term tensions that
could result in small scale confrontations over
contested claims, and no track record of
adjudicating competing claims under the
Convention of the Law of the Sea, we judge the
Arctic is unlikely to spawn major armed conflict
– Circumpolar states have other major ports on other
bodies of water
– States share a common interest in regulating access
to the Arctic by other powers
– Stability would encourage high-tech companies to
support extraction of the regions resources (U)
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The Arctic
NIC 2025 Assessment
• Greatest strategic consequence over the next
few decades may be to relatively large resource
deficient trading states such as China, Japan,
and Korea who will benefit increased access to
energy resources and shorter trading distances.
• Canada and Russia are the two major Arctic
states, and since Russia’s Arctic waters melt
before Canada’s, Russia is likely to inherit firstmover advantages. (U)
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Planned Follow-On
Research
• Country/Region Studies - use the methodology
of the NIA, but drill down to provide more
detail on specific countries/regions
– Get more detailed science – what might we expect?
– Convene experts to ascertain the national
security/state stability impacts (U)
• Foreign Reactions to aggressive US
mitigation/energy transformation decisions
– Craft an aggressive but credible scenario
– What are the unforeseen consequences and possible
national security ramifications? (U)
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Planned Follow-On
Research
• Explore – with a “geopolitical game” the national
interests of an opening Arctic
– In general what is the appropriate venue for raising and
having an integrated discussion on Arctic issues, such as
navigation, energy security, fisheries management, tourism
(protection for citizens in the region), and climate change?
– Is it possible to have a one-stop Arctic policy process? What
is the role for Arctic Council, NATO, UN Climate Change
Convention, the European Polar Consortium, and the
International Maritime Organization? (U)
• Failing States – Identify the states most likely to have
significant stress, humanitarian disasters, and/or fail
due to climate change in ten, twenty, thirty years (U)
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Challenges for the
Intelligence Community
• Collection – this is about the science
– Need specificity and resolution
• Below the country level – water and temperature
– What does it mean for agriculture, disease, animals,
humans?
• Extreme weather events
– Where, what frequency, what infrastructure at risk?
• Tipping Points (U)
• Analysis – this is about state stability
– How will humans react? (U)
Continued research to model social human dynamics at the
individual and society level could have huge payoffs. (U)
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Process Perspective
Global Business Network
GHG Emissions Approach
Political
Science
INFERENCE
Security Implications
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Political and Social Movements
Social
Science
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Human Impacts
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Biological
Science
Working
Group II
Biophysical Impacts
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Geophysical Impacts
Physical
Science
National
Security
Experts
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SRES A2
DATA
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Working
Group I
GHG Emissions Scenarios
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(Draft) Wish List
“…necessary, but not sufficient…”
• Climate Sensitivity
– 1.5 to 5.5 ?
– Is it constant for all CO2 levels up to
850ppm?
• Extreme Weather Events
– Tropical Storms (Intensity, Frequency,
Location)
– Surface Storms (Tornados, Severe Winds)
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(Draft) Wish List
“…necessary, but not sufficient…”
• Model Resolution
– Temperature, Precipitation
– At the “county” level (well within nationstates)
– Water Scarcity (consider demographics)
• Agricultural Impacts
– Vulnerability of existing crops
• “Production” Farming
• “Subsistence” Farming
– Crop substitution possibilities
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(Draft) Wish List
“…necessary, but not sufficient…”
• Tipping Points
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Arctic (or Ocean) Methane Release
CO2 from changes in land use or oceans
Abrupt Ice loss form either pole
Major global circulation changes
Food/lifestyle sustainability
• Social Modeling
– Stay or Migrate
– Accept or Reject Solutions/People
– Demographic Pressures
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Final Thoughts
This need not be a one way transfer!
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Questions?
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