UC Riverside unveils Desert Climate Resilience Initiative website and toolkit for Coachella Valley

UC Riverside researchers introduced the Desert Climate Resilience Initiative (DCRI) and its public-facing website and park toolkit to the Palm Springs Sustainability Commission on May 5. Danielle Binia, an assistant specialist at the UC Riverside Center for Conservation Biology, said the project aims to connect scientific findings on desert biodiversity and carbon with community priorities and local land-management decisions.

The project, funded by the Coachella Valley Mountains Conservancy and started in 2022, produced two primary deliverables: a DCRI website for public access and a prioritization, adaptation and resilience toolkit designed for community leaders and land managers. "We wanted to provide actionable information to the public and decision makers to boost community resilience with climate change via partnerships with local organizations and outreach to the public," Binia said.

Binia emphasized that deserts store meaningful carbon primarily in soils and calcium-carbonate formations, not only in above-ground biomass. "When people think about carbon storage, they think of sequoia forests," she said. "However, we actually have a lot of our carbon that's stored in our soils." The project used geodata to produce vulnerability maps that show how native plant communities may change under future climates and maps of current carbon stocks intended to inform conservation prioritization and land-use planning.

A central element of the project is community engagement. Binia described outreach including nature walks, field trips for students, tabling at events and recorded interviews collected as "Coachella Valley Voices," a set of climate stories the team incorporated into the website. She read an excerpt from a community member (Prima) underscoring that residents with economic pressures often must prioritize immediate needs over climate action.

The DCRI team also documented and incorporated traditional ecological knowledge from local indigenous communities. The website includes guidance on respectfully collaborating with tribal partners, a species guide (for plants such as honey mesquite and others identified by interviewees), and materials produced in English and Spanish. Project contributors named on the site include Sienna Thomas and Rachel Gallardo.

Binia said the initiative concluded its primary funded work in March 2026 but that the website and toolkit will remain available and the team is seeking further collaborations and funding for follow-on work, including an ongoing long-term study on desert carbon sequestration.

The commission had no formal vote related to the presentation. Staff and commissioners asked several technical questions about carbon in desert soils, and Binia responded that much desert carbon is in deep plant roots and soil carbonate forms that can remain stored for millennia. The project website (resilientcoachella.ucr.edu) and the park toolkit are available for public use, and the team said additional materials (pamphlets and a short video) will be shared with the commission and the public.