PHOTOS: A new tool developed by University of Hawaiʻi researchers allows anyone in the state to generate custom, site-specific climate reports to support decisions related to drought, wildfire and land management—a major step forward in Hawaiʻi’s climate resilience efforts. The Climate Change, Climate Variability and Drought Portfolio tool was unveiled at a May 2025 meeting of the Hawaiʻi Climate Data Portal (HCDP) User Group, which drew lawmakers, emergency managers and wildfire officials. The new system lets users select or draw an area of interest, enter basic details and receive a tailored climate portfolio by email. It is free to use and portfolios are generated and delivered in less than an hour.
“We used to generate these portfolios one at a time, but the demand for them was so great that we decided to automate the entire process,” said Ryan Longman, lead researcher on the HCDP project and the UH consortium director of the Pacific Islands Climate Adaptation Science Center. The tool is part of the larger Change Hawaiʻi project, which is working to transform how the state tracks weather, drought and wildfire risk using advanced climate modeling, real-time data systems and artificial intelligence. Change Hawaiʻi is part of the Established Program to Stimulate Competitive Research or Hawaiʻi EPSCoR.
