A shared understanding of this climate-impacted future is essential to securing livelihoods in the near term and preparing the region to be a likely destination for in-migration as the country, particularly the East coast and southern region, is projected to face more frequent and severe climate shocks.

Here, we aim to outline the challenges and opportunities Central Appalachia will encounter related to community and economic development through a climate lens. Specifically, we must understand the opportunity to mitigate the impacts of climate shocks on already vulnerable rural communities. This baseline analysis will be critical to advancing long-term climate resilience, as well as environmental and economic justice in the region.

The extraction of Appalachia’s natural resources has fueled economic growth of the United States for generations, while the industries associated with this extraction contributed directly to the climate crisis itself. All the while, working families in rural Appalachian communities received little benefit from this extraction and bore the brunt of the economic, environmental, health, and social costs of this country’s extraction-based energy economy (Crosson, 2021) (Zipper & Skousen, 2021). In fact, economic and environmentally motivated migration are central facets of the region’s past, present, and future.

As we look forward, it is clear that Appalachia will become increasingly relevant nationally and internationally in the coming decades due to its role as a natural carbon sink and as a globally-significant site of ecological diversity that is juxtaposed by defaced mountains, fouled waterways, and other legacy impacts of fossil fuel extraction (The Nature Conservancy, 2022).

Invest Appalachia is committed to building more equitable and sustainable economic markets within our region. Necessary to achieving that objective is the recognition that the climate crisis will challenge and exacerbate existing inequalities (and is doing so already). Doing this work in a region with existing economic challenges requires the assembly of collaborative infrastructure to move tailored and targeted resources to the ground, in support of a climate resilient future.