The USGCRP released its long overdue new strategic plan without fanfare on April 27. Most notably, the new strategy aims to enhance the federal research program’s science-for-society component by informing decision-makers with good scientific communication.
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The USGCRP released its long overdue new strategic plan without fanfare on April 27. Most notably, the new strategy aims to enhance the federal research program’s science-for-society component by informing decision-makers with good scientific communication.
You can read the National Global Change Research Plan 2012-2021 here.
The last fully-developed USGCRP Strategic Plan was released in July 2003. CSW published multiple posts and public comments on a review draft of the new Strategic Plan, which can be seen here, here, and here. This post, which summarizes the main elements of the plan, is the first of a new CSW series on the past, present, and future of the USGCRP.
First, some background: The USGCRP was created as a presidential initiative in the late 1980s and codified by Congress in the Global Change Research Act of 1990. The program coordinates the work of 13 departments and agencies that collectively support research and the development of capabilities to respond to climate and global environmental change. Together, the participating agencies are charged with providing “a comprehensive and integrated United States Research Program to assist the Nation and the world to understand, assess, predict, and respond to human-induced and natural processes of global change.” Investments in observation and monitoring, research and modeling, assessment, information services and outreach totaled about $2 billion in 2010. Global observing systems and scientific research, in both federal and nongovernmental research institutions, make up the vast majority of the budget.
Throughout its life, the USGCRP has created and maintained a mix of atmospheric, oceanic, land, and space-based observing systems; gained new theoretical knowledge of Earth System processes; advanced understanding of the complexity of the Earth System through predictive modeling; promoted advances in computational capabilities, data management, and information sharing; and developed and harnessed an expert scientific workforce.
The 2012-2021 Strategic Plan sets four goals, three of which are given new and greater emphasis in the USGCRP’s long-standing effort (as encompassed in Goal 1) at enhancing human understanding of the Earth System.
- Advance Science
- Inform Decisions
- Conduct Sustained Assessments
- Communicate and Educate
Goal 1: Advancing scientific knowledge of the integrated, natural, and human components of the earth system
The Strategic Plan lays out a well-developed research agenda associated with this goal. Indeed, this section is built upon decades of major research and occupies about half the document. Goal 1 objectives neatly summarize the USGCRP research agenda, while adding a new component with Objective 1.2:
- 1.1– Earth system understanding
- 1.2– Science for adaptation and mitigation: Advancing understanding of the vulnerability and resilience of integrated human-natural systems.
- 1.3– Integrated observations
- 1.4– Integrated modeling
- 1.5– Information management and sharing
Objective 1.2 aims to advance use-inspired science (defined as science necessary to improve fundamental understanding in areas important to society) to assess the vulnerabilities to global change, understand the societal and ecological characteristics that confer resilience in the face of these changes, and support the adaptation and mitigation responses to the risks these changes pose.
Sounds great, but how is this going to be accomplished? The document identifies four “themes” associated with this effort. These include identifying and understanding key environmental and societal vulnerabilities to global change over a range of time scales; developing a knowledge base to support regional and sectoral responses to global change; developing a knowledge base to support responses to global scale threats; and finally, creating and applying the tools and approaches needed to iteratively manage the risks of global change.
Assessment of human-environment systems together is so important, the document stresses, because the interdependence of Earth system processes affects ecosystems, human communities, and socio-economic sectors. Key resources – water, energy, and food – are strongly connected to the environment and are thus vulnerable to global change. To understand vulnerability in these sectors we need to know not only about the natural processes involved in global change, but also about human behavior that influences production and consumption. With this in mind, potentially risk can be managed more effectively.
Managers and policymakers will need to manage trade-offs among food, energy, and water demands in a changing climate while minimizing risks. Decisions made by farmers, land managers, and policymakers will benefit greatly from a synthesis of input