Strategic Plan For The U S Climate Change Science Program

The report reviews a draft strategic plan from the U.S. Climate Change Science Program, a program formed in 2002 to coordinate and direct U.S. efforts in climate change and global change research. The U.S. Climate Change Science Program incorporates the decade-old Global Change Research Program and adds a new component -the Climate Change Research Initiative-whose primary goal is to "measurably improve the integration of scientific knowledge, including measures of uncertainty, into effective decision support systems and resources."

The U.S. Climate Change Science Program (CCSP) released its Strategic Plan in 2003. This Revised Research Plan in compliance with Section 104(a) of the Global Change Research Act of 1990, is an update to the 2003 Strategic Plan. It reflects both scientific advances since the publication of the 2003 Strategic Plan and the evolving needs of society. The update focuses on near-term (1-3 year) planning needs, and specifically addresses research plans for the period 2008 to 2010. The Revised Research Plan also represents one of the first steps in the longer-term development of the next Strategic Plan. CCSP is currently developing a process for gathering input from a wide range of stakeholder and scientific communities to inform the development of that new Strategic Plan, which will describe approaches for addressing the Nation's needs for climate change information beyond the 2010 timeframe and into the next decade. The Revised Research Plan contains an updated statement of capabilities and objectives consistent with CCSP's current Strategic Plan but reflecting both scientific progress and the Nation's evolving societal and environmental needs. It also contains examples of research progress and a discussion of the program's emerging priorities. Using the program's five strategic goals as an organizing framework, the Revised Research Plan provides a goal-by-goal overview of emerging research questions and themes, key research topics, and illustrative research plans for the years 2008 to 2010. CCSP's vision is a Nation and the global community empowered with the science-based knowledge to manage the risks and opportunities of change in the climate and related environmental systems. Its mission is to facilitate the creation and application of knowledge of the Earth's global environment through research, observations, decision support, and communication. This mission arises from the recognition that climate variability and change will continue to influence society directly and indirectly, and that in order to make informed decisions, society requires knowledge as to 1) what is changing and how; 2) what forces are causing those changes; 3) how the Earth system may change in the future and affect societies and ecosystems; 4) what parts of the Earth system are most sensitive to global change and how adaptable those parts are; and 5) how scientific knowledge can be effectively applied to manage the risks and opportunities. These are the essence of CCSP's strategic goals.

Formed in 2002 to coordinate and direct U.S. efforts in climate change and global change research, the Program incorporates and builds upon the Global Change Research Program, U.S. Department of Energy) and adds a new component - the Climate Change Research Initiative. A draft strategic plan for the Climate Change Science Program was released to the scientific community and public in November 2002. At the request of the CCSP, the National Academies formed a Committee to review the draft strategy plan and the results are reported here.

The vision document provides an overview of the Climate Change Science Program (CCSP) long-term strategic plan to enhance scientific understanding of global climate change.This document is a companion to the comprehensive Strategic Plan for the Climate Change Science Program. The report responds to the Presidents direction that climate change research activities be accelerated to provide the best possible scientific information to support public discussion and decisionmaking on climate-related issues.The plan also responds to Section 104 of the Global Change Research Act of 1990, which mandates the development and periodic updating of a long-term national global change research plan coordinated through the National Science and Technology Council.This is the first comprehensive update of a strategic plan for U.S. global change and climate change research since the origal plan for the U.S. Global Change Research Program was adopted at the inception of the program in 1989.Unspecified CenterCLIMATE CHANGE; MANAGEMENT PLANNING; RESEARCH MANAGEMENT; PROJECT PLANNING; UNITED STATES; CARBON CYCLE; EARTH ATMOSPHERE; ECOSYSTEMS; GLOBAL WARMING; LAND USE; PRIORITIES; WATER RESOURCES

The U.S. government supports a large, diverse suite of activities that can be broadly characterized as "global change research." Such research offers a wide array of benefits to the nation, in terms of protecting public health and safety, enhancing economic strength and competitiveness, and protecting the natural systems upon which life depends. The U.S. Global Change Research Program (USGCRP), which coordinates the efforts of numerous agencies and departments across the federal government, was officially established in 1990 through the U.S. Global Change Research Act (GCRA). In the subsequent years, the scope, structure, and priorities of the Program have evolved, (for example, it was referred to as the Climate Change Science Program [CCSP] for the years 2002-2008), but throughout, the Program has played an important role in shaping and coordinating our nation's global change research enterprise. This research enterprise, in turn, has played a crucial role in advancing understanding of our changing global environment and the countless ways in which human society affects and is affected by such changes. In mid-2011, a new NRC Committee to Advise the USGCRP was formed and charged to provide a centralized source of ongoing whole-program advice to the USGCRP. The first major task of this committee was to provide a review of the USGCRP draft Strategic Plan 2012-2021 (referred to herein as "the Plan"), which was made available for public comment on September 30, 2011. A Review of the U.S. Global Change Research Program's Strategic Plan addresses an array of suggestions for improving the Plan, ranging from relatively small edits to large questions about the Program's scope, goals, and capacity to meet those goals. The draft Plan proposes a significant broadening of the Program's scope from the form it took as the CCSP. Outlined in this report, issues of key importance are the need to identify initial steps the Program will take to actually achieve the proposed broadening of its scope, to develop critical science capacity that is now lacking, and to link the production of knowledge to its use; and the need to establish an overall governance structure that will allow the Program to move in the planned new directions.

The U.S. Climate Change Science Program (CCSP) coordinates the efforts of 13 federal agencies to understand why climate is changing, to improve predictions about how it will change in the future, and to use that information to assess impacts on human systems and ecosystems and to better support decision making. Evaluating Progress of the U.S. Climate Change Science Program is the first review of the CCSP's progress since the program was established in 2002. It lays out a method for evaluating the CCSP, and uses that method to assess the strengths and weaknesses of the entire program and to identify areas where progress has not met expectations. The committee found that the program has made good progress in documenting and understanding temperature trends and related environmental changes on a global scale, as well as in understanding the influence of human activities on these observed changes. The ability to predict future climate changes also has improved, but efforts to understand the impacts of such changes on society and analyze mitigation and adaptation strategies are still relatively immature. The program also has not met expectations in supporting decision making, studying regional impacts, and communicating with a wider group of stakeholders.

In May 2001, the Administration asked the National Academy of Sciences - National Research Council (NRC) to provide an updated evaluation of key questions about climate change science. Upon receipt of the NRC's report in June 2001, the President directed the relevant agencies and departments of the federal government to build on the extensive U.S. Global Change Research Program (USGCRP) to accelerate research on the most important uncertainties in climate science, enhance climate observation systems, and improve information available to decisionmakers. To accom- plish this, the Administration took several steps: The President launched the Climate Change Research Initiative (CCRI) in June 2001, with an enhanced focus on the climate effects of aerosols (tiny particles) in the atmosphere, the carbon cycle in the Earth system, climate mod- eling, observations, and development of scien- tific information to support decisionmaking. The President created a new, cabinet-level organization in February 2002, to improve the government-wide management of climate sci- ence and climate-related technology develop- ment. Two collaborative interagency programs were launched in response to the President's direction: the Climate Change Science Program (CCSP) and the Climate Change Technology Program In July 2002, a year-long process to prepare a 10-year strategic plan for the CCSP was initiat- ed. This planning process was designed to ensure a comprehensive examination of research and observation needs, transparent review by all the international scientific and stakeholder communities, and establishment of defined goals for the research. This document, together with the companion CCSP scientific strategic plan, represents the culmination of the planning and public review process. The United States has also launched an interna- tional effort to design and implement a com- prehensive, multilaterally sponsored Earth observing system, which will provide critical information to improve climate science and modeling. This system will build directly upon the major advances in observations and data management already achieved by the United States and other nations. A ministerial meeting hosted by the U.S. government in Washington in July 2003 is the first step in a planned 10- year effort to greatly improve the ability to "take the temperature of the Earth." Vision and Goals Research and observations can play unique roles in helping society to deal with key climate change issues. This gives rise to the guiding vision of the U.S. Climate Change Science Program.