Evaluating Progress of the U.S. Climate Change Science Program Methods and Preliminary Results (2007) / Chapter Skim
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5 Progress Toward the Cross-Cutting Issues
5 Progress Toward the Cross-Cutting Issues
Pages 99-120
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From page 99... ...
: decision support resources is combined with human contributions and responses, modeling is combined with climate variability and change, and data management is a subgroup of observations and monitoring. This chapter describes the committee's preliminary assessment of progress in the 22 goals of the CCSP cross-cutting issues.
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From page 100... ...
The need to collect social, economic, and health data to address the human dimensions aspects of the program adds an additional level of complexity because these data are outside the purview of agencies traditionally associated with climate measurements. Moreover, concerns about privacy bring unique challenges to the collection and dissemination of social science data.
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From page 101... ...
A wide variety of satellite and in situ instruments have been deployed, but they are operated individually without the framework of a comprehensive system. Operational satellite systems have been designed primarily to meet the needs of the National Weather Service and do not carry instruments capable of producing climate quality data records.
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From page 102... ...
NASA's Applied Sciences program is aimed at generating new information products from research satellite systems to meet the needs of decision makers. However, NASA's satellite sensors were designed primarily to meet scientific and technology demonstration objectives, and if observations and monitoring goal 12.2 is to be achieved, decision support requirements will have to be factored into the design of future satellite systems.
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From page 103... ...
A considerable amount of deliberation and coordination on climate observations has taken place at the international level. Coordinating bodies exist on different aspects of the climate observing system, including the Global Climate Observing System (GCOS)
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From page 104... ...
Grid computing approaches are also being developed to share computing resources and enable distributed data processing. The Global Change Master Directory provides a summary of data holdings, including climate indicators, which helps users find distributed data holdings.
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From page 105... ...
In particular, NOAA's primary mission with respect to satellite observations is to meet the needs of the National Weather Service, which does not require climate observations. NASA does not undertake operational measurements, although some "systematic" measurements (e.g., from MODIS, Landsat, Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission)
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From page 106... ...
However, research funds are not available to support the expansion of existing networks planned under several of the CCSP research elements, and priorities for which networks receive other limited resources will likely be set at the agency level. Challenges in data management include securing and managing the long-term data archive (NRC, 2006b)
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From page 107... ...
MODELING The CCSP strategic plan describes two complementary streams of climate modeling activities. The first is fundamental research on climate processes operating in the atmosphere, ocean, land, and cryosphere required for model development through improved representation of climate processes.
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From page 108... ...
Yet many challenges remain, ranging from scientific uncertainties and questions on climate processes articulated in many of the CCSP research questions to the extensive computational demands required to build more comprehensive models. While the ultimate objective is a comprehensive Earth system model, constrained by observations, the complexity of Earth's climate system will require the CCSP to focus on models that will aid in understanding the processes that maintain and regulate climate.
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From page 109... ...
CLIVAR program, has been the development of CPTs, which gather observationalists, process modelers, and coupled climate modelers around specific issues or key uncertainties. They aim to link process-oriented research to modeling for the purpose of addressing key uncertainties in coupled climate models.
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From page 110... ...
The delivery of climate services also requires an enhanced regional climate modeling capability, and perhaps initialized climate forecasts out to decadal time scales (e.g., Hibbard et al., 2007) to improve understanding of climate change and impacts at spatial scales relevant to many stakeholders (NRC, 2005b)
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From page 111... ...
Other approaches that attempt to blur the distinction between weather and climate are also emerging, such as beginning integrations with higher resolution to satisfy weather forecast requirements, then cascading down to lower-resolution versions of the model with consistent physical parameterization schemes. The potential benefits of a stronger research focus on the seamless paradigm include skill improvement in both weather and climate forecasts; stronger collaboration and shared knowledge among the weather and climate communities working on physical parameterization schemes, data assimilation schemes, and initialization methods; and shared infrastructure and technical capabilities.
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From page 112... ...
Global Change Research Program "has not produced sufficient information to meet the expressed needs of decision makers." 11.1. Prepare scientific syntheses and assessments to support informed discussion of climate variability and change and associated issues by decision makers, stakeholders, the media, and the general public.
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From page 113... ...
. For example, climate variability is an explicit factor in decisions about fisheries management, and adaptive management strategies are also beginning to be put in place for forestry and are supported by an infrastructure that includes scientific inputs on climate variability.
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From page 114... ...
Without adequate support, the field not only will stagnate but actually could regress at a time when the need for its input will be the highest. The human contributions and responses research element has the potential to inform the decision support resources cross-cutting issue (1)
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From page 115... ...
However, the combined management of the human contributions and responses research element and the decision support cross-cutting issue has made it more difficult to assess whether the decision support goals are being met and where critical gaps lay (see Chapter 4)
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From page 116... ...
. The CCSP program office has also prepared one internal annual implementation plan and is working on another, and it is assisting CCSP agencies with their public comment processes for pending synthesis and assessment reports (Nick Sundt, personal communication, January 9, 2007)
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From page 117... ...
The planned synthesis and assessment products should improve CCSP communications by providing content for dissemination. However, although the CCSP web site provides both the status of synthesis and assessment products and a mechanism for providing public comment, few stakeholders have been engaged in reviewing the draft prospectuses or reports (Nick Sundt, personal communication, January 9, 2007)
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From page 118... ...
Nevertheless, it is clear that some of the most effective coordination is done by international programs, such as the World Climate Research Programme, the International Human Dimensions Programme, and the International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme. These programs have sponsored a host of
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From page 119... ...
scientists and agencies through the CCSP. Agencies participating in the CCSP contribute much to international collaborative activities, through the participation of individual scientists and, in some cases, through provision of funding to support international program offices.
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