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Research Relating to Mitigation and New Technologies

During the last twenty years, improvements in energy efficiency have fueled U.S. economic growth: energy intensity has decreased by 27 percent, while the economy has grown by nearly 56 percent. If energy intensity had stayed at 1972 levels, an additional $30 billion would have been needed to fuel the economy's annual energy demands, and greenhouse gas emissions would have been substantially higher.

The United States is committed to improving energy efficiency and energy technologies in all critical market segments: commercial and residential buildings, transportation, industry, utilities, and government. The policies contained in the U.S. Climate Action Plan are aimed at transferring information on energy efficiency and energy technologies and creating an effective market for investing in existing or nearly commercially available technologies for reducing greenhouse gas emissions and protecting the carbon sinks both in the United States and abroad. A successful long-term strategy must ensure that a constant stream of improved technology is available and that market conditions favoring its adoption are not impeded.

The United States is investing strongly in research and development of promising technologies that will reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Research priorities to reduce energy demand include advanced building systems, transportation equipment systems, and manufacturing technologies. Research priorities for lower-carbon, energy-supply technologies include sustainable biomass energy systems, advanced natural gas turbines, fuel-cell technologies, more efficient clean-coal technologies, cogeneration systems, improved efficiency of energy-distribution and -storage systems, renewable-energy technologies, hydrogen fuel systems, and continued research into nuclear safety and waste disposal options that could maintain commercial nuclear power.

Research activities can be subdivided into those relating to solar and renewables, fossil fuels, nuclear and fusion, and energy efficiency. Efficient technologies include both those that reduce energy inputs required to provide the desired services, and also those that reduce resource inputs to provide a product. The United States has a diverse portfolio of investments in technology development. Some projects are taking place in national laboratories, and others are government-subsidized, direct grants to researchers. Recent efforts have moved to cost-shared efforts and partnerships with industry and to cooperative agreements between national laboratories and industry.

Solar and Renewable-Energy Technologies

Solar and renewable-energy technologies currently supply about 7 percent of U.S energy needs, a large portion of which comes from hydropower. Increasing this fraction will require additional technological developments, focusing particularly on the following technologies.

Thin-Film Technologies

Using thin-film materials for generating photovoltaic electricity offers a promising path to very low-cost energy. This process applies very thin layers of semiconductor materials--as thin as 1 micron, about 300 times thinner than conventional techniques--to low-cost backing materials, such as glass or stainless steel foil. Materials being evaluated include cadmium telluride, copper indium selenide, polycrystalline silicon, and gallium arsenide. Manufacturers can also take advantage of existing processes, such as those used to coat glass. While typical modules are made of cells wired into circuits, thin-film technology can produce a circuit as a single large piece.

Photovoltaic Technologies

Photovoltaics are already being used effectively in a broad range of applications, including off-grid electricity supply systems. Current photovoltaic research projects are focusing on producing new semiconductor materials; improving crystal growing techniques for creating lower-cost, higher-quality cells; and enhancing the performance of existing photovoltaic devices. Research is being conducted in partnerships with private firms and the DOE national laboratories.

Wind Systems

The U.S. government supports applied research in wind characteristics and the aerodynamics, structural dynamics, and materials of wind turbine systems. These systems will reduce carbon emissions by displacing bulk power, fossil-fueled systems.

Geothermal Technologies

The United States is also investing in basic and applied research on the use of U.S. geothermal resources to produce energy. This research includes monitoring and modeling geothermal production and its environmental impacts. Efforts are focused on improving exploration and drilling methods, the productivity and longevity of reservoirs, resistance to corrosion, and the design of energy-conversion systems.

Fuel Cells

Fuel-cell research is aimed at producing reliable and commercially competitive fuel cells to meet transportation and electricity generation demands. Research areas include developing on-board reformers, hydrogen storage devices, and power management devices.

Biomass for Direct Power

The industrial and commercial sectors are demonstrating both a need for fossil fuel substitutes and a desirability to be more independent of the fossil fuel power grid. In cooperation with DOE, DoD, and the Tennessee Valley Authority, EPA is integrating and demonstrating biomass to electricity systems for the nonutility sector. Initial systems will use waste biomass in gasification and gas cleanup systems that feed a turbine to generate electrical power. Future systems could use biomass plantations as well as waste products and could be used in new or retrofit applications.

Methane Use

Waste methane is a powerful greenhouse gas. Using methane to produce power in fuel cells could significantly reduce emissions and produce a clean, useful product. Demonstrations are being performed with commercial fuel cells at a landfill site and a wastewater digester. Methane emissions from animal waste lagoons are also being considered for recovery as a potential source of energy.

Fossil Fuels Energy Technology Research

Fossil fuels and the technologies that use them are in wide use, supplying approximately 85 percent of U.S. energy demand. Although these technologies are relatively mature, significant efficiency and environmental improvements can be made in the availability, recovery, and combustion of fossil fuels. Relatively small increases in efficiency can result in substantial reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, because fossil fuels are used very extensively.

Advanced Turbines

The United States is conducting research to increase the efficiency, performance, and reliability of gas turbines. Advances in materials sciences are enhancing the ability of turbine blades to operate in high temperatures or dirty environments. Computer and aerodynamic research activities are also improving blade shapes and machining techniques.

Clean, Efficient Transportation Fuels

A practical approach to meeting the goal of using hydrogen in fuel cells is to transition to hydrogen through a liquid fuel that could be used in conventional internal combustion engines. Methanol from biomass is a strong candidate for this transitional phase.

EPA, the University of California at Riverside, South Coast Air Quality Management District, and others are developing the Hynol process, which produces methanol from a wide variety of biomass sources. Hynol-produced fuel could provide transportation fuel into and through the 21st century.

Advanced Vehicles

The Presidential initiative "Partnership for a New Generation of Vehicles" is combining the resources of the "big three" U.S. automakers and more than a dozen federal organizations in a drive to develop a prototype hybrid electric vehicle (HEV) capable of providing 80 miles per gallon by 2004. DOE's HEV Propulsion Program has signed independent contracts with General Motors, Ford, and Chrysler to produce production-feasible HEV propulsion systems by 1998, first-generation prototypes by 2000, and market-ready HEVs by 2003. The DOE program is funding approximately 50 percent of the development costs.

DOE's Office of Advanced Automotive Technologies is focusing on developing electric and hybrid vehicle technologies, advanced-heat engines, alternative fuels, and advanced materials for application to all light-duty vehicles, including passenger automobiles. The goal is to drive these technologies to a point of maturity where auto manufacturers can incorporate them into the average family car.

Clean Coal

Research to dramatically increase the efficiency and environmental performance of coal use is critical to addressing climate change, both in the United States and internationally. Current research is focusing on developing technologies for coal cleaning, gasification, and fluidized bed combustion; capture, disposal, and use of CO2; improved combustors; and enhanced recovery of coal-bed methane to reduce the risk of mine explosions.

Nuclear and Fusion Energy Technology Research

Nuclear power supplied about 7 percent of U.S. energy needs in 1990. U.S. policy is to maintain the safe operation of existing nuclear plants in the United States and abroad and to preserve the option to construct the next generation of nuclear energy plants. Toward these ends, the U.S government is working with industry to ensure the safe operation of nuclear plants and safe storage of spent nuclear fuel.

Advanced Reactor and Nuclear Safety

The United States is working to develop next-generation, light-water nuclear reactors, with simplified designs and better engineered, passive safety systems. Advanced concepts include materials designed to prevent failure in case of an accident, and application of alternative solutions for use as the heat-exchange medium.

Fusion Energy

Working with U.S. industry and international partners, the U.S. research programs are creating materials and techniques to develop fusion as a safe, environmentally sound source of energy. Advanced research and development in the fusion program is providing high-technology spin-offs relating to such areas as superconducting materials, computer technologies, lasers, electronic diagnostic equipment, and high-frequency radio sources.

Energy Efficiency Research

The U.S. tradition of relatively low energy costs has promoted the world's strongest economy. This track record serves as the basis for continued U.S. research toward improved energy efficiency.

Building Shells

Improving the roofs, walls, windows, and foundations of buildings is critical to changing the buildings sector's energy consumption.

Windows and glazings research addresses the development of advanced fenestration technologies, such as spectrally selective coatings appropriate to regional climate conditions and electrochromic glazings (where window tint is controlled by an electrical signal). Research on walls, roofs, and foundations focuses on improving materials currently being used and investigating the use of other materials. Another focus of building shell research is developing CFC-free insulation materials.

Building Equipment

Building equipment research focuses on developing equipment and systems that offer greatly improved performance over existing systems. Research on heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning equipment covers all types of fuel sources--oil heat as well as electric and natural gas systems.

For example, research on advanced electric heat pumps, new natural gas heat pumps, and CFC-free refrigerants could improve the energy efficiency of building equipment; research on advanced lighting technologies could double the efficiency and lifetimes of current fluorescent lamps; and the use of fuel cells for building applications is an important new research area being investigated.

Building Systems

Building systems research focuses on integrating the building's equipment, appliances, and shell to maximize its entire performance. The U.S. research program is divided into three separate activities: Residential Building Systems, Commercial Building Systems, and Best Practices.

Current research activities include developing, demonstrating, and bringing to market energy-efficient and renewable-energy technologies. The savings from these technologies will be applied to construct new and retrofit existing buildings. Research efforts also include developing basic analytical and design tools and understanding buildings to enhance their design and construction.

High TEWI (Total Equivalent Warming Index) Refrigerants

Introduced as an alternative to the ozone-depleting substances being phased out under the Montreal Protocol and Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990, hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) are the fastest-growing greenhouse gas emissions. EPA is researching some environmentally benign alternative refrigerants, with the aim of increasing and demonstrating their energy efficiency and safety.

Industrial Efficiency

The U.S. government has formed partnerships with seven materials and process industries that together use more than 80 percent of all energy in manufacturing and generate more than 80 percent of U.S. waste and pollutants. The Industries of the Future program is working with the forest and paper, steel, aluminum, metal casting, glass, chemicals, and petroleum refining industries to create "technology development roadmaps" to support a long-term strategy.

The nation can substantially reduce greenhouse gas emissions by improving the efficiency of industrial combustion. Projects are now under way to develop oxy-fuel firing, advanced porous radiant (pebble) burners, ferrous scrap preheaters, and catalytic combustion. These technologies can reduce greenhouse gas emissions by burning less fuel, converting fuels to natural gas, and eliminating postcombustion controls (which may produce greenhouse gases).

Research Relating to Socioeconomic Causes and Effects

The goal of the U.S. government research programs is to develop improved measures of the sensitivity, vulnerability, and adaptability of socioeconomic systems, and project the societal implications of climate change and long-term natural variability (NSTC 1997). The vulnerability of U.S. socioeconomic systems to climate change depends in part on changes over time in population, technologies, economic development, and land-use patterns. Trends in these underlying factors will affect the degree to which climate change will alter food production, the quantity and quality of U.S. water resources, health, infrastructure, financial services, and economic activities dependent on natural resources.

U.S. research activities are focusing on increasing understanding about these underlying socioeconomic factors and human activities, and improving and extending methods and models to integrate information across ecological, physical, economic, and social science disciplines. This research and integration will enhance both projections of and human responses to climate change impacts, predictions of greenhouse gas emissions and sinks, and evaluation of policy options for better managing U.S. human and environmental systems.

Climate Change Contributions of and Consequences for Human Societies

Estimating changes in the climate system and their effects on human societies requires understanding and projecting the key socioeconomic factors driving those climate changes and assessing the effectiveness of policy measures.

Toward this end, the United States is developing methods and models for assessing technological innovation and diffusion; social values; the feasibility, costs, benefits, and efficacy of alternative response strategies; and the role of information in decision making. The U.S. government is also carrying out research on different economic sectors and managed resources (e.g., water resources, agriculture, forestry, fisheries, energy, transportation, financial and insurance services, and coastal infrastructure), human health, and other nonmarket effects of climate change.

Health-related research is focusing on the incidence and spread of infectious diseases, and the effect of heat stress on mortality. Research on climate variability examines the vulnerability of society to the impacts of short-term climate fluctuations, or changes in the frequency and intensity of extreme climate events.

Other studies are designed to improve information and model the economic consequences of climate change impacts on freshwater habitats, coastal zones and coastal ecosystems, forests, rangelands, croplands, and deserts. These studies include assessments of alternative methods of management and their effect on the ability of ecosystems to adapt to rapid climate change.

Integrated Assessments: A Framework for Policymakers

The depth and breadth of information coming from research in the natural, social, and policy sciences necessitate developing methods for integrating this information into a form that is meaningful to the policy process. Integrated assessments provide a useful framework for pulling together the best available information from all of the sciences and explicitly modeling their linkages.

The United States is supporting a variety of efforts to refine and extend integrated assessment models, and to investigate the various interactions and interdependencies of the different components of climate change. For example, the Stanford-based Energy Modeling Forum brings together a variety of integrated assessment modeling teams and scientists, representatives of the policymaking community, and experts on the key individual components of climate change. The Forum is facilitating the comparison of various approaches to integrated assessment to evaluate their usefulness in developing and analyzing policies for responding to climate change, and in setting priorities for climate change research.

U.S. research activities also include developing and disseminating information on projected impacts and analytical tools to help regional and local planners and managers evaluate the effectiveness and viability of alternative approaches for mitigating or adapting to the consequences of climate change.

Interagency Analysis of Policy Initiatives

The U.S. government has established an interagency team to analyze issues associated with global climate change policy initiatives. This team is investigating the following key areas:

International Research and Capacity Building

Effective global change research brings together scientists from around the world to assess, evaluate, and build on each other's work. U.S. scientists are closely collaborating with the international scientific community by participating in international research programs and research activities coordinated by multilateral organizations, particularly the IPCC, which is the primary vehicle for international cooperation on assessment of climate change issues.

U.S. participation in other international efforts to understand and assess the state of knowledge about global change includes building global change research capacity in developing countries, sharing data and information with the international scientific community, and collaborating on bilateral research projects.

International Research Programs

Three major international programs are addressing scientific questions related to the global environment: the World Climate Research Program, the International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme, and the Human Dimensions of Global Environmental Change Program. These programs have identified many of the key scientific problems that need to be addressed on a global scale; have developed the scientific rationale and plans for resolving these problems; and are providing an international framework within which research activities sponsored by the U.S. Global Change Research Program can both address national research objectives and provide key contributions to coordinated programs toward resolving global and regional scientific questions.

The World Climate Research Program

Jointly sponsored by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC), and the International Council of Scientific Unions (ICSU), this program seeks to determine to what extent transient climate variations are predictable and to lay the scientific foundation for predicting the response of Earth's climate to natural or human influences. In mid-1997, the United States will co-sponsor a major conference with the WMO, IOC, and ICSU, to review the program's progress to date and to determine if the program needs additional scientific direction.

The International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme

This ICSU-sponsored program focuses on acquiring basic scientific knowledge about the interactive processes of the Earth's biology and chemistry and their relationship to global change. It gives priority to key interactions and significant changes on time scales of decades to centuries that most affect the biosphere, that are most susceptible to human perturbations, and that will most likely lead to a practical, predictive capability.

International Human Dimensions Program

The ICSU has recently become a co-sponsor of this program, which was initiated under the aegis of the International Social Science Council. The Federal Republic of Germany has offered to host Secretariat, and is currently setting up IHDP offices in Bonn. The Scientific Committee for the IHDP is reevaluating and updating its draft scientific program, in consultation with IHDP national committees, including the U.S. National Committee under the National Academy of Sciences.

International Group of Funding Agencies for Global Change Research

IGFA's goal is to facilitate international global change research in natural, social, and economic sciences by bringing the perspective of national funding agencies to strategic planning and implementation of such research.

U.S. contributions to the IGFA's second Resource Assessment Survey include summarizing U.S. activities supporting global change research and providing information on U.S. research projects and their lead scientists. The IGFA will share this information with international global change research programs, to help them enhance communication with their U.S. colleagues.

The United States is also leading an IGFA Working Group that is examining the relationship between national agencies that fund global change research and those that fund development aid. The aim is to determine whether these two groups of agencies can work together more closely in areas where global change research and development interact.

Committee on Earth-Observation Satellites

The United States is striving actively (1) to optimize the benefits of spaceborne Earth observations through cooperation in mission planning in development of compatible data products, formats, services, applications and policies; (2) to serve as a focal point for international coordination of space-related Earth observation activities; and (3) to encourage complementarity and compatibility among spaceborne Earth-observation systems.

In September 1996, CEOS and IGFA joined with other international organizations and experts in an In Situ Observations workshop sponsored by the Global Climate Observing System. At its November 1996 plenary meeting in Canberra, CEOS approved new directions for its activities on information systems and services, reviewed needs for protecting Earth-observation satellite frequencies, and asked its Working Group on Calibration/Validation to address relevant recommendations from the In Situ Observations workshop.

Multilateral Program Activities

The United States is providing substantial financial and technical support to environmental research conducted by the World Meteorological Organization and the United Nations Environment Program. It is also working with the IPCC to assess climate change mitigation and adaptation strategies. This environmental research is essential to the international global climate change negotiations under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, to Earth observations, to global climate modeling, and to the full international exchange of global climate data and information.

World Meteorological Organization

WMO coordinates, standardizes, and improves world meteorological activities and encourages the efficient exchange of meteorological information among countries throughout the world. As part of its activities, WMO has been actively engaged in various aspects of climate and climate change, with such programs as the World Climate Research Program and the World Climate Impacts Program. The United States provides significant support to WMO and is actively involved in ongoing observational activities and in planning for the WMO Global Climate Observing System. Along with the United Nations Environment Program, WMO has helped sponsor the scientific assessments of both climate change and ozone depletion.

United Nations Environment Program

One of UNEP's major climate change activities is designing and implementing a Global Environment Monitoring System, with a Global Resources Information Data Base component. This program links more than twenty-five major global monitoring networks, a number of which are established and supported by U.S. agencies. Along with WMO, UNEP has co-sponsored the scientific assessments of climate change and ozone depletion.

Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change

The IPCC's climate change assessments draw upon thousands of scientists from more than 150 countries. U.S. Global Change Research Program projects and program-supported scientists have provided extensive scientific and technical input to these assessments, serving as lead authors, co-authors, contributors, and reviewers.

The IPCC's recently completed Second Assessment Report concludes that human activities are likely to have affected climate over the past century, that climate change is likely to become more pronounced over the next several decades, and that many natural ecological systems and managed natural-resource systems are vulnerable to climate change. The IPCC is planning to complete its Third Assessment Report by 2001.

The Subsidiary Body for Scientific and Technological Advice of the FCCC has recently asked the IPCC to prepare a number of technical papers and special reports to clarify issues under negotiation in the FCCC or to further articulate and integrate the vulnerability assessments presented in the Second Assessment Report. The United States will continue to be a strong participant in upcoming IPCC activities, encouraging an intensified focus on regional issues.

The United States continues to serve as co-chair of the IPCC Working Group II, and the U.S. Global Change Research Program provides the resources to support Working Group II's Technical Support Unit. The United States coordinates its IPCC-related activities on an interagency basis.

FCCC Subsidiary Body on Scientific and Technological Advice

Under the aegis of the SBSTA, Parties to the Convention agreed upon guidelines for preparing the developing countries' national communications to fulfill their obligations under the Convention to the Conference of the Parties. They also approved reporting guidelines for Activities Implemented Jointly, the pilot phase initiated by the First Conference of the Parties.

International Ozone Assessment

During 1994, the United States led the preparation of the international Scientific Assessment of Ozone Depletion, continuing a U.S. series started in the 1970s and internationalized in the 1980s. The most recent assessment compiled information about emissions of ozone-depleting substances, observed and predicted changes in ozone concentrations, the effects on the ozone layer of recent volcanic eruptions, the development and character of the Antarctic ozone hole, the increases in UV radiation that result from ozone depletion, the effects on the radiation balance (and thereby on climate) of changes in ozone concentrations, and the build-up and expected effects of substitute compounds.

The ozone assessments have provided crucial scientific information to negotiators of the Montreal Protocol on Substances That Deplete the Ozone Layer and its subsequent amendments and adjustments. As a follow-up to the overall assessment, a special assessment on the effects of subsonic and supersonic aircraft is currently being conducted by NASA and is expected to be completed by the end of 1997.

Regional Research and Related Capacity Building

The U.S. Global Change Research Program is making its research and related capabilities available to other regions and nations of the world to enable them to improve both their understanding of, and their capabilities to mitigate and adapt to, climate change. U.S. regional cooperation includes work in Southeast Asia, Sub-Saharan Africa, and the Americas. The Research Program is also helping developing countries and countries with economies in transition to build their capabilities to conduct global change research.

Inter-American Institute for Global Change Research

Following the entry into force of the Agreement to Establish the Inter-American Institute for Global Change Research (IAI) in 1994, the IAI Conference of the Parties selected a Scientific Advisory Committee, an Executive Council, an IAI Director, and a site for the IAI Directorate. The Director officially assumed his position, and the Directorate was opened at the National Space Research Institute of Brazil in March 1996.

The IAI has issued two calls for scientific proposals, and grants are currently being awarded. The results of these awarded proposals will serve as the first examples of IAI-fostered regional cooperation, which is expected to promote optimal use of available resources for global change research and to augment the scientific capacity of the region. Scientific data and information provided by IAI researchers will be managed as a common resource for the region and should provide baseline information for regional planning.

European Network

European researchers are responding to ENRICH's recently issued call for proposals with descriptions of EU activities that support future global change research in such areas as networking and infrastructure development.

Asia-Pacific Network

The January 1997 APN Workshop on Human Dimensions Issues in New Delhi identified potential topics for future research related to food security, freshwater supply and declining water quality, uncertainties regarding health status changes flowing from global change, and improvements in the flow of information to policymakers. These recommendations were addressed by the APN's Scientific Committee and during the March 1997 APN Inter-Governmental Meeting.

International Research Institute for Climate Prediction

The IRI will provide an integrating point for modeling, observations, process studies, and social science research conducted by many nations. Research will focus on predicting climate fluctuations and enhancing capabilities for adapting to existing fluctuations in climate, such as those associated with El Niño events. This work should provide insight into how society might adapt to longer-term climate change.

During the November 1995 "International Forum on Forecasting El Niño: Launching an International Research Institute," held in Washington, D.C., the United States offered to provide a site for the IRI's core facility. Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, in partnership with the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, will house the core facility and will make its capabilities available to the international community.

The U.S. Global Change Research Program has been cooperating with a number of countries and organizations interested in advancing the IRI. Pilot applications are being developed in collaboration with existing regional networks, such as the IAI. In November 1996, two workshops were convened as the initial steps in designing and implementing such pilot activities in Southern Africa and the Middle Americas.

Global Change System for Analysis, Research, and Training

U.S. leadership in and funding support for the START program reflect the continuing U.S. commitment to build capacities for global change research in the developing world. A joint initiative of the International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme (IGBP), the International Human Dimensions Program, and the World Climate Research Program, START is comprised of a series of regional research networks that promote focused research and training on regional issues of global relevance, integrate and synthesize results, and provide input to national and regional decision makers.

In 1996, START distributed thirty fellowship, visiting scientist, and lectureship awards. The program assisted affiliated institutions in Africa and Asia in developing global change data and information systems. In concert with the IPCC, WCRP's CLIVAR project, the IGBP Global Change and Terrestrial Ecosystems project, and the IRI, START is building capacity for integrated assessment modeling of agriculture and food security in the Asian monsoon region and in Sub-Saharan Africa. Also, in collaboration with the IGBP, START has initiated research on changes in land use and land cover in Africa and Asia.

U.S. Country Studies Program

This program is making U.S. Global Change Research Program studies and capabilities available to other nations to help improve their understanding of climate change, strengthen their participation in the IPCC process, and assist in the development of their national communications, as called for under the FCCC.

The Country Studies Program has worked with fifty-six developing countries and countries with economies in transition around the world to estimate their greenhouse gas emissions, assess their vulnerability to climate change, evaluate their adaptation and mitigation options, and develop their climate change action plans. The program has prepared more than twenty peer-reviewed publications documenting preliminary results of this work and will be releasing several major synthesis reports and data bases in the near future. The Country Studies Program has also provided training and analytical support to more than a thousand analysts from other countries.

Sharing Observational Capabilities and Research Data

A high priority of the U.S. Global Change Research Program is to share its climate-observing capabilities with the international scientific community and to provide easy access to global change research results and educational resources.

Integrated Global Observing Strategy

At its Plenary Meeting in November 1996, CEOS endorsed the concept of IGOS and established a team to develop a strategy for implementing the IGOS space component. The team met in February 1997 in Irvine, California, to define, characterize, and develop this component. It created the Analysis Group to examine the extent to which existing and planned missions meet defined user requirements. These activities are being coordinated actively with IGFA, with user groups, and with in situ service providers.

Global Change Research and Information Office

The U.S. supports GCRIO to provide scientists around the world access to data and information on global change research, adaptation/mitigation strategies and technologies, and global change-related educational resources. GCRIO acts as a clearinghouse for key documents and reports generated or sponsored by the U.S. government, provides high-level user services for and access to the interagency Global Change Data and Information System, and offers outreach services to both domestic and international target audiences (including governments, institutions, researchers, educators, students, and the general public).

Bilateral Cooperative Research

The U.S. Global Change Research Program is collaborating with France, Canada, and Japan--to name just a few countries--through a series of bilateral research projects.

Cooperation With France

Data from the TOPEX/Poseidon satellite mission, a U.S.-French collaborative program, challenged a fundamental oceanographic theory about the speed of large-scale ocean waves. This finding could enhance weather forecasting and capabilities for predicting the effects of El Niño events on weather patterns years in advance. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration and the French National Center for the Exploration of Space signed an agreement in December 1996 for a follow-on mission, Jason-1, to be launched in 1999.

Cooperation With Canada

Results from the BOREAS field/airborne/satellite campaign in 1996 involving the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the National Science Foundation, the Environmental Protection Agency, and Canadian partners showed the air above northern forests to be drier than expected, resulting in adjustments to weather-forecasting models.

Cooperation With Japan

The United States and Japan are cooperating in many areas of global change research. The fourth in a series of bilateral Workshops on Global Change Research addressed "Land Use/Land Cover Change and Global Environmental Conservation" in February 1996 in Tsukuba, Japan. The fifth took place in March 1997 in Honolulu, Hawaii, and focused on "Improved Uses of Global Change Information."

The National Space Development Agency of Japan launched its Advanced Earth Observing Satellite (ADEOS) mission in August 1996. In addition to a French and several Japanese instruments, ADEOS carries two NASA sensors that feed back valuable information to the international scientific community. The NASA Scatterometer provides data on ocean winds and ocean-atmosphere links, and NASA's Total Ozone Mapping Spectrometer monitors global ozone and records observations of atmospheric sulfur dioxide.

Through a memorandum of understanding signed in October 1995, NASA is cooperating with the National Space Development Agency of Japan on the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission. Scheduled for launch in 1997, this unique mission will measure tropical precipitation globally for the first time.

The United States is also working closely with Japan in planning and developing the new Japanese Global Change Prediction Initiative. This initiative could bring substantial new resources for global change research, observations, and modeling to Japan's national program and to international efforts in these areas.

In 1995, the United States and Japan announced a plan for a Global Observations and Information Network, which will enable users in both countries to access each other's data by computer. NOAA is leading this effort, which is intended to improve connectivity and interoperability among networks for satellite and in situ observations within and between Japan and the United States.

A U.S.-Japan Joint Technical Workshop was held in June 1996 in Tokyo, and another is planned for June 1997 in Boulder, Colorado. The focus is expected to be on implementing advanced networking technologies and demonstration pilot projects. The Global Observations and Information Network is also expected to provide a model for a global information infrastructure. ~~

Next: Chapter 7. Education, Training, and Outreach