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Home | About | Programs | Interagency Partners | News | Events | Funding | Education & Outreach | Links | Documents |
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The Carbon Cycle Interagency Working Group (CCIWG) is responsible for interagency coordination of U.S. carbon cycle science research. This entails coordinating research programs within and across agencies, coordinating the solicitation and review of research proposals (when appropriate), implementing targeted research, providing an interface with the scientific community conducting carbon cycle research, updating needs assessments, working to secure resources for new activities, and reporting results and accomplishments. The CCIWG is comprised of members from 10 participating federal agencies and departments that support and execute U.S. carbon cycle science research.
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U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) |
Agricultural Research Service (ARS) |
The USDA Agricultural Research Service (ARS) Global Change National Program focuses on four aspects of global change: Carbon Cycle and Carbon Storage; Trace Gases; Ecosystem Impacts; and Changes in the Weather and the Water Cycle. There is much overlap between these components as all are influenced by each other. The goal of ARS’ carbon cycle and storage research is to provide the data and the process understanding necessary to describe the current and potential roles of agriculture in the global carbon cycle with sufficient accuracy to inform policy and aid producers and other land mangers in making decisions that are both economically and environmentally sound. Soil is the largest terrestrial carbon pool, and how agricultural soils (crop, pasture and range lands) managed greatly influences the amount of carbon that is stored in soil. In the conterminous U.S., agriculture is by far the largest land use. Thus, the management of agricultural lands has a large effect on the carbon cycle. Current estimates are that U.S. agricultural lands have the potential to sequester up to 220 Tg yr-1 of carbon, much of this due to past adverse land management that now can be rectified while keeping much of this land in production. Major ARS carbon cycle activities include GRACEnet and Agriflux. GRACEnet (Greenhouse gas Reduction through Agricultural Carbon Enhancement NETwork) is determining soil carbon status under current practices and developing practices to increase soil carbon sequestration, minimize greenhouse gas emissions, and document other production and environmental benefits in a variety of production systems at more than 25 locations across the U.S. The Agriflux network is determining CO2 exchange in range, pasture and crop land sites and examining how management influences this exchange. Other ARS research addresses carbon cycle dynamics and transformations in plants and soil, the development of improved analytical and measurement methods, the effects of CO2 enrichment and other environmental variables (temperature, water, ozone, etc.) using FACE (Free Air Carbon Enrichment) and other techniques on carbon cycle processes and the development of decision support systems. Most ARS research is conducted intramurally, although there is significant cooperation with university and other federal agency scientists. All ARS research is peer reviewed by the independent Office of Scientific Quality Review.
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Cooperative State Research, Education, and Extension Service (CSREES) |
The mission of USDA Cooperative State Research, Education and Extension Service (CSREES) is to advance knowledge for agriculture, the environment, human health and well-being, and communities by supporting research, education, and extension programs in the Land-Grant University System and other partner organizations. The agency does not perform actual research, education, and extension but rather manages the funding (both competitive and formula based) for research, education, and extension at the national, state, and local levels, and provides program leadership in these areas. Through grants offered by CSREES, the USDA enables researchers throughout the United States to solve problems critical to our farmers, consumers, and communities. CSREES is USDA's major extramural research agency, funding both individuals and institutions. Funded research programs span problems and issues encompassed within eleven national emphasis areas, each of which includes one or more research programs, each a compendium of related research, education, and extension activities. In cooperation with public institutions, private sector partners, and the Land-Grant University System, the agency provides national leadership to promote teaching excellence, enhance academic quality, and develop tomorrow’s scientific and profession workforce. Extension programs play an important role at all land-grant universities engaged in research and teaching. Extension means reaching out, along with teaching and research, to solve public needs with college or university resources through non-formal, non-credit programs, largely administered through thousands of county and regional extension offices, bringing land-grant expertise to local levels.
The CSREES global change program focuses on land use, land cover, and managed ecosystems in terms of responses, feedbacks, and drivers of carbon and greenhouse gas fluxes, drawing upon issues in watersheds and water quality, air quality, soil processes and productivity, and agroecosystems. The long term goal is to understand land change by integrating environmental and socioeconomic elements in predictive models that will ultimately lead to credible projections and scenarios at various space and time scales. The goal is to continuously improve decision-making for resource management while sustaining ecosystem goods and services.
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Forest Service (USFS) |
The mission of USDA's Forest Service Research and Development (FS R&D) is “to develop and deliver knowledge and innovative technology to improve the health and use of forests and rangelands.” As a land management agency, the US Forest Service has a unique responsibility to address questions about climate change mitigation and adaptation involving the many issues that challenge forest and rangeland owners, managers, and users. FS R&D focuses its many strengths and capabilities to address questions about climate change impacts; the adaptation actions needed to increase resilience of forests and ranges to the impacts; the potential of forests to mitigate atmospheric greenhouse gas (GHG) concentration changes by storing additional carbon in living vegetation; and reducing fossil carbon use by increasing production of biofuels and substituting forest products for more GHG-intensive materials.
FS global change scientists are dispersed in many locations and work toward resolution of the many different issues and research needs of land owners and managers. There is an extensive infrastructure of research laboratories, long-term research studies, and continuous data from nation-wide forest surveys and experimental forests. More than a decade of focused global change research, a prior decade of air pollution research, and several decades of experience with integrated assessments provide a firm scientific foundation for continuing to address the challenges of global change and forest management. The FS global change research program is supported by strengths of its more traditional research in areas such as ecophysiology, landscape ecology, watershed hydrology, vegetation modeling, nutrient cycling, forest management and strong and productive partnerships with universities, federal and state agencies, NGOs and the forest industry here and abroad.
Overall FS R&D global change research priorities involve the three areas of adaptation (maintaining vegetation vitality to continue providing required ecosystem servides), mitigation (increasing carbon storage in soils, living plants and wood products, reducing fossil fuel emissions by increasing biofuel use), and policy support (national and international assessment writing, US and UNFCCC GHG reporting). Research priorities specifically focused on the carbon cycle are: (1) improving observations of forest carbon stocks and flows based on development and deployment of improved field measurement techniques and measurements integration, and maintaining a forest carbon-monitoring program component of the interagency research effort on the North American Carbon Program; (2) integrating observations with process-level studies to better understand, forecast, and manage the relationships between carbon in forest and rangeland systems and climate; (3) developing and deploying forest management systems and technologies that increase carbon sequestration, provide fossil fuel offsets, enhance productivity, and maintain environmental quality; (4) providing integrated prediction models of vegetation dynamics affecting ecosystem services, particularly including carbon storage and water supplies; and (5) improving technical information for forest greenhouse gas accounting rules and guidelines.
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Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) |
The Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) provides leadership in conserving, maintaining, and improving our natural resources and the environment. Since 1935, NRCS (originally the Soil Conservation Service) has provided leadership in a partnership effort to help America's private landowners and managers conserve their soil, water, and other natural resources. NRCS provides financial assistance for many conservation activities. The Conservation Technical Assistance program provides voluntary conservation technical assistance to land-users, communities, units of state and local government, and other Federal agencies in planning and implementing conservation systems. Technical assistance is based on sound science customized to specific needs. NRCS reaches out to all segments of the agricultural community, including underserved and socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers to ensure that its programs and services are accessible to everyone. NRCS manages natural resource conservation programs that provide environmental, societal, financial, and technical benefits. Science and technology activities provide technical expertise in such areas as animal husbandry and clean water, ecological sciences, engineering, resource economics, and social sciences. NRCS provides expertise in soil science and leadership for soil surveys and for the National Resources Inventory, which assesses natural resource conditions and trends in the United States. NRCS provides technical assistance to foreign governments and participates in international scientific and technical exchanges.
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U.S. Department of Commerce (DOC) |
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National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) |
The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) conducts and supports scientific and engineering research in disciplines ranging from chemistry and physics to information technology, working collaboratively with colleagues in industry, academia, and government. Research tools developed at the agency, including measurement methods, standards, data and various technologies assist industrial, academic, and government scientists worldwide. Researchers in industry, universities and other government agencies work with the agency to solve technical problems, improve productivity or work on innovative new ideas. Partnerships with agency take many forms. NIST’s nationwide network of Manufacturing Extension Partnership centers helps smaller manufacturers in their local area, for example. Companies can become research partners through the Advanced Technology Program, a cooperative research and development agreement or by joining a research consortium. NIST funds industrial and academic research in a variety of ways. Advanced Technology Program co-funds high-risk, high-payoff projects with industry. The Small Business Innovation Research Program funds research and development proposals from small businesses. The agency also offers other grants to encourage work in specific fields, such as precision measurement, fire research, and materials science. Grants/awards supporting research at industry, academic, and other institutions are available on a competitive basis through several different NIST offices. NIST develops an extensive array of traceable reference materials, standard reference data, and calibrations, including many applicable to constituents of the atmosphere. While these programs are not specifically designed for carbon cycle research, in general, the measurements are crosscutting and have a wide range of applications from health care to the automotive industry to climate change.
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National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) |
The mission of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) is “to understand and predict changes in the Earth’s environment and conserve and manage coastal and marine resources to meet the Nation’s economic, social, and environmental needs.” NOAA’s efforts to examine the long-term climate are designed to develop a predictive understanding of variability and change in the global climate system, and to advance the application of this information in climate-sensitive sectors through a suite of research, observations and modeling, and application and assessment activities. NOAA’s research program includes ongoing efforts in operational in situ and satellite observations with an emphasis on oceanic and atmospheric dynamics, circulation and chemistry and understanding and predicting ocean-land-atmosphere interactions, the global water cycle, atmospheric composition, and the role of global transfers of carbon dioxide among the atmosphere, ocean, and terrestrial biosphere in climate change. Programs also include improvements in climate modeling, prediction and information management capabilities, and the projection and assessment of variability across multiple time-scales; the study of the relationship between the natural climate system and society and the development of methodologies for applying climate information to problems of social and economic consequences.
NOAA’s Climate Program operates a peer-reviewed process for all sponsored research from NOAA or other government laboratories, universities, or private companies. Grants to institutions outside of NOAA are processed through the Grants Management Division; NOAA grants are funded through an internal process. An external panel of scientists reviews the NOAA Climate Program and each program element has an advisory panel that helps management set priorities. In addition, the program relies on community planning and international programs that are relevant to improving climate forecasts for program direction and guidance.
The NOAA Earth System Research Laboratory operates aircraft and a set of 600 m communication towers that profile carbon dioxide, methane and carbon monoxide in North America. NOAA marine laboratories, the Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory, and the Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory, contribute to carbon cycle science through air-sea measurements of CO2 and ocean carbon inventories in the North Atlantic and North Pacific, and with change of CO2 measurements from coastal moorings.
More information:
Carbon Cycle Greenhouse Gases Group - NOAA Annual Greenhouse Gas Index - Carbon Tracker
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U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) |
The focus of DOE carbon cycle research is primarily on Terrestrial Carbon Processes (TCP) and provides scientific knowledge of terrestrial components of the global carbon cycle. In general, the TCP research provides insight into the fate of excess CO2 from human activities, including a scientific understanding of carbon cycle mechanisms and controls on CO2 as a forcing factor of climate change. Objectives are to (i) provide accurate predictions of atmospheric CO2 change; (ii) quantify terrestrial carbon sources and sinks and how they are changing in relation to other atmospheric, climatologic and hydrologic influences; (iii) assess terrestrial feedbacks on carbon cycle and climate; and (iv) use modeling approaches. TCP results from these investigations are extended to larger scales, thereby contributing to continental scale analysis of carbon sources and sinks.
Four components of the TCP Program include AmeriFlux, the FACE experiments, soil carbon research and carbon cycle modeling.
In addition, TCP supports carbon isotope tracer research as a powerful method for understanding and quantifying carbon transformations, and for estimating rate parameters of terrestrial carbon processes. The research involves state-of-the-art observations and experiments that provide a quantitative and predictive understanding of the terrestrial carbon cycle processes that can affect atmospheric CO2 trends and inter-annual variability, which influence the CO2 forcing of climate. TCP research makes significant contributions to the U.S. Climate Change Science Program (CCSP) by providing answers to questions of the CCSP Strategic Plan. TCP is an integral part of the North American Carbon Program (NACP), and contributes observations, experimental results and models to regional or continental scale analysis of CO2 exchange, including new knowledge of terrestrial carbon sources and sinks needed for periodic assessments of the State of the Carbon Cycle for North America.
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Geological Survey (USGS) |
The earth's surface does not exist in a static, unchanging "natural" condition interrupted by the work of humans, but rather it is a dynamic system of which humans are a part. Understanding changes to the Earth's surface and the underlying processes that induce them has enormous impact on how society responds to these changes and, ultimately, the costs of responding to change. United States Geological Survey (USGS) Global Change Research activities strive to achieve a whole-system understanding of the interrelationships among Earth surface processes, ecological systems, and human activities. Activities of the program focus on documenting, analyzing, and modeling the character of past and present environments and the geological, biological, hydrological, and geochemical processes involved in environmental change so that future environmental changes and impacts can be anticipated.
USGS research is conducted in cooperation and partnership with other agencies and academic collaborators. In direct support of the Carbon Cycle Science Program, USGS activities include integrated studies in: carbon sequestration in sediments; landscape dynamics, land use and vegetation change; the fate of carbon in high-latitude landscapes; exchaMay 8, 2007th's surface; monitoring and modeling carbon distribution and flux; sensitive species, ecological and biogeochemical change; and societal implications and human adaptations of ecological impacts resulting from global change.
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National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) |
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) supports a balanced program of science, exploration, and aeronautics consistent with the agency’s goals for human space flight. For science, the focus is in disciplines where access to space enables new scientific endeavors or enhances existing ones. NASA’s goal for Earth Science is to study planet Earth from space to advance scientific understanding and meet societal needs. Activities toward meeting this goal include obtaining observations of the Earth system from space-based and sub-orbital platforms, conducting research and data analysis, modeling, applying research results to decision support, and scientific assessment. Participants in the research program include scientists and engineers from academic institutions, industry, NASA centers, and other government agencies. Scientists from foreign countries also participate on a no-exchange-of-funds basis. Research topics to be solicited and missions to be pursued are identified through a strategic planning process that requires input from the scientific community, responds to national priorities and international partnership opportunities, and ensures consistency with NASA’s Exploration Vision, science mission statement, and strategy documents. NASA research is competed and subjected to full scientific peer review involving external and internal experts who are selected on the basis of their scientific and technical qualifications and with due attention to conflict of interest. Selections are made based on overall scientific merit, cost, and relevance and responsiveness to the NASA science program goals and the specifics of the solicitation. Interagency coordination includes established relationships for common programs with shared responsibilities as well as the structured mechanisms available through the Climate Change Science and Technology Programs. Coordination that is more informal occurs at all levels through the actions of individual managers and program offices. International coordination uses established bilateral, or occasionally multilateral, agreements with other national space agencies, or through the Committee on Earth Observing Satellites and other non-governmental organizations.
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National Science Foundation (NSF) |
The National Science Foundation (NSF) funds high-quality research initiated extramurally in the U.S. scientific community. Although NSF receives proposals throughout the year, most programs have published target or deadline dates. Submission dates remain the same from year to year for unsolicited proposals and ad hoc submission dates for special initiatives. Depending upon the program, proposals may be evaluated by mail review, panel review, or most commonly a combination of the two. Funded research projects deriving from unsolicited proposals are reviewed annually by the appropriate managing program officers through a combination of annual progress reports received from principal investigators, participation in professional society meetings, and site visits. By supporting workshops and conferences, and by fostering cooperative efforts with U.S. and foreign agencies, NSF encourages the scientific community to envision and to set forth for consideration innovative ideas for development as special research initiatives.
Carbon cycle science at NSF is supported by unsolicited proposals to a wide range of individual programs, as well as by a changing palate of focused solicitations on particular topics. PIs should explore these various avenues with the responsible program officers. Particular programs to contact include the Geoscience Directorate Divisions of Oceanography, Earth Science or Atmospheric Sciences, the Office of Polar Programs and the Biological Sciences Directorate Division of Environmental Biology.
This page last updated April 19, 2007 .
