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US Climate Change Science Program

Updated 11 October, 2003

The U.S. Climate Change Science Program:
Vision for the Program and
Highlights of the Scientific Strategic Plan
 Report released 24 July 2003
   

 

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The Administration's Actions to Enhance Scientific Understanding of Global Climate Change

"My Cabinet-level working group has met regularly for the last 10 weeks to review the most recent, most accurate, and most comprehensive science. They have heard from scientists offering a wide spectrum of views. They have reviewed the facts, and they have listened to many theories and suppositions. The working group asked the highly respected National Academy of Sciences to provide us the most up-to-date information about what is known and about what is not known on the science of climate change."

-- President Bush, June 11, 2001

Scientific Review Requested from the National Academy of Sciences

In May 2001, the Administration asked the National Academy of Sciences' National Research Council to provide an updated evaluation of key questions about climate change science, with reference to the recently completed Third Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), and with reference to ongoing climate change research in the United States and other nations. The NRC committee report, Climate Change Science: An Analysis of Some Key Questions, was issued in June 2001. The summary of the report stated:

"Greenhouse gases are accumulating in Earth's atmosphere as a result of human activities, causing surface air temperatures and subsurface ocean temperatures to rise. Temperatures are, in fact, rising. The changes observed over the last several decades are likely mostly due to human activities, but we cannot rule out that some significant part of these changes is also a reflection of natural variability. Human-induced warming and associated sea level rises are expected to continue through the 21st century...Because there is considerable uncertainty in current understanding of how the climate system varies naturally and reacts to emissions of greenhouse gases and aerosols, current estimates of the magnitude of future warming should be regarded as tentative and subject to future adjustments (either upward or downward)...

"Making progress in reducing the large uncertainties in projections of future climate will require addressing a number of fundamental scientific questions relating to the buildup of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and the behavior of the climate system...In addition, the research enterprise dealing with environmental change and the interactions of human society with the environment must be enhanced...An effective strategy for advancing the understanding of climate change also will require (1) a global observing system in support of long-term climate monitoring and prediction, (2) concentration on large-scale modeling through increased, dedicated supercomputing and human resources, and (3) efforts to ensure that climate research is supported and managed to ensure innovation, effectiveness, and efficiency."

The key areas addressed in the June 2001 NRC report include climate observations; the influence of aerosols in the atmosphere; carbon sources and sinks in the atmosphere, oceans, and ecosystems; climate modeling; scenarios of human-induced climate impacts; and the integration of scientific knowledge, including its uncertainty, into effective decision support systems. These considerations have guided the development of the focused climate research and technology initiatives announced by the President that same month.

The Climate Change Research Initiative Launched in June 2001

"As we analyze the possibilities, we will be guided by several basic principles. Our approach must be consistent with the long-term goal of stabilizing greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere. Our actions should be measured as we learn more from science and build on it...We will act, learn, and act again, adjusting our approaches as science advances and technology evolves. Our administration will be creative."

-- President Bush, June 11, 2001

Upon receipt of the NRC report in June 2001, the President launched the U.S. Climate Change Research Initiative "...to study areas of uncertainty and identify priority areas where investments can make a difference." The CCRI represents a focusing of resources and attention on those elements of the USGCRP that can best support improved public debate and decisionmaking in the near term. The goal of the CCRI is to improve integration of scientific knowledge (including measures of uncertainty) into policy and management decisions and evaluation of management strategies and choices -- within the next 5 years.

To meet this goal, and consistent with the National Research Council reports, the CCRI aims to:

1. Reduce scientific uncertainty in three key areas of climate science:
  • Develop reliable representations of the climatic forcing resulting from atmospheric aerosols. Aerosols and tropospheric ozone play unique, but poorly quantified, roles in the atmospheric radiation budget. Proposed activities include field campaigns (including aircraft missions), in situ monitoring stations, improved modeling, and satellite data algorithm development.
  • Improve our understanding of the global carbon cycle (sources and sinks). CCRI funds will be targeted for activities to carry out the integrated North American Carbon Program (NACP), a key element of the U.S. Carbon Cycle Science Plan. This program will improve monitoring techniques, reconcile approaches for quantifying carbon storage, and elucidate key processes and land management practices regulating carbon fluxes between the atmosphere and the land and ocean.
  • Increase our knowledge of climate feedback processes. Poor understanding of "climate feedbacks" -- key interactions among two or more components of the climate system, such as clouds, water vapor, ocean circulation, or sea ice -- are responsible for large uncertainties in our ability to reliably predict climate variability and change. CCRI will prioritize activities to support increased understanding of feedback processes.
    •

    2. Enhance and expand observations of the Earth system. CCRI efforts will contribute to and benefit from the design and operational implementation over the next 10 years of a new international, integrated, sustained, and comprehensive global Earth observation system to minimize data gaps and maximize the utility of existing observing networks.

    3. Increase our climate modeling capacity. CCRI will support continued development and refinement of computational climate models. Priority activities will focus on improving model physics (particularly with respect to clouds and aerosols), increasing resolution of climate model simulations, improving methods to assimilate observations into model analyses and predictions, and exploring limits to predictability of climate variability and change. CCRI will also support development of climate modeling to provide routine model products for policy and management decision support.

    The President also launched the parallel Climate Change Technology Program in June 2001, "...to strengthen research at universities and national labs, to enhance partnerships in applied research, to develop improved technology for measuring and monitoring gross and net greenhouse gas emissions, and to fund demonstration projects for cutting-edge technologies." Technological breakthroughs will be needed to address the long-term challenge of global climate change. The CCSP and the CCTP are closely collaborating to ensure that: (a) science drives the definition of technology needs; and (b) science is used to evaluate the potential consequences of proposed technology innovations.

    Integration of the Short-Term CCRI and the Long-Term USGCRP to Form The Climate Change Science Program

    The Administration's Climate Change Research Initiative is accelerating key areas of long-term research supported by the U.S. Global Change Research Program. The USGCRP was established by the Global Change Research Act of 1990 to address natural and human-induced changes in the Earth's global environmental system; to monitor, understand, and predict global change; and to provide a sound scientific basis for national and international decisionmaking. To date, more than $20 billion of research funding has supported the USGCRP.

    The near-term focus of the CCRI on key climate change uncertainties is being balanced with the breadth of the long-term USGCRP, creating the combined CCSP program that accelerates research on key science uncertainties while supporting long-term advances in understanding the physical, biological, and chemical processes that influence the Earth system. The budgets of the CCRI and USGCRP program elements are developed and maintained separately within the Climate Change Science Program, but the program management structure is identical for both the CCRI and USGCRP elements. This combined management focus is consistent with the recommendations of the 1999 report of the National Research Council, Global Environmental Change: Research Pathways for the Next Decade. The Pathways report formulated a framework of research questions that has significantly influenced the development of the CCSP Strategic Plan.

    The CCSP must also integrate the products of capabilities that make essential contributions to global change research, but were outside the original USGCRP framework. These include the operational environmental satellite system, various in situ ocean and atmospheric observing systems, and associated data centers. This will facilitate the transition of research observations into operational systems and the use of research products by mission agencies.

    New Cabinet-Level Management Structure Created in February 2002 to Oversee the Climate Change Science Program and the Climate Change Technology Program

    In February 2002, the President created a new Cabinet-level management structure, the Committee on Climate Change Science and Technology Integration, to oversee the more than $3 billion annual investment in the combined federal climate change research and technology development programs. The new management structure places accountability and leadership for the science and technology programs in the relevant cabinet departments (see Figure 2). The relevant research continues to be coordinated through the National Science and Technology Council in accordance with the Global Change Research Act of 1990.

    Climate science and technology management structure.
    Figure 2: Climate science and technology management structure.

    Under the new management structure, the CCSP integrates research on global climate change sponsored by the Departments of Agriculture, Commerce, Defense, Energy, Health and Human Services, the Interior, State, and Transportation, together with the Environmental Protection Agency, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the National Science Foundation, the Agency for International Development, and the Smithsonian Institution. The Office of Science and Technology Policy, the Council on Environmental Quality, the National Economic Council, and the Office of Management and Budget also participate. The principal areas of global change research for the CCSP agencies are summarized in Appendix B.

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