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Sponsored by the Paleoclimate Program, Division of Atmospheric Sciences, National Science Foundation.

Collaborate, Cooperate, Co-locate
June 4, 2008

A Case study prepared by Dr. James Kimpel

This case study will give you an opportunity to surf the Web to get information on the remarkable partnership that has emerged over the past 27 years among weather entities in Norman, Oklahoma and beyond.  The Norman weather community anticipated the significance of the National Weather Service Modernization in the 1980s and 90s, the impact of better forecasts and warnings on the public and private sectors, and the value of partnerships among academic, government and private organizations.  A lot of material is presented below.  You are not required to read every word, but you should attempt to gain an understanding of each item at the ‘executive summary” level.

1. End state:  Links to Weathersphere and National Weather Center Building, Stormeyes

2. The Early Years:  Teaching Hospital and Applied Systems Institute (ASI), The Early Years

3. Successful joint ventures:

   1. NEXRAD (WSR-88D),
   2. Center for Analysis and Prediction of Storms (CAPS)       
   3. The Oklahoma Mesonet
   4. Atmospheric Radiation Measurement Program (ARM Site)
   5. The National Weather Center Building (NWC)
      1. External Review of need for new building
      2. NOAA Benefits of Collaboration document
   6. Collaborative Adaptive Sensing of the Atmosphere (CASA)
   7. Phased Array Radar (PAR), Dr. Pamela L. Heinselman bio
   8. Hazardous Weather Testbed

4. Assignment:

   1. You will be assigned to one of three groups.  You will not know in advance to which group you will be assigned.  The three groups are:
      1. Academic
      2. Private sector
      3. Government
   2. From each group’s perspective and using examples from 4.a through 4.h above:
      1. What are the benefits of collaboration within groups?  Across groups?
      2. What are the downsides to collaboration?  What are the traditional impediments to collaborating across group boundaries?
      3. The National Weather Center concept is arguably a great benefit to the Norman participants.  How does the nation benefit from this collaboration?
      4. How does the idea of collaboration tie into U.S. economic competiveness?
5. Additional Readings:

1. NCR BASC study entitled “………Research to Operations:  Crossing the Valley of Death”
2. Norm Augustine’s “Rising Above the Gathering Storm”

EARTH SCIENCE AND APPLICATIONS FROM SPACE:
National Imperatives for the Next Decade and Beyond

By William H. Hooke

AMS Summer Policy Colloquium Case Study
June 2008

Introduction

This case study examines the rationale for, the process underlying, and the outcomes and impact of an NAS/NRC Space Studies Board decadal survey: EARTH SCIENCE AND APPLICATIONS FROM SPACE: National Imperatives for the Next Decade and Beyond. The survey goal was to develop consensus recommendations from the Earth and environmental science and applications communities regarding space-based and ancillary observing systems. Some 100 scientists, organized into seven panels, participated in the survey over a two-year period. (In fact, a much larger number of scientists contributed in varied informal ways to the process.) Since the report was issued in 2007, based on anecdotal evidence, federal agencies have frequently referenced the recommendations when making program plans and budget allocations.

 Preparing Assessments that Evaluate the
Impacts of Climate Change on the United States

A Case Study prepared for the 2007 Summer Policy Colloquium
 By Mike MacCracken

This case study considers the challenge of identifying, researching, summarizing, evaluating, and adapting to the likely consequences of climate change on the United States. As background for ultimate consideration of the question of what steps to take in the future, this note provides a very brief overview of the scientific development of this issue and then a description of two previous periods (1985-1990 and 1995-2000) when this general issue was addressed in a pioneering and insightful way by US decision makers in the Congress and Administration, respectively. By providing a brief synopsis of what occurred during those two periods (and there is no attempt here to be complete), it is hoped that the lessons of what was done and consideration of the effectiveness (or lack thereof) of the efforts can serve to improve the choices to be made over coming months for providing the most useful possible information to decision makers and the public. To prompt your input to developing a plan for future actions that should be taken, some comments about how various steps worked are contained in the footnotes, and the final section of this write-up identifies a number of issues and questions.

The Supply of Natural Resources Information Infrastructure: Issues in the Theory and Practice of Estimating Costs

A Case Study prepared for the 2007 Summer Policy Colloquium
 By Molly K. Macauley

The collection and analysis of information about natural resources, the environment, and weather places heavy reliance on physical infrastructure. Estimating the cost of infrastructure is difficult for many reasons; ensuring accurate estimates is even more difficult given the tendency for contracting mechanisms to induce downward biases. This paper has reviewed the conceptual and empirical literature on cost estimation and associated contract design to highlight some of these problems and outline possible approaches to ameliorating them.

The Federal Resonse to Hurricane Katrina

A Case Study prepared for the 2006 Summer Policy Colloquium
By William H. Hooke

In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in 2005, the White House, the United States Senate, and the U.S. House of Representatives conducted independent investigations of what had gone wrong. By and large, their conclusions addressed deficiencies in the emergency response. Certainly that emergency response could have been much improved, saving many lives. But what about the loss of 200,000 homes? A comparable number of jobs? What could government at all levels have done to reduce the economic disruption of the region and speed the recovery? This case study examines these broader aspects of the disaster.

Climate Change Negotiations: Past, Present, and Future

A Case study prepared for the 2005 Summer Policy Colloquium

By Scott Barrett
Johns Hopkins University
School of Advanced International Studies

In the history of large scale, international negotiations, probably no issue has attracted as much attention as global climate change (the previous record holder was probably the Law of the Sea negotiations). For over 15 years, numerous negotiating sessions have been held, involving crowds of negotiators (a diplomat once told me that there were 50 members of a US negotiating team attending one of the sessions). Supporting these public efforts have been countless domestic meetings among specialized agencies and ministries, huge efforts by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change to synthesize and organize the scientific evidence, and much more besides. The input into this process has been unprecedented.

And yet all this effort has made little difference. So far, two agreements have entered into force—the Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Kyoto Protocol—but neither will do much to mitigate or forestall climate change. One purpose of this case study is to explain why.

Issues at the forefront of public policy for environmental Risk

A Case study prepared for the 2005 Summer Policy Colloquium

By Molly K. Macauley

The lay of the policy land for addressing and managing environmental risk includes the hillock of the precautionary principle, the mountain of the practice and ethics of monetary valuation, and the tectonic plates of real-world innovations in markets and trading exchanges for nonmarketed environmental goods. This paper offers an overview of these contemporary and as yet unresolved issues and asks how each might be addressed in disparate environmental risks such as lightning, climate change, and severe weather.

Is the Vision of the Earth Observation Summit Realizable?

 A Case Study prepared for the 2004 Summer Policy Colloquium

 By Molly K. Macauley

This paper discusses the rationale for and challenges of the summit's objectives. The paper is not intended to argue for or against the Global Earth Observing System of Systems (GEOSS) but rather, it considers whether the GEOSS vision is realizable, given its stated goals, and what steps might enable further progress towards the goals. Space-derived observations seem to be the focus in summit documents prepared to date, although in-situ measurements, particularly of land surface, ecological, and human health parameters are highly important for their data content as well as their use in validating and verifying space data. Most of the examples offered in the paper use space-derived earth observation data, but the general concerns raised here about the difficulties in realizing the vision of the summit pertain to both space-derived and in situ data.

The paper also suggests a wholly different objective for the summit, namely the opportunity for GEOSS to serve as the internationally agreed technical and institutional means of monitoring compliance with international environmental and natural resources agreements. Such an objective is a radically different and no doubt much more politically sensitive function than envisioned at the summit. The objective is essential for global sustainable development, however, and is ideally provided by an internationally coordinated earth observing system such as GEOSS.

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THE IMPROBABLE MONTREAL PROTOCOL: SCIENCE, DIPLOMACY, AND DEFENDING THE OZONE LAYER

  A Policy Case Study Prepared for the 2004 Policy Colloquium

By Richard Elliot Benedick

Introduction: In January 1985, not long after I took over the international environment portfolio at the State Department, I led a small American delegation to a little-noticed meeting in Geneva . There, the U.S., Canada, and a few like-minded countries tried, and ultimately failed in the face of strong opposition from other governments, to achieve a multilateral agreement to limit use of chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs). The event attracted only perfunctory attention in the press, and its unremarkable results occasioned no diplomatic ripples in national capitals.

   For three years, this awkwardly titled Ad Hoc Working Group of Legal and Technical Experts for the Preparation of a Global Framework Convention for the Protection of the Ozone Layer, an assemblage of diplomats, environmental officials, and government lawyers under the auspices of a small UN agency, the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), had struggled in vain to reach a consensus on controlling CFCs. Two months later, a handful of countries signed the Vienna Convention for Protection of the Ozone Layer, a toothless treaty to encourage ozone research that did not even mention CFCs in its text.

   The following year, I was asked by Secretary of State George Shultz and Ambassador John Negroponte, then Assistant Secretary of State for Oceans, Environmental, and Scientific Affairs (OES), to lead negotiations for a protocol on controlling CFCs. Very few gamblers would have wagered at that time that such negotiations could succeed. CFCs were virtually synonymous with modern standards of living, finding new uses in thousands of products and processes. Billions of dollars of international investment and hundreds of thousands of jobs worldwide were involved. Technological alternatives were nonexistent or considered too costly or unfeasible. Powerful governments and global economic interests were aligned in adamant opposition to controls, as were ideological elements within the administration of President Reagan. Still other governments and publics were unaware or indifferent to an arcane threat. Perhaps most significant of all, the arguments for control rested on unproven scientific theories: throughout the protocol negotiations there was firm evidence neither of the predicted ozone layer depletion nor of any harmful effects.

  Yet, in September 1987 an international accord was signed in Montreal that made headlines around the globe. By 1989, protection of the ozone layer figured prominently in discussions among the world's political leaders. Within a short time, whole classes of hitherto indispensable chemicals were being phased out and industries were being transformed. CFCs and ozone had become, literally, household words.

  The heads of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) and UNEP later wrote that “the action to defend the ozone layer will rank as one of the great international achievements of the century.” [1] Under conditions of great scientific uncertainty and political and economic opposition, the negotiators of the Montreal Protocol averted grave dangers to life on Earth. The protocol also set a number of important precedents that influenced the great wave of environmental diplomacy of subsequent years, including several international treaties as well as the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development and Agenda 21. What happened between the publication of controversial scientific theories in 1974 and the signing of a landmark treaty in 1987, together with the subsequent evolution of that treaty, is a fascinating and instructive example of how science and diplomacy can effectively interact to address a global threat.

[1] G.O.P.Obasi and Elizabeth Dowdeswell, Foreword to R. Bojkov, The Changing Ozone Layer , Geneva : WMO/UNEP, 1995.

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Private-Public-Academic Roles and Responsibilities in the Atmospheric Sciences

A Case Study Prepared for the 2003 AMS Summer Policy Colloquium

Prepared by Roger A. Pielke, Jr, University of Colorado

Overview: For decades members of the atmospheric sciences community have discussed and debated the proper roles and responsibilities of government, business and academia in the provision of products and services. Such issues are common across many areas of science and technology, and are typically considered a matter of "technology policy." This case study provides a guided tour of this debate, setting the stage to ask the question: where next?

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The Development of the
U.S. Global Change Research Program: 1987 to 1994

A Policy Case Study Prepared for the 2001
American Meteorological Society Policy Symposium
June 3-12, 2001 Washington, DC

Prepared by Roger A. Pielke, Jr., University of Colorado

The Goal of the Case Study: This case study is written for those with an interest in how scientific research is related to policy development through the institutions of U.S. government. Specifically, the case study focuses on the development of U.S. Global Change Research Program (referred to throughout as the Program), the primary U.S. response to the issue of global climate change, from 1987 to 1994. Thus, the case is designed to provoke discussion and debate among all with an interest in the relation of science and policy.    

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A Herculean Task? Economics, Politics, and Realigning Government
in the Case of U.S. Polar-Orbiting Weather Satellites

A Background Paper prepared for the
American Meteorological Society 2003 Summer Policy Colloquium

Prepared by Molly K. Macauley, Resources for the future

Excerpt from Intro: This paper reviews the background of the merger leading to the formation of NPOESS, its status, and the challenges now confronting the program. The paper also addresses some “value of information” approaches to improved understanding of the benefits of data from NPOESS. The value of information discussion is pertinent because the merger itself focused on cost savings - but attractive as these are, saving money alone does not go far in informing decision makers about the usefulness of bits and bytes.  The paper begins with a description of polar-orbiting satellites and the customers for their data, including the rapidly expanding interest in the role the satellites could play in providing data for research about changes in climate. This introductory section also reviews the current status of federal funding of the new program. The paper then offers background about the decision to form the new joint program, including discussion about the anticipated cost savings. The next sections discuss the status of the program and challenges that figure prominently, as well as possible ways to help fix some of the problems that NPOESS is encountering.

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PART I DATA EXCHANGE
THE ROAD TO RESOLUTION 40 AND BEYOND

(Evolution of International Atmospheric Data Exchange)

Prepared by Robert Landis, National Weather Service Retiree

Excerpt from Intro: For nearly a century and a half nations of the world have cooperated in the free and unrestricted international exchange of atmospheric data and services, particularly that information observed or derived in support of daily operational weather warnings and forecasts. In the late 1980’s some nations, feeling the threat to sustain their National Meteorological Services from possible reductions in traditional government funding embarked upon an accelerated commercial activity in order to derived new sources of funding. This step, largely from Western Europe raised many questions regarding such issues as: (1) the role of Government in providing Weather and Climate Services and the corollary of the role of the private sector; (2) the relationship of private sector and government provided services in other countries; and (3) the contribution of resources to sustaining the major global infrastructure of observations and numerical model output particularly from the private sector. The confluence of these issues as well as the continuing lack of national support for atmospheric science in most developing countries led to a contentious series of events that resulted in
the adoption of “Resolution 40” at the Twelfth WMO Congress in May of 1995. Resolution 40 might be consider be considered an agreement of “what is not unacceptable”. The opposite to this double negative is “that it is acceptable”. In order to adopt Res. 40 there was a need for considerable ambiguity. Members of WMO wanted to leave considerable interpretation to each individual nation. Nevertheless, Res. 40 has become a new standard for how Atmospheric Science and Services will be pursued at the global level for the foreseeable future. This case study will seek to describe the evolution of Res. 40 through the eyes of Decision Makers, principally in the USA as well as raise the many complex issues considered in this process.

Part II Data Exchange

Atmospheric Science and the Constitution of Public Policy:
The Case of the National Acid Precipitation Assessment Program (NAPAP)

Prepared by Charles Herrick, Stratus Consulting

Abstract: Developed for the American Meteorological Society, 2002 Summer Policy Colloquium, this case study explores the National Acid Precipitation Assessment Program (NAPAP) as an example of science-policy assessment. The case study consists of three primary sections: Part I provides a short background and summary of the acid rain issue and the NAPAP program; Part II articulates three “propositions,” framed to address important issues concerning the application of scientific data and information in a policy context; and Part III evaluates NAPAP in terms of science-policy assessment criteria developed by the Global Environmental Assessment (GEA) project. The case study also explores ways in which the “NAPAP model” might be instructive for other large-scale, multi-disciplinary environmental assessment issues, such as global change. 

The Environmental Foundation
Weather and Climate Observations: A Case Study on the Evolution
of Integrated Global Climate Observing

Prepared by Robert Landis, National Weather Service Retiree

Abstract: The case study examines some of the decisions related to the institutional processes that influenced the planning and development of the Global Climate Observing System (GCOS). GCOS is one of the first attempts since the establishment of the World Weather Watch to significantly increase a comprehensive set of new and modified environmental observations from both the earth’s surface and space. GCOS is intended to be a logical next step in the evolution of a total environmental observing program for the planet earth. This program has come at a time when the global public interest and knowledge began to relate closely several major issues – ecological quality; local, regional and global climate change, and natural disaster management. The study assumes that we must ultimately attain a systematic method of observing our earth’s environment as an integrated mechanism. The Case will contrast decisions made as a part of the development and implementation of the World Weather Watch (WWW) and those of a generic model, with actions taken to develop GCOS over the last decade. Questions are raised throughout the study regarding specific decisions,
particularly with respect to the role of the US, that have been made with respect to GCOS. Because of the scope and complexity of the issue of global observations, only a select number of issues will be addressed. It is not the intent of the study to be critical, but it is an objective to understand the decision process within GCOS, including the US decision processes, and to perhaps offer alternatives for future actions. The readers of the study should assess the quality of the decisions in terms of a degree of satisfaction, and to suggest alternatives or follow-on actions. It is perceived that these decisions have influenced and continue to influence the careers of most participants in the AMS Colloquium. In making an assessment, it should be recognized that much of the language used in governmental and intergovernmental fora tend to avoid or de-emphasize negative decisions, often allow for plausible deniability, can be contradictory in many respects to allow for a spectrum of views, and are adopted not so much for support, but for lack of an objection.