The U. S. Global Change Research Program (USGCRP) is developing a new decadal strategic plan in compliance with the terms of the Global Change Research Act (GCRA) of 1990.  The plan, which will dictate the direction of the program from 2011-2020, will provide guidance to ensure that the USGCRP functions successfully around the new program priorities, which include adaptation science, climate services, integrated observations, fundamental research, modeling, Assessments, and communication, education, and engagement.  The goal of the new USGCRP strategy is to be a truly integrated “end-to-end” program that not only provides basic science, but also tools to use the science, and to translate it to a broad audience. The primary challenge is to develop a plan that has sufficient flexibility and agility to respond to scientific and technological advances, changing user needs, and economic fluctuations.

There will be  opportunities for public outreach on the plan, including a webinar on the outline of the plan, a public comment period, townhalls at professional meetings, among others. There has also already been significant input into the strategic planning process, including 21 public “Listening Sessions” held throughout the US in 2007-2009. Reports from these listening sessions are available at www.globalchange.gov. USGCRP and Member Agencies have also commissioned more than twenty reports on related topics from the National Research Council (NRC) over the last four years that will also be used to help guide the creation of the plan. The final strategic plan is expected to be released by the end of 2011.

The Department of Energy has unveiled a new site on energy literacy.  The purpose of the site is to define what it means to be Energy Literate and to identify the essential principals that underlie this literacy.  This project is modeled after the already successful Ocean Literacy and Climate Literacy projects carried out by NOAA. The document will be drafted collaboratively by the thirteen US Global Change Research Program (USGCRP) partner agencies, after sufficient public input has been collected.  To visit the site, please go to http://wiki.citizen.apps.gov/Energy_Literacy/index.php/Main_Page.

Announcing the next installment of "Climate Conversations," USGCRP's monthly seminar/webinar series, presented by Dr. Jeffrey S. Deems, and Dr. Thomas H. Painter:

Dust Impacts on Snowmelt Timing & Water Yield in the Upper Colorado River Basin

The waters of the Colorado River serve 27 million people in seven states and two countries but are overallocated by more than 10% of the river's historical mean. Climate models project runoff losses of 7-20% from the basin in this century due to human-induced climate change. Recent work has shown that by the late 1800s, decades prior to allocation of the river's runoff in the 1920s, a fivefold increase in dust loading from anthropogenically disturbed soils in the southwest United States was already decreasing snow albedo and shortening the duration of snow cover by several weeks. We present new results showing that peak runoff at Lees Ferry, Arizona has occurred on average 3 weeks earlier under heavier dust loading and that increases in evapotranspiration from earlier exposure of vegetation and soils decreases annual runoff by more than 1.0 billion cubic meters or ~5% of the annual average. The potential to reduce dust loading through surface stabilization in the deserts and restore more persistent snow cover, slow runoff, and increase water resources in the UCRB may represent an important mitigation opportunity to reduce system management tensions and regional impacts of climate change.

Jeffrey S. Deems, PhD, is a Research Scientist at the National Snow and Ice Data Center and at the NOAA Western Water Assessment at the University of Colorado at Boulder. He conducts research in snow hydrology, lidar remote sensing of snow depth, mountain system hydrologic modeling, and dust and climate change impacts to snow and water resources at catchment to regional scales. At NSIDC he is the Science Liaison for the NASA Operation IceBridge Mission.

Thomas H. Painter, PhD, is a Scientist at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory/California Institute of Technology and a Research Professor at the University of California, Los Angeles. His areas of interest are snow hydrology, radiative impacts of light-absorbing impurities on snow and glacier melt, water resources from mountain snow and ice, multispectral remote sensing and imaging spectroscopy, and solar system astrobiology. Dr. Painter has pioneered our understanding of the impacts of dust emission from land use change on snow and ice cover in mountain systems and the hydrologic response. He is Chairman and organizer of the Working Group on Light-Absorbing Impurities in Snow and Ice. He is the Vice-Chair of the Cryosphere Focus Group of the American Geophysical Union and member of the AGU Eos Editorial Advisory Board.

On October 14, 2010, the Interagency Climate Change Adaptation Taskforce released a progress report which outlines recommendations to President Obama for how Federal Agency policies and programs can better prepare the United States to respond to the impacts of climate change.  The Taskforce is co-chaired by the Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ), the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP), and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), and includes representatives from more than 20 Federal Agencies. The report recommends that the Federal Government expand and strengthen the Nation’s capacity to understand, prepare for, and respond to climate change.  The recommendations include making adaptation a standard part of agency planning and ensuring scientific information about the impacts of climate change is easily accessible. Click here to read the full press release and progress report.