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Summary
INTRODUCTION
The draft Ocean Research Priorities Plan (hereafter referred to as the plan or the ORPP), entitled
Charting the Course for Ocean Science in the United States: Research Priorities for the Next Decade,
represents the first coordinated national research planning effort involving all federal agencies that
support ocean science. The draft plan was prepared by the National Science and Technology Council's
Joint Subcommittee on Ocean Science and Technology (JSOST) as called for in the U.S. Ocean Action
Plan. This important effort has opened up valuable lines of dialogue between and across government
agencies, academia, non-governmental organizations, and industry.
The purpose of the draft plan is to: "...develop and present ocean research priorities that address
key interactions between society and the ocean." The draft plan identifies six themes that represent key
areas of human interaction with the ocean:
· Stewardship of Our Natural and Cultural Ocean Resources
· Increasing Resilience to Natural Hazards
· Enabling Marine Operations
· The Ocean's Role in Climate
· Improving Ecosystem Health
· Enhancing Human Health
21 longer-term (~10 years) and four near-term (2-5 years) research priorities are defined with regard to
these themes. There is no ranking of either the long-term or near-term priorities. Commonalities among
the themes, particularly in the areas of infrastructure and education, are identified. The plan concludes by
articulating a path forward that is defined by three overarching opportunities and the four near-term
priorities. The plan also mentions the development of the Implementation Strategy, a document that will
be released with the final version of the ORPP.
The co-chairs of the JSOST requested that the National Research Council (NRC) conduct a
review of the draft plan. An ad hoc committee was assembled to perform this review, guided by the
study's statement of task (see Box S-1). In Phase 1, the NRC staff provided summaries of
recommendations from NRC reports published in the past 7 years that related to the themes, pillars, and
cross-cuts identified by the JSOST. This report represents the results of phase 2 of this study. The
findings and recommendations of this phase are summarized below.
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Box S-1
Statement of Task
Phase 2
An ad hoc committee will review the draft plan for the "Ocean Research Priorities Plan" prepared by the
JSOST with input from a public workshop in April, 2006. The review will address the following
questions about the draft plan as a whole:
(1) Is the plan responsive to the nation's needs for ocean research?
(2) Does it effectively link proposed science and technology developments to benefits to the nation
with regard to quality of life, safety and security, economic growth, environmental sustainability,
and education?
(3) (a) Are the priorities for each theme area clear and appropriate? (b) Is the time frame for attaining
these priorities realistic?
(4) Is there an appropriate balance (a) between short-term (2-5 years) and longer-term (5-10 years)
priorities, (b) among substantive research areas, and (c) between research activities such as
observations, modeling, and communicating results?
(5) Does the document adequately identify multidiscipline and/or multi-mission issues?
(6) Does the document identify the highest near term research priorities to address the goals and
expected societal results?
(7) Does the plan adequately consider the following resources: physical infrastructure, information
infrastructure, and intellectual capital?
In its review, the committee will consider the scientific and stakeholder community comments at the April
2006 workshop and other comments received during the public comment period.
(8) The committee will also evaluate whether the format of the workshop promoted the open
exchange of ideas and suggestions for improvement.
Phase 3
In this phase, the committee will provide an overall assessment of the revised (final) plan with an
emphasis on:
How has the plan evolved in response to the NRC review and other community input?
What specific improvements should be reflected in future planning efforts for ocean research?
ASSESSMENT OF THE OVERALL PLAN
General Considerations
The draft plan succeeds in five important ways. The critical link between the ocean and society is
clear and well articulated. The overarching opportunities defined in the plan are appropriate and
compelling. The six broad themes succeed in capturing the main ocean-related issues facing society in a
comprehensive and coherent way, and the draft plan acknowledges the role of fundamental curiosity-
driven research in meeting the nation's needs for ocean research and development. The plan includes
research priorities in the social sciences, a necessary component for improving ocean stewardship.
The organization of the draft plan undercuts many of the valuable points that are made in the text.
In particular, the sections Expanding the Scientific Frontier: The Need for Fundamental Science,
Opportunities for Progress, the Overarching Opportunities, and Making a Difference all support the
societal themes; however, these sections are not effectively presented in the current draft. The plan could
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be revised in accordance with the JSOST's Ocean Priorities Framework (April 2005), which would
address many of these shortcomings. The Framework document lists the following sections as part of the
draft plan: Vision, Challenges, Principles and Critical Elements, Themes, Goals, Resources, and
Evaluating Performance. Alternatively, the use of cross-cutting themes, similar to the approach in the
Planning Document (April, 2006) but placed early in the ORPP, would give these issues greater emphasis
and illustrate many of the connections among the themes.
The plan is not successful in translating the link between society and the ocean into a bold and
compelling vision for ocean research in the next decade. There is a need to draw a clearer connection
between the problems and opportunities facing society and the specific challenges for ocean science, and
between these specific challenges and the research priorities identified in the plan. A stronger connection
to earlier reports, such as those by the U.S. Commission on Ocean Policy (USCOP), the Pew Oceans
Commission, and the Joint Ocean Commission Initiative, would underscore the coherent evolution of
thinking about the critical role that ocean research plays in addressing the pressing problems and
opportunities facing society, and put the draft plan into a larger context.
RECOMMENDATIONS:
· The Ocean Research Priorities Plan should provide a bold and compelling vision for the
future of ocean science research. This vision should be placed near the front of the plan and
referenced in the discussions of the theme priorities. This would help to integrate the
discrete sections of the plan.
· The plan should be reorganized to include a discrete section devoted to cross-cutting
elements that are central to the vision for ocean research. The concept of cross-cutting
themes used in the Planning Document should be reintroduced and moved toward the
beginning of the plan as a way to reinforce the importance of these elements in creating the
foundation for progress on the societal themes. In particular, the section Expanding the
Scientific Frontier: The Need for Fundamental Science should be included as one of these
cross-cuts and revised to strengthen the rationale for basic research.
Themes and Priorities
The draft research priorities plan is organized around six societal themes. The themes
successfully capture the main ocean-related issues facing society, have an interdisciplinary focus, and
would benefit from a collaborative approach among federal, state and local agencies to integrate efforts.
However, the draft plan is less successful at elucidating the linkages among these themes. These
connections provide opportunities for identifying research priorities in addition to the ORPP's
"Overarching Opportunities." Most of the thematic discussions address at least some issues that are linked
to other themes. It would be helpful to enhance this discussion by taking a more consistent approach
across the themes that: (1) carefully considers the interfaces between themes that intersect the key areas
identified in the document, and (2) states the research needs and the mechanisms that will foster
collaborative research in those areas.
The priorities within each theme are intended to guide effort toward the most important scientific
objectives that must be reached to achieve the larger societal goals. This intention is only partially met.
There are three primary concerns about the research priorities as they have been identified in the draft
plan:
· The priorities that start with "Understand" sound like goals (not research priorities) while the
priorities that start with "Apply" sound more like activities. This terminology communicates
neither the value of ocean research nor the exciting challenges of the research which could then
be used to develop milestones. In addition, many of the priority statements are so all
encompassing that they do not indicate areas of research that should take precedence.
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· The wording of some research priorities suggests that they do not involve research but rather
implies that they are activities or operations that have no clear research component (e.g.,
Priorities 11 and 16).2
· The priorities do not convey the degree of difficulty or challenge in achieving them, making it
difficult to realistically address the feasibility and time frame for their likely success.
To provide a clearer connection between the scientific priorities and the underlying societal needs, it
would be useful if the plan articulated a series of "challenges for science and society." These challenges
would facilitate the identification of more tightly formulated research priorities under each theme and,
importantly, would galvanize the ocean research and policy communities around the plan.
The draft plan identifies specific criteria by which research priorities were selected. However, the
connection between these criteria and the specific priorities that were selected is not clear. Many of the
priority statements are too broad to provide useful guidance. Also, it is unclear how the priorities relate to
existing programs versus new initiatives. In some cases, the science described in the supporting text is too
prescriptive with regard to the type of research activities required to address the priorities. In addition, the
plan lacks both a schedule for addressing the priorities and specific benchmarks for measuring progress.
RECOMMENDATIONS:
· The ORPP should clearly state the goals, challenges, and research priorities of the plan and
how these relate to existing programs and new initiatives. The challenges should provide a
more directed and inspiring rationale for the research priorities.
· Linkages among the themes should be clearly and consistently delineated in the supporting
text for the research priorities. This could be accomplished through a simple statement that
a given research priority will also forward the goals of other (specified) themes.
· The Implementation Strategy should include a schedule by which these priorities could
reasonably be addressed, a set of benchmarks by which progress could be assessed, and a
strategy for maintaining new capabilities (made possible by advances in knowledge of
processes, modeling, and technology) through the transfer from research to operational
programs.
CONSIDERATION OF SPECIFIC THEMES
Stewardship of Our Natural and Cultural Ocean Resources
This theme encompasses stewardship of all aspects of the oceans and Great Lakes that represent
commodities that fulfill essential human needs (e.g., goods and services like food and transportation) or
values (e.g., recreation, tourism, preservation of culture). Although the plan discusses the need for taking
an ecosystem-based approach, we suggest that the plan go one step further and use ecosystem-based
management as the unifying concept to connect the numerous human uses of the ocean and research
priorities. The committee also believes that the discussion of this theme fails to capture a sense of the
imperiled status of our oceanic resources, the changes in human behavior necessary to achieve
sustainability for renewable resources, and the difficulty of the science needed to solve these problems. In
addition, the committee found it difficult to identify those resources and research priorities that the report
classifies as cultural. The confusion stems from differences in how the plan discusses these resources. As
it stands, the title of this theme implies that "natural" and "cultural" resources are of equal importance in
terms of research priorities, yet none of the proposed priorities deal directly with cultural resources.
2See Table 4-1 for list of priorities.
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RECOMMENDATIONS:
· This theme should further emphasize the necessity of understanding all human impacts, not
just fishing, and the feedbacks and cumulative impacts among them as the means of moving
ocean governance to an ecosystem-based approach. In addition, a more compelling case
should be made for these extremely important research priorities based on the greater
scientific and public awareness of the decline in living resources and biodiversity.
· Research priorities for "cultural resources" should be identified or this topic should be
removed from the theme.
Increasing Resilience to Natural Hazards
This theme addresses societal risks and vulnerability to coastal and marine hazards, such as
hurricanes and tsunamis. Emphasis is on understanding economic, environmental, social, and public
health impacts from hazards, assessing and reducing risks and vulnerability, and making better forecasts
of hazards. The priorities are appropriate, they address significant challenges, and there is a good balance
among the priority areas. One deficiency in this theme is identification of the need for more process
research to understand the nonlinear complexity of coastal inundation forcing, coastal erosion and
sediment transport, and the health of coastal ecosystems has been highlighted in other reports, notably the
report from the USCOP. Hazards affect activity under all of the other themes and the discussion would be
improved if these linkages were reviewed in brief.
RECOMMENDATION: The discussion of each of these priorities should be modestly expanded to
provide greater specificity in the description of proposed research and to include research on
coastal erosion and sediment transport.
Enabling Marine Operations
The draft plan defines marine operations to encompass commercial, recreational, and defense and
security matters. The document provides justification for further research by correctly noting that marine
operations can be expected to grow in importance in the future and therefore require a strong ocean
science and technology base to maintain their vitality.
The priority statements in this section would be improved if made more specific and inspiring.
The priorities, as presented, appear to be focused largely on marine transportation. Greater balance needs
to be added by discussing how the proposed research will address marine operations related to defense,
fishing and aquaculture, recreation, search-and-rescue, and energy and minerals exploitation. Some
linkages to research within the other themes are identified but could be greatly expanded. Several of the
suggested topics seem to involve operational issues that do not have a clear research component.
RECOMMENDATIONS:
· Specific research requirements should be better identified and described.
· The plan should clearly distinguish operational activities from research goals. These goals
should be broader than marine transportation and include areas such as national defense,
fishing, and recreation.
The Ocean's Role in Climate
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The title of this priority does not reflect the intent to address both the role of the ocean in climate
and the impact of climate variability and change on the ocean. A more appropriate title might be "Oceans
and Climate." The priorities concern translation of basic research into practical use for societal benefits
and address the required basic research components. Thus, while broad, they are complete and balanced.
The priorities, as written, however, would be unlikely to capture the imagination and interest of non-
scientists.
The critical needs for this theme are to expand sustained ocean observations and to conduct ocean
process research required to improve numerical models for ocean-state estimation and prediction. It is not
clear from the document how the pursuit of the thematic priorities will be coordinated to achieve this. The
need for an integrated and sustained observing system is identified clearly. The importance of sustained
and enhanced satellite observations for these climate priorities is called out, but the critical problem of
ensuring continuity of existing and planned systems is not addressed. The required synergy between
observations and models is not adequately addressed within the research priorities.
RECOMMENDATIONS:
· Linkages with other themes should be improved.
· Priorities 12 and 14 should include discussions of sea level that explicitly recognize the
importance of compounded sources of variability and change.
Improving Ecosystem Health
This theme correctly addresses and acknowledges the complexity and importance of marine
ecosystems, and suggests that there is much to be learned about the structure, function, and vulnerability
of these systems. However, there are still some significant knowledge gaps that the plan misses,
including: factors that control ecosystem stability and productivity, processes acting across interfaces,
linkages between ecosystem types, and ultimately the relationship between marine ecosystems and the
larger ocean-Earth-atmosphere system. Another important omission is research to develop indices that
can be used to define healthy, resilient, and productive ecosystems. Some of the requirements that call for
new and improved models implicitly require experiments and process studies. This could be made more
explicit.
Productivity appears to be presented as the sole indicator of ecosystem health. However, by
itself, productivity is a poor metric because marine systems can maintain stable levels of secondary
production, set by nutrient loadings and physical conditions, even when severely perturbed by human
activities. Ecosystem health needs to be assessed more broadly.
RECOMMENDATIONS:
· A broader range of ecosystem responses (not just productivity) should be considered as
measures for ecosystem health. Priority 15 would be improved by substituting wording
such as the following: "Develop the capability to predict the impact of natural and
anthropogenic processes on ecological systems."
· Additional emphasis should be placed on increasing knowledge and understanding of
factors contributing to maintenance and restoration of ecosystem health.
Enhancing Human Health
This theme addresses a broad array of human health issues that relate to the ocean, with the major
issues being pathogens, harmful algal blooms (HABs), contaminants, marine bioproducts, and biological
models. These are appropriate and capture the most important research topics. The justification for this
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theme is solid and should be easily understood by non-scientists, although the theme rationale could be
strengthened by expanding beyond sickness and drugs to include the potential for major contributions to
science in general. The research priorities capture a broad range of topics that are appropriate and will
clearly advance science in this area. The priorities would be strengthened by clearer wording and by more
explicitly describing important linkages with research priorities in other themes.
This theme includes an appropriate balance between substantive research areas, except for the
inconsistent emphasis on basic research among the four research priorities. A strength is the recognition
of the multidisciplinary nature of research needed to advance this theme.
RECOMMENDATION: More careful wording should be used so that the distinction between
Priorities 18 and 19 is clear, the scope of recommended research is not unnecessarily constrained,
and important linkages among research themes are described. The importance of both process
studies and quantification of risk should be clearly emphasized.
INTERDISCIPLINARY AND MULTI-MISSION OCEAN RESEARCH
Major ocean research and management challenges facing our nation require interdisciplinary
approaches and cut across the defined missions of individual government agencies. The complexity of
these challenges should be matched by the use of sophisticated approaches that draw on expertise from a
range of disciplines in order to enhance knowledge and to apply that knowledge to the development of
scientifically sound management strategies. The major themes and "overarching opportunities" identified
in the draft plan are interdisciplinary in nature and require expertise from many fields for substantial
progress to be made. The draft plan rightly acknowledges the importance of interdisciplinary science, as
well as approaches that cut across agency missions. The six research themes lend themselves to
interdisciplinary efforts and collaboration, both within and across agencies. The descriptions of major
research areas in the plan also indicate the need for integration, systems approaches, and collaboration in
the conduct of research and the gathering of data. However, the identification of important linkages
among the six major themes and multidisciplinary needs within research priorities was uneven, and in
some instances quite weak. Pointing out these linkages throughout the report serves many important
purposes, including more accurate identification of both the range of specific expertise needed to address
the major themes and the scope of interdisciplinary and multi-agency efforts that will be required. The
focus on interdisciplinary science starts off in the right direction through much of the draft plan. The real
test of a commitment to move beyond historical disciplinary and organizational barriers will be
determined by whether the Implementation Strategy presents a pathway to break down barriers between
disciplines and agencies to facilitate multidisciplinary, multi-mission programs.
The emphasis on multidisciplinary, multi-mission efforts and collaboration above should not be
interpreted as a recommendation to abandon or downplay the importance of disciplinary training.
Expertise and training in specific disciplines will be required to develop effective multidisciplinary
efforts. Also, advances in traditional disciplines contribute to the solution of important scientific
challenges; hence, experts in these fields can help identify new concepts or technologies that will support
multidisciplinary programs.
RECOMMENDATIONS:
· The ORPP should provide a more comprehensive description of the needs and
opportunities for multidisciplinary research, as well as research partnerships (multi-agency
and agency/academic/industry/international), for each societal theme.
· The Implementation Strategy for the ORPP should evaluate the adequacy of existing
mechanisms for interagency and agency-academia collaborative research to identify
opportunities to improve collaboration among sectors.
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· Disciplinary expertise and research should not be neglected in the description of important
research and training needs presented in this document.
EVALUATION OF NEAR-TERM PRIORITIES
Near-term priorities provide a bridge between the generalities of the themes, the focus of the 21
priorities, and the launching of more specific actions. It is necessary to focus the early research efforts
where they will have the most impact and where they can be readily implemented. Given these
constraints, the near-term priority areas selected appear to be appropriate and will advance the ocean
research agenda, although they are not as clearly tied to the 21 long-term priorities as they might have
been.
The basis for the selection of the near-term priorities is not clear. While criteria for selection have
been identified, these criteria are not referenced in the discussion of the individual near-term priorities.
Also, there are no milestones or metrics offered for tracking progress towards meeting the objectives
behind these priorities. A few examples under each near-term priority would be valuable in illustrating
potential outcomes and would provide more inspiration for the priorities. Also, it is not clear how the time
frame for the near-term priorities meshes with the implementation of the 21 priorities. The ORPP does not
explain how the implementation of the near-term priorities will affect the initiation of research efforts
identified under the individual themes.
RECOMMENDATIONS:
· The specific linkages of each of the near-term priorities to the 21 longer-term priorities
should be identified. Milestones and metrics should be identified to measure
accomplishment and progress.
· The near term priorities should include a description of the relationship between what is
already being done in each area and how it will be expanded under the research plan.
· The time frames for conduct of near-term and longer-term research should be clearly
defined with a discussion of the balance of effort between the two sets of priorities.
RESEARCH AND HUMAN RESOURCE NEEDS
Physical Infrastructure
The draft plan successfully lists most of the types of physical infrastructure that will be required:
vessels, earth-sensing satellites, buoys, unmanned vehicles, new sensors (particularly aimed at biological
and chemical ocean variables), and more. It also mentions, correctly, various needs for more widespread
deployments of many of these tools, and integrations of their measurements. However, the draft does not
go beyond the stages of listing and mentioning. It does not provide goals and objectives that are
connected to the stated priorities nor does it give specifics for implementation. Consequently, it is not
possible to answer the question of whether the plan "adequately" considers these tools.
Information Infrastructure
This discussion essentially parallels the discussion of physical infrastructure. Plans exist that
address needed information infrastructure for ocean sciences, but these plans were not written within the
context of the ocean research priorities. Although discussions of the information infrastructure, in these
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and other reports may be informative, they do not address "adequacy" for the purpose of the ORPP.
Therefore, the existing plans only serve as guidance in defining information infrastructure not as the basis
for determining the adequacy of the information infrastructure called for in the draft plan.
Intellectual Capital
The draft plan contains mention, but scant quantitative assessment, of the need for intellectual
capital or the future workforce required to carry out the research and related work envisioned in the plan.
Short shrift also is given to the social science workforce needs that are integral to the plan. The needs run
from Ph.D. researchers to electronics technicians to science managers to experts in formal and informal
education, outreach, social science, and economics.
RECOMMENDATIONS:
· The final plan should move towards greater specificity in the area of infrastructure in order
to command serious attention from its intended audiences.
· The ORPP should take heed of broader workforce issues and information sources in
revising, clarifying, and improving its projections of needs in this area.
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Representative terms from entire chapter:
ocean research
