Figure 1.
The tenth meeting of the EOS Investigators Working Group (IWG) and a special meeting of the EOS Payload Panel were held in Santa Fe, New Mexico, June 27-29, 1995. An undercurrent throughout the meeting was the need to face ever-tightening budgetary constraints.
In line with the strong concerns with budgetary issues there were major presentations on the implementation of Mission to Planet Earth (MTPE) in the post-2000 era by Bob Price, an EOSDIS cost model by Dale Harris, and an overall MTPE implementation review by the Payload Panel.
Other topics that received major attention were: (i) an increased focus on collaboration between NASA and NOAA, with special consideration of mutually supporting roles in the converged National Polar Orbiting Environmental Satellite System (NPOESS C-1) to be ready for launch in 2004; and (ii) the status of plans for, and progress in, developing an EOS Science Implementation Plan to be completed by the end of this year.
Ghassem Asrar, EOS Program Scientist, presided over this plenary session.
Charles Kennel, Associate Administrator for Mission to Planet Earth, was the lead speaker, giving the philosophy of Earth observations, a short description of the evolution and current status of EOS, and then a discussion of the NASA/NOAA alignment process.
Kennel said that significant public expenditures must be sustained for global change research. "The world will need an Earth Observing System indefinitely. Scientific integrity is the sine qua non." There must be frank assessments of quality and open discussions of scientific uncertainty.
He started the evolutionary review by saying that following last year's August 1994 rebaselining, it was still possible to maintain the schedule for the first EOS series of platforms and instruments although the program was now reduced to its minimal cost and with considerable risk.
In January of this year, the President's FY 1996 budget request called for removing an additional $5 billion from the NASA budget through FY 2000. MTPE was asked to consider how to take its share of the cuts but responded that it was already too close to an ultimate minimum to lower its budget requirements any further. Following an assessment period, NASA Administrator Dan Goldin instituted a Zero Base Review. It was concluded that the agency would take a reduction in its infrastructure--thus there would be a drop in employment at each of the NASA Centers. In the President's budget request, the employment drop was pegged at about 30%, to be achieved through reduced staffing. Still, the science conducted at the Centers was largely protected. Another conclusion of the Zero Base Review was that NASA would now move toward a "full" accounting system in which government salaries and overhead would be taken into account as in the private world.
Also early this year there was a Federal Laboratory Review which caused NASA, DOE, and DoD to look for redundancies in their organizations. The NASA review was conducted by John Foster. They found that MTPE was among the most important of the NASA programs, but two elements were lacking: 1) no technology infusion was explicitly included in MTPE, and 2) there was no overall science plan, and planned-for short-term results were not defined.
Later, Robert Walker, chairman of the House Science Committee requested a General Accounting Office (GAO) study of the life-cycle cost of EOS over a 29-34 year lifetime. Kennel said that it is essential to respond immediately to such cost questions. He cited the Superconducting Supercollider debacle as an example of a program whose demise was caused by an apparent lack of attention to costs. For EOS there needs to be an explicit picture of the costs associated with the next phase, running out to the year 2022.
The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) in February of this year presented an analysis of how to achieve an $840 M cut in EOS through the year 2000. They concluded that this could be done through delaying the CHEM mission by five years and taking away 25% of the EOSDIS budget. In this approach, there would be delays in providing the data stream, and there would be no short-term benefits achieved.
In March of this year, OMTPE (the Office of Mission to Planet Earth) issued a white paper describing an EOS evolution study in which long-term costs would be reduced, and the program would operate under an annual budget cap after the year 2000. Also in March, OMTPE initiated a NASA/NOAA alignment study, which was to demonstrate how to achieve the benefits of data system synergy.
In April, Congressman Walker requested two coordinated studies: The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) Board on Sustainable Development was to conduct its Congressionally mandated five-year review of U.S. Global Change Research Program (USGCRP), especially EOS and EOSDIS, and NASA was to prepare a scientific and technical justification of EOS and EOSDIS.
In May, the House of Representatives budget committee passed a resolution calling for a $2.7 billion reduction in MTPE for the period FY 1996 to FY 2000.
As one sign in a more-positive direction, in June the Senate subcommittee on Science, Technology, and Space reported favorably on MTPE. Also in June, the GAO issued its study on EOS life-cycle costs.
Turning to the NASA/NOAA alignment study, Kennel said that there could be collocation synergy and also data systems synergy. Collocation synergy includes exploring greater collaboration in modeling and data assimilation, ground systems for spacecraft operations, and algorithm development and research data processing. Data system synergy discussions have included the possibility of integrating NOAA information technology requirements into EOSDIS. There would also be technology infusion from NASA directed toward the development of the National Polar Orbiting Environmental Satellite System (NPOESS).
Concerning the evolution of EOS, Kennel said it would be important to retain the standard 24 measurement sets. They would be accomplished through the flight of the first series of EOS satellites from AM-1 through Laser ALT. Then, it would be feasible to fly the following missions while maintaining a $1 billion cost cap, beginning in 2001.
An important news item was NASA's determination (the week before the IWG meeting) that ESA could not commit to providing the MIMR instrument with acceptable assurance. Accordingly, NASA is exploring the possibility of the Japanese providing an AMSR instrument as replacement for MIMR.
Kennel described the MTPE strategic plan for commercialization activities. The concept is to stimulate commercial involvement in MTPE in several possible ways: 1) through commercial use of MTPE data, 2) government purchase of commercial data, 3) privatizing certain MTPE functions (taking advantage of commercial assets‹"anchor tenancy"), and 4) having commercial interests use government assets.
Kennel affirmed NASA's belief that the world needs and will need an Earth Observing System indefinitely, and he reviewed the question of whether the global change research is sustainable. If the House budget resolution to take $2.7 billion away from MTPE in the period FY 1996 to FY 2000 were to come to pass, and the amount came entirely from EOS, there would be a 79% reduction in the non-contracted effort. This would essentially allow completion of the spacecraft now in the development phase--TRMM, AM-1, and Landsat-7‹but not allow the balance of the first EOS series to be initiated as planned. This would have the effect of unraveling the global climate change strategy.
Various discussion points followed Kennel's presentation. Reinhard Beer pointed out that technological infusion has already occurred in the EOS program‹calling attention to the developments in cryogenic coolers that have been spurred by NASA. Peter Brewer stated that the National Science Foundation (NSF) is NASA's largest partner in U.S. Global Change Research and asked whether NSF is included in discussions on achieving the goals of MTPE. Kennel responded that there is no formal agency-to-agency partnership between the two agencies, but he does consult with Bob Corell at NSF.
Vince Salomonson urged that OMPTE develop a crisp statement on why Earth observations are needed indefinitely.
Kennel said that there had been a Marshall Institute report in response to a request from Representative Walker. The report was somewhat negative on global change research, but acknowledged the potential for global warming and agreed that there should be stable long-term funding for global change research.
Kennel said that there was a real possibility of a merger of appropriate elements of NOAA with NASA/MTPE. He also gave instances of coordination with other nations. He said that the draft plans of ESA, NASDA, and NASA all point to a global Earth observing system originating around the year 2015.
Robert Price, director of the Mission to Planet Earth Office (MTPEO) at the Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC), gave a summary presentation on "EOS Program Reshape." In the presentation, he described MTPE implementation in the post-2000 period. The effort to redefine NASA's approach to accomplishing MTPE objectives in the post-2000 era has been termed "reshaping." The reshaping effort calls for the EOS program to fit within a cost cap and to end in the year 2019. It also calls for increased NASA/NOAA cooperation.
Price showed the new MTPE timeline. It includes the five-year USGCRP reviews called for by the Congress and two-year program reviews called for by MTPEO. Flights in the New Millennium Program (NMP) are to begin in about FY 98 and will take place on 18- to 20-month centers. They will focus on developing new technologies. New science is expected to come from applications of NMP developments to the new program of Earth System Science Pathfinders (ESSP). The year 2019 has been adopted as the date for ending the EOS program.
The steering committee for the reshape process was led by Charles Kennel for NASA and Robert Winokur for NOAA. The three study teams were: Science (Michael King, Chair), Flight (Chris Scolese, Chair), and Data (John Dalton, Chair).
The ground rules for the "reshape" exercise included changing the scope of EOS without increasing funding for the years prior to 2000 to do the following in priority order: 1) provide for NOAA and Landsat operational measurement sets beginning in 2004; and 2) support funding for future Mission Technology Flight Demonstrations in NMP.
There is a new proposed approach to defining EOS missions. Some are to be designated as "monitoring," and others are to be designated as "process study" missions. Monitoring missions are those that must be conducted continuously-without breaks--whereas process missions may be interrupted for periods of time. The concept of the 24 EOS measurement sets is to be preserved, but it is understood that there is not a one-on-one correspondence between the instruments and the measurement sets.
Designing a smaller AM-2 mission will permit advancing the MODIS and Landsat Advanced Technology Instrument (LATI) measurements. There is to be an advanced MODIS and an advanced MISR on AM-2. The CHEM-2 mission will be split into a monitoring and a process study mission. In the new mission sequence, Laser ALT is advanced to 2001. A new PM-2A mission will be designed to complement the NPOESS C-1 mission.
Price presented seven options for reducing the costs of EOSDIS. Among them was decreasing the number of Distributed Active Archive Centers (DAACs). The recommended approach was to establish two "consolidated" hubs where the data processing hardware would be situated and five user support centers from which data processing can be accomplished remotely. This move is hoped to lead to considerable savings.
Regarding the NASA/NOAA alignment process, preliminary considerations have included program integration (referring to the science activities), technology infusion for both low-Earth orbit (LEO) and geostationary orbit (GEO) missions, and synergistic relations regarding the data systems.
Price said that the second series of EOS missions will incorporate developments from the New Millennium Program (NMP). The third series (referred to so far as "dash 3") are now designated "continuity" missions and will also feature developments from NMP. There are to be Announcements of Opportunity (AO) for participation in the Earth System Science Pathfinder (ESSP) missions.
Price gave a charge to the IWG and to its Payload Panel: 1) "Consider the proposed changes to the program and make recommendations"; and 2) "Offer suggestions to define your participation in a process to periodically review the program, including advances in the state-of-the-art and mission concepts."
Price concluded his presentation saying that the "reshaping" process preserves the 24 EOS measurement sets and will stay within a $1 billion annual budget cap in the years after 2000.
Berrien Moore discussed the forthcoming National Academy of Sciences/National Research Council (NASA/NRC) Summer Study, which will be a review of USGCRP and, therefore, MTPE/EOS. The review will be held at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography starting on July 19, and will be co-chaired by Ed Frieman (Scripps) and Moore (University of New Hampshire, EOS Principal Investigator). [Frieman is chair of the NAS Board on Sustainable Development, and Moore is chair of the Board's Committee on Global Change Research (CGCR)]. The review was called for in a letter from Congressman Robert Walker, Chairman of the House Committee on Science, addressed to Bruce Alberts, President of the NAS, and Robert White, President of the National Academy of Engineering (NAE). Walker's letter points out that the requested review is in line with Public Law 101-606, the Global Change Research Act of 1990. This law specifies that there be a five-year review cycle on USGCRP. (USGCRP was established in 1990.) The letter mentions changing needs for activities in support of public policy.
In the letter Walker states his interests in establishing the scientific progress that has been achieved to date; assessing the current observational strategy--taking into account the possible commercial uses of the products--considering the possibility of privatizing EOSDIS.
Moore presented the preliminary agenda for the Summer Study. Four science areas have been identified with the following panel leaders:
The Study is to end on Friday July 28, and hard copies of its findings are to be delivered by the end of August to the Congress, the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP), and the administrators of the relevant federal agencies.
Bob Harriss, Director of the Science Division of MTPE, spoke on MTPE Science Implementation. He stressed that MTPE science needs to adopt an aggressive posture. We must get the message across that lots of progress has already been made. It is very important to have metrics of MTPE accomplishments.
The time is right to make it clear that NASA Research and Analysis (the R&A program) science and EOS science work together. There is, in fact, a fully integrated effort within NASA and within NOAA and NSF as well.
A draft MTPE science plan is to be issued this fall. Science priorities for the years 1995 to 2000 are as follows:
Harriss gave research goals that support each of the four science priorities and then listed observations that support the goals. In support of the seasonal-to-interannual climate change research goal are observations to characterize extreme climate events and natural hazards. Harriss pointed out that NASA's space geodesy program is basic to conducting MTPE's sea-level altimetry mission. Good digital elevation model (DEM) data are needed and planned for in support of many aspects of Earth remote observations.
Looking at the USGCRP goal in regard to land-cover change and global productivity, Harriss noted that changes in "industrial metabolism" and land transformations are both examples of human forcing.
The ocean color community is pulling together a calibration/validation plan to make use of data from various observing programs, both interagency and international. The modeling community is finding that model intercomparisons are powerful tools to drive science forward.
A near-term product of Earth observing science is likely to be the development of high-precision agriculture.
The Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite (UARS) has provided a global perspective on stratospheric ozone changes and has been the basis for the action by society to restrict the uses of CFCs and thereby to bring human-caused ozone depletion to a halt. In this connection Goddard has a new space-based program to measure surface levels of UV.
Kennel added that a shuttle radar laboratory (SRL) mission could collect great amounts of topographical data. This would be an important supplement to the MTPE missions and to the work of the Defense Mapping Agency.
Michael King, EOS Senior Project Scientist, presided over this plenary session.
Yukio Haruyama, National Space Development Agency (NASDA) of Japan, discussed NASDA future Earth observation plans. The ADEOS spacecraft is due to be launched in August 1996, and the launch of ADEOS II will permit an overlap between the two missions, leading to a continuous 10-year program. AMSR is intended to fly on ADEOS II, and there are plans for a TRMM follow-on to be called ATMOS-A. However, there is no funding commitment for space missions beyond 2004.
NASDA's data policy is the same as that of EOSDIS. Procedures for getting data to the users are under development right now.
Chris Readings, European Space Agency (ESA), described ESA's future Earth observation plans. There is an intent to increase commercial and operational use of European space-based observations. Since his last presentation, the METOP program (polar) has changed to include three satellites; likewise, METEOSAT Second Generation (MSG) (in the geostationary line) will have three satellites. Meteorological Operational Satellite (METEOSAT) will be flying second-generation instruments; the Geostationary Earth Radiation Monitor (GERB) is an important addition to the program.
The scientific achievements of ERS-1 are now documented and available in book form. There have been 350 responses to the Announcement of Opportunity for participation in ERS-1. Land channels are a new addition for the version of the Along-Track Scanning Radiometer (ATSR) which is to fly on ERS-2.
METOP-1 will include a dual-swath wind scatter-ometer (ASCATT). An instrument called OMI (based on GOME) is planned as an ozone-monitoring instrument. An effort has been under way for the first time to get the operational community to state its requirements for OMI.
A Doppler wind lidar is still under study as part of an Earth Observations Preparatory Program (EOPP).
Readings defined candidate missions for the post-2000 era. The Earth Explorer missions will be dedicated to R&D. The Earth Watch missions are regarded as pre-operational. There were nine identified candidate Explorer missions--the first three are to have priority as important and feasible, but not being done elsewhere. A proposed chemistry mission was regarded as too ambitious, but it will be reconsidered when the requirements have been scaled back. Five missions have been identified under the rubric of Earth Watch. The strongest push is for coastal zone observations--both land and water. ESA is also reviewing the future of synthetic aperture radar (SAR). A data system is now being built to accommodate data starting with ERS-1 and continuing to the time of ENVISAT. There is a concern with data transfer across international boundaries. Collaboration has been most successful on operational scenarios, e.g., EUMETSAT with NOAA.
Ichtiaque Rasool commented that at the Center for Earth Observations they are trying to form an entity among EUMETSAT, ESA, and the European Community.
Michael Freilich, chair of the Panel on Data Quality (PDQ), discussed developments that are directed toward an overall EOS Calibration/Validation and Quality Assurance Plan, which defines activities aimed at ensuring the ultimate scientific integrity of the EOS data suite. Uncertainties arising from different instruments contribute to the overall uncertainties associated with the various EOS measurement products.
Freilich gave his definitions of calibration, validation, and quality assurance:
The Panel views as its key effort establishing the adequacy of the calibration/validation activities conducted in EOS.
Following an afternoon break, Drew Rothrock, as leader of the effort, described the status and gave an overview of the EOS Science Implementation Plan. He said that the Plan would fill a serious void for which EOS has been criticized for some time. He listed the chapters which address each of the seven themes of EOS, identified the lead chapter authors, and said that the intent is to have the Plan published by the end of this year. Also in his listing were the names of persons designated to provide specific sections within the chapters. With seven topical chapters of about 50 pages each plus additional front and back chapters, Rothrock estimated that this would turn out to be about a 500-page document.
There was some discussion as to whether this would be properly called an "implementation" plan if it did not carry dates by which things are to be accomplished. Another issue was whether specific individuals or groups in EOS would be named. Pierre Morel noted that there were parts of Earth science that did not appear in the outline of the Plan. For instance, he said, atmospheric circulation was omitted, the troposphere was omitted, and coastal zone activities were omitted.
Mous Chahine said that the Plan should give the hypotheses which have led up to the elements of the EOS program--Why are we doing this? We must also give the expected results of the program. Ricky Rood called attention to the need to have one specific place in the Plan where the assimilation effort could be described, showing its integrative effect over all the aspects of EOS science. He also argued for the use of timelines in the Plan and said that it would be important to specify uncertainties where they exist and indicate how they would be reduced.
Bruce Wielicki felt that it would be desirable to indicate new possibilities for measurements such as cloud radars. Correspondingly, Mark Schoeberl proposed that the Plan should identify measurements that are not being made by EOS.
The last speaker of the day was Dennis Hartmann who, as lead author for Chapter 4, Clouds, Radiation, Water Vapor, and Precipitation, of the Science Implementation Plan, discussed the status of the chapter. Material is coming in as requested. As described later, other chapters were discussed in breakout sessions on Wednesday afternoon.
Ali Montasser, NASA Headquarters, chaired this plenary session, which was devoted primarily to developing an understanding of EOSDIS operations and associated costs.
Lead speaker was Dale Harris, Associate Director of Mission Operations and Data Systems for the Earth Science Data and Information System (ESDIS) Project at NASA Goddard, who gave the EOSDIS update and status. Harris said that there has been a complete reorganization of EOSDIS since last year and listed the program changes that have been made. Among these changes were: a tentative decision to abandon TDRSS for the missions that follow the AM-1 mission-using ground stations would lead to a cost increase for EOSDIS but a savings in costs attributed to the spacecraft; a decision to consolidate the EOS Data and Operations System (EDOS) at White Sands that would save on costs; and a decision to strengthen the system engineering and integration team in the ESDIS Project.
Organizational changes included: naming Harris to his present post with John Dalton as his deputy; naming Ellen Herring to head the System Management Office; Mel Banks to head the Development Office; and H. K. Ramapriyan to head the Science Office where he oversees the DAAC efforts.
Harris showed the TRMM launch schedule and said that EOSDIS will archive and distribute all TRMM data. While listing major accomplishments Harris noted that the DAACs now need test data sets from TRMM instruments.
The Version 0 (V0) Information Management System (IMS) has been on-line since August 1994. It has some problems due to bandwidth limitations. There is an approach to making V0 available through a World Wide Web gateway.
Jim Hansen noted that in the past civil servant costs have not been included in government cost budgets but that they will be in the future. This will be a significant consideration in evaluating the "real" costs of programs such as EOSDIS.
Dave Glover, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute, chairman of the EOS Data Panel, gave a Panel update and status. He thanked Harris for his clarifications of the $2.2 billion EOSDIS budget, which would be the subject of Harris's follow-on presentation. He referred to the activities of the two ad hoc EOS study groups, the Ad Hoc Working Group on Production and the Ad Hoc Working Group on Consumers. He noted that projected savings in EOSDIS are to come from reductions in networks and reductions in personnel costs.
The new consolidation concept calls for having two Processing and Archiving Centers (PAACs) and establishing User Support Service Centers (USSCs) to replace the DAACs. The two PAACs would not necessarily be back-ups for each other.
Reinhard Beer commented that the instrument people worry about their data disappearing into a centralized facility and that his group would be perfectly happy to do its own processing. Bruce Barkstrom opined that it was highly probable that there would be no economies of scale due to centralizing‹also communications costs would rise.
Much of the morning plenary session was given over to a major presentation by Dale Harris, simply titled EOSDIS Costs. The purpose of the presentation was to develop an understanding of the cost elements of EOSDIS to enable better participation by the science community in budget reduction decisions, and to build support by the science community for the resulting reduction decisions. Harris started by saying that the Hughes contract known as the EOS Core System (ECS) delivers only a piece of the entire system. The Project at Goddard contracts to deliver the entire system. Referring to an earlier proposed change, he said that adding ground stations for data acquisition would lead to an added $100 million in costs. This is because data storage onboard the spacecraft following AM-1 would need to be increased.
Harris gave a detailed budget summary for EOSDIS. Columnar entries, listed by function, were for FY 1995 and prior years (one column) and then individual entries for each fiscal year from FY 1996 to FY 2000. The grand total was $2.2308 billion.
Among "individual functions," the two significantly largest cost items were data capture, initial processing, and archiving; and science data processing, archiving, and distribution. Among "engineering/integration functions" the standout cost item was ECS contract-wide functions.
In the discussion that followed, Pierre Morel asked how the requirements could be reduced so as to lower costs. He asked why there were so many flight operations instrument data sets. Who checks their quality (in view of the huge amounts coming down)? Harris responded that all data are saved in case problems should arise later. The requirement to have 95% availability of data for two orbits is a big cost driver.
Jeff Dozier said that we still need to be able to relate costs to requirements. We should be able to identify what would be lost if costs were to decrease? We also need an independent assessment of EOSDIS costs from experts in computer technology. The technological forecasts used by EOSDIS still need to be checked. (Montasser said that there is an independent organization, the Gartner Group, whose business it is to verify costs.) Dozier added that the chief cost driver is the requirement for high system reliability. Reber asked whether changing "requirements" to "goals" or "best efforts" would lead to savings.
Eric Barron, chairman of the EOS Science Executive Committee (SEC), discussed changes within the SEC. Every year about half of the SEC Panel chairs are replaced, thus bringing in new members to share SEC responsibilities. New chairpersons at this time are as follows:
Barron reported that the peer reviews for the Interdisciplinary Science Investigations are soon to be held. Principal Investigators may add up to five papers to the peer review package. These can be attachments to the specified 30-page progress report.
Starting at noon and running in two-hour parallel sessions, reviews were held of the various chapters of the Science Implementation Plan, with lead chapter authors as follows:
At several of these chapter reviews the point was made that attention needs to be paid to the question of the social relevance of EOS science.
This was the beginning of an all-day session of the EOS Payload Panel. This morning session was largely devoted to providing information that the Payload Panel could use in its deliberations.
Mark Abbott, as new chair of the Payload Panel, opened the session and said that it is expected that the Panel will meet again in the fall. He then yielded the floor to Bob Price, for a presentation on the EOS "reshaping" exercise that has been going on since early March. Price noted that John Hrastar, his new deputy, led the exercise.
The guidelines were to reshape the program for the post-2000 era, to fit a cost cap, to adapt to the better, faster, cheaper mission design approach, and to increase NASA/NOAA cooperation. The task group for the exercise was to take a proactive role in redefining the program. The budgetary target was to stay within an annual $1 billion cost cap. Study teams that were formed included NOAA members as well as representatives of EOS science, flight programs, and data systems.
A ground rule was to retain the 24 measurement sets as a fixed requirement, but not necessarily to retain the specific instruments that might obtain the measurements. Any new science is to be added on as a "new start" under Mission to Planet Earth. The 24 measurement sets listed by Price are shown here as Figure 1.
Figure 1.
In another chart, Price categorized those measurements that were felt to be appropriately described as "monitoring" and those described as "process." Monitoring denotes measurements that must be made continuously without interruption. Process measurements can be made with periods of gaps. Breakouts into monitoring and process studies are illustrated in Figures 2a and 2b.
Figures 2a
Figure 2b
The new proposed launch sequence is shown in Figure 3. Noteworthy on this chart are the appearance of PM-2A, the related NPOESS C-1, and CHEM-2 Monitor and CHEM-2 Process missions. PM-2A now is regarded as the research mission and is limited to three instruments: CERES, "passive microwave," and Advanced MODIS (AMODIS). The other key part of the original PM mission, the overall atmospheric sounding system, is to be carried by NPOESS, characterized as the operational mission. The split of the CHEM mission presumes that monitoring can be done by the Advanced MLS (AMLS) and SAGE III, whereas Advanced TES (ATES), Advanced HIRDLS (AHRDLS), and Advanced Science Instrument (ASI) will make the observations needed for the process studies.
In the discussion that followed an objection was voiced to the phrase that "science needs are met by the reshaped program." Kennel's response was that the program has indeed lost robustness but the measurement categories have been retained. Still the program has become more vulnerable through accepting gaps in the measurement process and through accepting greater reliance on programs conducted by others. Reinhard Beer urged that measurements of the oxidizing capacity of the troposphere be kept as a requirement for monitoring. Moore said that there is a concern about the nature of the collaborative effort between the EOS PM-2 mission and the NPOESS mission. Mouginis-Mark was concerned with the need to provide high-resolution bands to measure SO2 in the atmosphere. He thought that this might be a suitable requirement for an Earth System Science Pathfinder (ESSP) Mission.
Hartmann suggested that monitoring implies trend detection and, therefore, leads to a requirement for a well-calibrated instrument set. Rottman urged that SOLSTICE should be in operation at the same time as the CHEM mission. It would provide a key measurement set for monitoring.
Freilich asked whether the program now assumed that vector surface winds over the ocean would be determined by a passive microwave sensor. Price replied that it was indeed the assumption. Asrar added that it would take advantage of the polarization properties of the signal received from the surface and that this measurement scheme was desired by NOAA. Brewer suggested that sea surface salinity could also be measured by passive microwave using an L-band radiometer.
Continuing his presentation, Price said it is necessary to allow the possibility of new measurements entering the program--this could be accomplished through the 5-year USGCRP review cycle. It is also necessary to give more substance to participation with international entities and with commercial interests.
After the morning break Price continued to outline the cost-reduction plans that are part of "reshaping." He spent considerable time outlining possible changes to EOSDIS that would result in considerable cost savings. Figure 4 illustrates cost- reduction options that have been investigated.
Figure 4.
An item that appears to be a major cost driver is the current EOSDIS requirement that "EOS shall be capable of delivering not less than 95% of all measurements made during any two consecutive orbits to the DAACs and the Level 0 backup archive." Price said that a cost-saving alternative would be to have the requirement changed from reading "any two consecutive orbits" to reading "each orbit repeat cycle." He argued that this would allow greater flexibility in spacecraft and ground system design.
Other portions of Price's presentation dealt with the nature of possible program collaboration between NASA and NOAA (NASA/NOAA Alignment) and with technology infusion into MTPE.
Following Price's remarks, Bruce Barkstrom gave his independent assessment of the possible cost reductions to be achieved in EOSDIS. He said that his analysis of hardware costs for the period 1996 to 2000 was in good agreement with the Project's figures. He felt that major savings would come from staff reductions and not from consolidation; and he questioned the Project's figures for network costs as being too high.
Barkstrom presented a strategy for reducing costs without consolidating facilities. This strategy is based on some preliminary results from an EOSDIS system model that he created. He felt that his model is in reasonable agreement with ESDIS Project estimates on hardware costs (computers, staging disks, and tertiary storage units) from 1996 through 2000, but is significantly lower in staffing costs than the ESDIS Project's estimates. He suggested that the Project had not adequately considered the amount of data required for quality assurance (QA) and validation in its estimates of network costs. (Barkstrom's model had not examined costs for flight operations or for capturing satellite data, considered only the TRMM and AM-1 missions with no allowance for later mission and data assimilation.
Barkstrom's strategy suggested: 1) accepting the Project's proposed actions to save costs on network development by consolidating EDOS and the ECS Science Network; and 2) reducing staffing through decreased staff growth at the DAACs, and through decreased effort on data schema design and development on the part of both the ESDIS Project and the ECS Contractor.
Barkstrom said that EOS scientists may need to take more responsibility for documentation and preparation of data products before turning them over to EOSDIS if some components of EOSDIS staffing are to be reduced. Savings could also come about through optimizing data delivery systems. Barkstrom's overall conclusions were that: 1) based on the available information, consolidation does not appear to be warranted; and 2) it appears that there are substantial possibilities for large cost savings through planning for decreased staffing and careful data delivery choices.
Barkstrom also noted that the DAACs currently provide the only substantive source of competition and innovation within EOSDIS. It is also clear that the DAACs are currently serving their user communities well and are generally supported by those communities. Thus, the suggestion of consolidation appears to place EOSDIS at unjustified risk of losing contact with the EOS user community.
In this final session, Mark Abbott summarized the NASA presentations and presented the challenges facing the Payload Panel. He began by saying that in the early days of EOS, the process for design and evolution of the payloads was relatively slow. The organizational structure (review committees, Academy panels, etc.) to implement this process worked well in an environment characterized by relatively stable funding and technology. The time scale for review was much smaller than the time scale for funding or technology changes. The situation has changed in the past five years such that these two time scales are nearly equal, but we still rely on essentially the same organizational structure. The challenge to the Payload Panel is to develop mechanisms to cope with this significantly changed environment.
Pressures on EOS include:
There are four elements that are needed to help balance these forces. We must have a prioritization and review process to insert new technology and new science into EOS. Second, we must consider how to transfer observing systems designed for research into ongoing, "operational" systems. Third, we need to establish a calibration/validation program to ensure inter-operability of the sensors. Fourth, we need a flexible data system that can incorporate new processing algorithms, support technology insertion, etc.
Four splinter groups considered these issues and also considered a request by Michael King to begin to categorize measurement types. The group chairs were Eric Barron, Dave Glover, Dennis Hartmann, and Berrien Moore.
The groups reported back in plenary, and Abbott summarized the findings:
The "wrap-up" presentation for the meeting was given by Charles Kennel. He said that a NASA government group would meet that night to react to what had transpired at the three-day meeting. He saw the need to reconcile the cost estimates for EOSDIS and said that he felt that the cost numbers should have been presented to the IWG a year ago. He also said that he saw the need to improve on the terminology being used to distinguish monitoring from process study observations. He then outlined the activities that would be coming up prior to the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) review.
On July 5 the NASA employees would rehearse their presentations to the NAS. White House representatives would be there. To be taken into account would be the reshape exercise, EOSDIS, commercialization strategies, the international dimension, and NASA/NOAA convergence. Sixteen-to-seventeen issue papers would be reviewed. Documents being prepared would be for public consumption as well as for the Congress to see. On July 11 there would be a meeting with Administrator Goldin, and on July 12 position papers would be forwarded to the NAS members of the review committee.
Between July and Labor Day there would be decisions made on the FY 1996 budget with the hope that the future of MTPE/EOS would not be unduly constrained.
Kennel left the group with the final thought that we need to consider how to accomplish science and technology evolution in MTPE/EOS while continuing to focus on long-term science issues.
