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U.S. National Science Foundation priorities: an update from CNIE and SCB

The National Science Foundation (NSF) recently released an interim report from their Task Force on the Environment. The report, Environmental science and engineering for the 21st Century: the role of the National Science Foundation, recommends broad expansion of funding and visibility for environmental research, education, assessment, and related activities at NSF. It calls for development of an organizational approach to ensure a high-priority, high-visibility, integrated, cohesive, and sustained environmental portfolio within NSF. On 29 July, the report was approved by the National Science Board (NSB). The NSB recommended that NSF request US$1 billion/year (phased in over five years) above current budget levels (estimated at $600 million) for environmental science activities. The full text of the report is available at http://www.nsf.gov/nsb/tfe/nsb99133/start.htm.

NSF created the Task Force on the Environment to "assist the Foundation in defining the scope of its role with respect to environmental research, education, and assessment, and in determining the best means of implementing activities related to this area." The Task Force was created as a result of the efforts of the non-profit Committee for the National Institute for the Environment (CNIE) to create a environmental funding institution under NSF.

NSF is accepting comments on the report at TFE@NSF.gov. In August 1999, SCB President Reed Noss submitted comments on behalf of SCB. For a complete copy of these comments, contact Noss at 7310 NW Acorn Ridge, Corvallis, Oregon 97330, Email nossr@ucs.orst.edu.

Noss supported the report's recommendation that NSF should "provide a more vigorous intellectual and leadership role in advancing new insights and fundamental knowledge essential to addressing a range of emerging environmental issues." Noting that basic and applied scientific research is central to answering questions about how we might assure true ecological sustainability, he commented, "SCB agrees strongly . . . that current funding for environmental research is grossly insufficient . . . we lack information on such basic issues as the landscape configuration required to sustain species and ecological processes over time, responses of species to different management regimes, and early-warning signals of ecosystem change." In his letter, Noss also commended the report's recommendation that NSF develop partnerships with agencies and non-governmental organizations in order to define and implement its new environmental research agenda. He added, "many of the leading scientific societies in the environmental arena, including SCB and the Ecological Society of America, are willing and able to provide assistance in this effort."

Noss also encouraged NSF to eliminate the barrier between "applied" and "basic" or "fundamental" environmental research. In closing, he reiterated that SCB looks forward to working with NSF to realize its bold proposal for environmental research, and thanked NSF for this landmark report.

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