Demonstration projects were sought to address infrastructure resilience needs for the Department of Defense (DoD). Specifically, proposals were sought for projects that would assess the currently available approaches regarding statistical and dynamical downscaling of climate-related data and that can be applied to the 6th Coupled Model Intercomparison Project climate model data for the purpose of informing DoD infrastructure planning. Projects were needed that compare, contrast, and identify technical readiness and maturity of currently available state-of-the-science and engineering practice approaches that support infrastructure site planning and engineering design needs for DoD installations in the contiguous U.S., Alaska, and Hawaii.
Proposed projects should have assessed the following:
- Strengths and weaknesses of current state-of-the-science downscaling approaches as related to DoD infrastructure planning and design needs.
- Extent to which various downscaling approaches may or may not be particularly suited for regional application within contiguous U.S., Alaska, and Hawaii.
- Uncertainty impacts inherent in the use of different gridded historical datasets used for the purpose of providing local reference climate data for the different approaches examined.
- Capability to use the downscaled climate data within the context of plausible scenarios while following robust decision-making principles.
The proposed projects should have described model downscaling approach information sources; assessed the cost of use from both the computer computational requirements and fiscal resource perspectives; and characterized, using case studies, the ability of the various model approaches to provide appropriate, authoritative, and practical information to DoD engineers and planners. Preference was given to projects that combined expert analysis with a decision support aid that clearly and impartially elucidated the various approaches, models, and tools available. Proposals that included a decision support aid must have proposed how the decision aid would be demonstrated, identify no less than three and no more than five installations as demonstration sites, and proposed the metrics by which success of the decision support aid would be measured. Proposed installations should represent a range of geographic regions, complex terrain, and resource constraints. Preference was given to projects that identified and recommended clear metrics or standards for DoD use in evaluating current and future downscaling approaches to meet DoD infrastructure planning and design needs. Metrics of interest to consider may include temporal and spatial resolution for temperature and precipitation (including rain versus snow), other hydroclimatic variables relevant to infrastructure concerns, ability to address the impacts of terrain and altitude on downscaling, and capability to capture impacts of regional to local hydroclimatic phenomena not resolved in the global models. Finally, preference was given to proposals that described a robust pathway for the transition and future sustainment of the proposed decision support tool beyond the duration of the project.
Project overviews will appear below as they are posted to the website.
