Funding will support NOAA’s collaborative efforts with three key industries
Today, the Department of Commerce (DOC) and NOAA announced an $85 million investment in the new Industry Proving Grounds (IPG) program to promote the development and use of actionable climate information. This initiative, which is funded through the Inflation Reduction Act—the largest climate investment in our nation’s history—as part of President Biden’s Investing in America agenda, will be led by NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI).
U.S. Department of Commerce Deputy Secretary Don Graves, joined by NOAA Administrator Dr. Rick Spinrad and NOAA Satellite and Information Service Assistant Administrator Dr. Steve Volz, visited NCEI facilities in Asheville, N.C. today to kick off the IPG program. DOC and NOAA officials were joined by industry leaders, highlighting the growing and important role of NOAA’s data, products, and services in creating a climate-ready nation while boosting economic growth.
“NOAA, alongside key industry leaders, is working to promote climate resilience across the United States,” said U.S. Department of Commerce Deputy Secretary Don Graves. “The Industry Proving Grounds initiative, which was made possible by funding from President Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act, will allow NOAA to deliver more modernized products and services to help build adaptation in the face of a changing climate.”
The IPG program focuses on three industries: finance and reinsurance, retail, and architecture and engineering. NCEI will continually engage with industry partners to inform sector-relevant data tools and user-friendly delivery of climate data. At the kick-off event, representatives from the Reinsurance Association of America, Retail Industry Leaders Association, and the American Society of Civil Engineers participated in a roundtable discussion.
By focusing on developing more relevant data products, NCEI aims to close sector-identified gaps in climate information needs, as well as expand its suite of products that blend environmental and socioeconomic data in order to better serve communities that are the most vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. Specific goals include providing a more robust understanding of historical hail events, which causes an average of $15 billion in damage to the United States each year, and supporting partners involved in catastrophic impact modeling and risk assessment to develop better information for the insurance sector.
“NOAA is constantly looking for ways to better serve the American public and key industry partners,” said NOAA Administrator Rick Spinrad, Ph.D. “This new Industry Proving Grounds initiative will help advance NOAA’s efforts to build a more Climate-Ready Nation by making way for innovative product development and ensuring our climate products, data and services meet the needs of climate-impacted industries.”
NCEI will deliver user-friendly climate data by modernizing NOAA’s data and information network, and leveraging Artificial Intelligence and cloud-based delivery. Other goals include co-creating tailored web interfaces with different industry sectors and developing use cases that document the importance of NOAA information to the industries that it services.
“NOAA plays an important role in our nation's prosperity, resilience, and equity as we learn more about our changing world,” said NCEI Director Deke Arndt. “This generous allocation of funding awarded through the Inflation Reduction Act will further our goal of increased literacy and utility of NOAA’s vast data holdings, continuing a long tradition of creating lasting value from the nation's investment in environmental observations and data.”
NCEI is collaborating closely on IPG with other NOAA offices, including the National Weather Service and Oceanic and Atmospheric Research, and has forged partnerships with the Department of Defense (DoD) and National Science Foundation (NSF). Using IPG funding, DoD plans to support U.S.-based companies in developing tools to improve operational forecasting for local/regional impacts of extreme weather. NSF will support university and industry research consortia in creating climate change risk assessment models to assist the finance and insurance sectors.
Additionally, to expand the use of NOAA technology and accelerate adoption and economic growth externally, the NOAA Technology Partnerships Office is performing market assessments of NOAA-developed technologies. The Technology Partnerships Office is also examining the best pathways for Regional Innovation Coordinators based across the U.S. to partner with the private sector, including: Small Business (SBIR), Cooperative Research and Development Agreements (CRADAs), and/or Other Transactional Authority (OTA).
NOAA’s ultimate mission is to provide environmental data, products, and services covering the depths of the ocean floor to the surface of the sun to drive resilience, prosperity, and equity for current and future generations.
