For their many climate-related missions, federal agencies need robust climate intelligence

The impacts of climate change are already upon us, and — whether from floods, storms, wildfires, droughts or other natural events — we know those impacts will be severe, even catastrophic in some cases. These climate-related disruptions are wide-ranging, affecting many mission areas of government, including environmental protection, transportation, energy, public health and safety, border protection, national security, agriculture and food security, and economic security, to name a few.

Many government planners are already thinking about how their agencies fit into a broader, whole-of-government approach to the problem. Along with that, a more scalable response to the problem will require a greater collaboration of talent, resources and perspectives; federal agencies will also need to partner with state, local and foreign governments, as well as with academic institutions, business communities, the scientific community, entrepreneurs, the first responder community, the public and others, showcasing a whole-of-America approach.

In other words, everyone has a role to play in this, and collaboration among all stakeholders will be vital in mitigating and adapting to the problems to come. At the foundation of this collaboration will be what we call climate intelligence. In essence, climate intelligence is data, derived from as many sources as needed, that has been translated into actionable information for specific stakeholders.

Climate intelligence can be used to better understand how the climate is affecting us or will affect us, as well as its cascading multi-sectoral impacts. It can help influence and change how people behave in ways that could lessen the impacts of climate change. And it can better inform decisions, research, deployments, behaviors and policies needed to improve society’s readiness and resiliency.

A modern-day example of climate intelligence is an effort we see underway among several federal agencies that aims to better understand the degree of water scarcity in the western United States. As we have seen in recent news, a severe drought has brought water levels of major western reserves — Lake Mead, Lake Powell and the Colorado River — to historically low levels, threatening the livelihoods, agriculture and health of regional populations.

The U.S. Geological Survey, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Bureau of Reclamation, Agriculture Department, and other agencies are partnering to collect and share a wide variety of data with each other as well as with key stakeholder communities. One data stream, for example, is generated by high-precision radar instruments and other sources and informs agencies of precipitation amounts in the western Rockies. Another data stream — derived mostly from manual sampling of snowpacks throughout the mountains — informs scientists how much water is in the snow. A third data stream, generated from satellites and ground-based microwave radiometers, tells us the level of water in the soil.

When combined, analyzed and properly packaged and presented, these data streams — all from highly disparate types, formats and sources of data — can offer valuable insights into what will happen in the near- and medium-term future in terms of water availability for key populations and stakeholders in that part of the country. This data-driven approach to assessing our climate-related circumstances and making decisions and policies is at the core of climate intelligence.

First and foremost, climate intelligence is about bringing multi-source data together in a way that makes it highly actionable for its intended consumers, whomever they might be. But to achieve the greatest positive impact, we believe climate intelligence also should be:

• Highly shareable for improved collaboration across the global community of data providers
• Delivered in customized, locally relevant ways (e.g., visualizations and curated data products) for specific stakeholders and purposes
• Augmented by partnerships and communities of data that span public, commercial and government datasets
• Shared so that it is discoverable and easily accessible and understood by all, including citizen scientists, underserved and marginalized communities, and the broader public
• Rapidly produced, acquired and delivered to keep pace with fast-evolving threats
• Responsive to self-service queries for many stakeholders and localities

Taken together, these characteristics will help federal agencies achieve the full scope of climate intelligence capability to help them elevate from an enterprise approach to data to what is truly needed: an ecosystem approach where data can come from any source and be translated into value for any consumer, inside or outside of government.

More importantly, if designed well, climate intelligence at the federal level can lead to greater resiliency in the near-term and better sustainability planning in the long-term, across the nation and beyond.

There are, of course, challenges for all organizations — federal agencies included — in being able to routinely produce and incorporate climate intelligence for day-to-day decision-making. After all, climate change is probably the ultimate big data challenge, simply because the data sets involved are so disparate, voluminous, fast-evolving and complex to work with.

One of the biggest barriers is making needed data accessible. Countless silos — imposed by organizational jurisdictions, regulations, technology infrastructure, organizational cultures and information classifications — make it hard to bring needed data sets together where they can produce greater value or any value at all.

Another challenge is the exponential proliferation of data products derived from that data. Stakeholders and data consumers — other than those who created and first used these products — have difficulty reusing or gaining value from them because the underlying assumptions, processes and algorithms are largely unknown.

Similarly, different organizations across the climate ecosystem employ a multitude of technology approaches for data access, shared access, analytics, visualization and dissemination. These disparate technologies and approaches can create barriers to reliable, verifiable and accessible climate data that can be used by various climate stakeholders.

These challenges are daunting, but not insurmountable. Moving forward, federal agencies must be empowered to address these challenges to outline a roadmap for building a robust climate intelligence foundation as well as improve collaboration to reflect a whole-of-America framework.

Prachi Sukhatankar is a vice president at Booz Allen Hamilton who leads climate and infrastructure transformation for Booz Allen’s clients. Dr. Jim Reilly, a former astronaut and former director of the U.S. Geological Survey, is an executive advisor in Booz Allen’s aerospace business.

In part 2 of this commentary, Sukhatankar will discuss practical ways to overcome the challenges to building a climate intelligence foundation.

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