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<td>News: NSF shrinks NEON in major blow to high-profile
U.S. ecological science project</td>
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<td>Mon, 3 Aug 2015 11:20:34 -0400</td>
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<th align="RIGHT" nowrap="nowrap" valign="BASELINE">From: </th>
<td>Robert Gropp <a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:rgropp@aibs.org"><rgropp@aibs.org></a></td>
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<td>AIBS Public Policy Committee mailing list
<a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:publicpolicycommittee-l@aibs.org"><publicpolicycommittee-l@aibs.org></a></td>
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To AIBS Public Policy Committee,
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<div>A rather rather major announcement from NSF regarding NEON.
Due to construction delays and cost overruns, the project is
being re-scoped and the aquatic aspects will be eliminated. <br>
<div><br>
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<div><a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="http://news.sciencemag.org/environment/2015/08/nsf-shrinks-neon-major-blow-high-profile-u-s-ecological-science-project">http://news.sciencemag.org/environment/2015/08/nsf-shrinks-neon-major-blow-high-profile-u-s-ecological-science-project</a></div>
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<div>Rob</div>
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<div class="field-item" style="box-sizing: border-box;">NSF
shrinks NEON in major blow to high-profile U.S.
ecological science project</div>
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<p style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 1rem;">The
National Science Foundation (NSF) today acknowledged
that it bit off more than it could chew when it agreed
in 2010 to build a unique network of dozens of
ecological stations across the United States. Facing
cost overruns and construction delays, NSF officials
have decided to reduce the scope of the troubled <a
moz-do-not-send="true" href="http://www.neoninc.org/"
style="box-sizing: border-box; color: rgb(46, 67,
118); text-decoration: none;">National Ecological
Observatories Network (NEON)</a> and eliminate a major
aquatic research component.</p>
<p style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 1rem;">NSF
recently discovered that the $433 million project, which
was scheduled to be completed next year, “was delayed
and projected to be approximately $80 million over
budget if it stayed on its current trajectory,” says
James Olds, head of NSF’s biology directorate. After
consulting with NEON officials and outside scientists,
Olds says NSF “identified a descope option that will
keep the project scientifically transformational and
should bring it in on time and on budget.”</p>
<p style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 1rem;">The
move to shrink NEON follows years of complaints from
scientists that NSF and project management have been
inflexible and that the community has been shut out of
the decision-making process. And all sides acknowledge
that NEON was terra incognito. A report in February by a
top-level advisory body noted that “it is important to
remember that the ecological research community has no
experience with a project of this scale.” The report
also tried to revive the flagging spirits of researchers
who may have lost interest in the project because of
what it called the “long time period of design and
construction without any data flow.”</p>
<div style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 1rem;"><br
class="webkit-block-placeholder">
</div>
<p style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 1rem;">NSF’s
announcement is a blow to those who plan to use NEON.
“It’s terrible news,” says ecologist Walter Dodds of
Kansas State University in Manhattan, who championed
STREON, NEON’s now-canceled aquatic experimentation
component. But NEON Inc., the Boulder-based nonprofit
that manages the project, vowed in a statement that “the
project will remain positioned to meet the goal of
transforming continental scale ecology,” adding that
large NSF-funded projects “commonly require adjustments
of scope and in this regard NEON is not exceptional.”</p>
<p style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 1rem;"><strong
style="box-sizing: border-box;">Ecology's big data
moment</strong></p>
<p style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 1rem;">The
changes are the latest twist for a project first
proposed 15 years ago—not by the ecology community, but
by then-NSF Director Rita Colwell. NEON was seen as
ecology’s entry into the world of big data. In lieu of
the traditional approach of having scientists monitor
their own tiny slice of the world, using their own
methods and instruments, NEON would standardize the
process—and collect data on a massive, continental
scale.</p>
<p style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 1rem;"><span
style="box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.538em;">After
several false starts, </span><a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="http://news.sciencemag.org/2009/07/another-green-light-neon-and-heftier-price-tag"
style="box-sizing: border-box; color: rgb(46, 67,
118); text-decoration: none; line-height: 1.538em;">researchers
and NSF coalesced around a final plan for NEON.</a> For
some 30 years, scientists would collect a continuous
stream of information from <a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="http://www.neoninc.org/science-design/field-sites"
style="box-sizing: border-box; color: rgb(46, 67,
118); text-decoration: none;">towers and sensors
installed at sites within 20 ecological domains</a>,
including tropical forests, wetlands, high desert
prairies, and even urban ecosystems. Data from “core”
terrestrial and aquatic sites within each domain would
be supplemented by information from two “relocatable”
sites, using equipment that could be moved every decade
or so. Three planes would fly over the domains
periodically during the growing season to record
changing vegetation patterns. The data would be
accessible to all, allowing scientists to assemble a
continental-scale picture of climate change, land-use
trends, and the movement of invasive species.</p>
<p style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 1rem;">Construction
began in 2011 and was supposed to be completed by the
end of 2016. But the path for project managers was never
smooth. Some of the problems were of their own making,
including high staff turnover and conflicts caused by
relegating scientists to what they saw as a secondary
role. The permitting process has turned out to be a
nightmare, and there were also persistent technical
challenges. Establishing sites outside the contiguous
United States has been especially problematic; Hawaii
and Alaska pose unique environmental challenges, and
NEON abandoned an urban site in Puerto Rico earlier this
year after two guards were killed.</p>
<p style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 1rem;">NSF
recently concluded that NEON was running a year behind
schedule, a time frame “that is not acceptable,” Olds
says. To get back on track, Olds says NEON will keep
core sites in all 20 domains, but reduce the number of
relocatable sites. As a result, the planned initial
cohort of 60 sites could be reduced to 50, says one
scientist familiar with the project.</p>
<p style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 1rem;"><strong
style="box-sizing: border-box;">STREON's choppy waters</strong></p>
<p style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 1rem;">The
biggest change is dropping STREON. Unlike NEON’s other
components, which gather information about the
environment, STREON was designed to intentionally alter
stream ecosystems—by adding nutrients, simulating
extreme weather conditions, and removing top
predators—and then document how they responded. But
obtaining the permits needed to conduct such experiments
proved difficult. “To do a STREON experiment, you need a
significant reach of stream, and access to it for 30 to
40 years,” Olds explains. “You’re asking for permission
to put chemicals into the water for a very long time,
and any single owner can veto it.”</p>
<p style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 1rem;">Olds
insists that NSF has not abandoned STREON. “We are very
interested in seeing the experiment go forward,” he
says. “It simply will go forward in a context other than
the construction of NEON.”</p>
<p style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 1rem;">Aquatic
scientists are skeptical. It will be difficult to run
STREON independently, they say, because it relies on
NEON sites as controls. They also see NSF’s decision as
part of a larger pattern of systemic neglect of NEON’s
aquatic components. This past June, Dodds and 18 other
researchers wrote to NEON and NSF, noting that
construction of aquatic sites was lagging far behind
terrestrial sites, and urging them to close the gap by
shifting resources. The number of STREON sites had
already been cut in half from the original 20, they
noted.</p>
<p style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 1rem;">NEON
officials rejected the idea, stating “we cannot make one
component of the Observatory a higher priority than
others.” They blamed “permitting, site science
requirements, and procurements” for delays, noting that
“for various reasons, these obstacles have presented
greater challenges on the aquatics side than on the
terrestrial side.”</p>
<p style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 1rem;">Dodds
says the decision to cast STREON adrift means that NEON
will be disproportionately focused on terrestrial sites.
He says it also runs counter to a 2003 report by the
National Academies that helped NEON win congressional
support. The report noted the importance of
supplementing NEON’s observational data with
experimental results. “That’s what the community felt
was important,” Dodds says. “And now there won’t be any
experimental elements.”</p>
<p style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 1rem;"><strong
style="box-sizing: border-box;">Details to come</strong></p>
<p style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 1rem;">NEON
officials still need to work out descoping details, Olds
says. But today’s move is designed to “strengthen NSF’s
oversight” of NEON, Inc., he noted, adding that the
agency expects the group “to work robustly with
stakeholders and ensure that the science will best serve
the evolving needs of the research communities it is
designed to serve."</p>
<p style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 1rem;">In its
statement, Neon Inc. said: "Science has been and will
continue to be the foundation of NEON ... We remain
unwavering in our commitment to scientific integrity and
fulfilling the mission of NEON using the best available
science. We are no less excited about NEON's potential
to contribute to essential ecological research for
decades to come."</p>
<p style="box-sizing: border-box; font-size: 1rem;">The
descoping, Olds noted, won’t affect NSF’s plans to spend
$65 million a year over the life of the project to
operate facilities and make data available to
researchers. “We have every intention of maintaining
that amount,” he says. “It’s in our budget.”</p>
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