Environmental Forum Plan

VISION

GOALS

• Integrate the science and policy capabilities of the University of Washington and other major regional institutions to help address public environmental and natural resource issues. Science-based decision-making is central to the NWEF.
• Assist political leaders to better integrate science, technology, and social information so they can design sustainable natural resource initiatives and policies.
• Create a collaborative environment wherein scientific research can provide value to the people faced with making decisions about natural resources.
• Design and build a neutral and trusted collaborative and interactive problem-solving environment where information, analytical tools, and decision makers effectively interact to solve problems and develop innovative new policy strategies.
• Create an educational observatory where science and public policy unite in cutting edge collaboration. A combined physical and remote classroom will provide a true view of environmental and natural resource analysis and resolution. Both collaborative research, teaching, and outreach opportunities should ensue from the learning that occurs when research needs emerge and case studies evolve from the interactions.

STRATEGIES

• Build a neutral and information-rich setting. Flexible group meeting space will be easily adaptable for changing technical discussions and policy-level working meetings. Data visualization tools, decision support techniques, and other presentation technologies will help participants compare ideas and solutions, understand and weigh trade-offs, and move toward resolution of complex issues.
• Create a space for collaboration. Scientists and policy staff will collaborate on research and analytical work that supports decision-making. Experts from diverse organizations will be able to participate directly and use advanced analysis and data displays and sophisticated information modeling tools.
• Assemble an information repository. By providing on-line access to information, the Forum will be a centralized information access site to enable teams and individuals to acquire, process, and store information. Quick and virtual access to information will enable scientists and policy makers to question, analyze, and identify possible solutions. Continuity of technical expertise, computing, information retrieval, and management are critical.
• Build an educational observatory. Forum space will provide access for classroom interaction and student participation and work. Virtual access to environmental and natural resource projects will provide teaching, research, and project opportunities. Collaborative work by many organizational participants will afford a window into other university and institutional cultures.
• Stimulate research from the search for long-term solutions. The collaborative working partners will introduce existing knowledge into deliberations. Information gaps and research needs will be identified, along with research that is needed for future decisions.

The NWEF strives to address regional environmental and natural resource issues as a multi-college effort of the University. The College of Forest Resources will be pivotal in helping regional policy makers reach decisions about sustaining natural resource productivity in a socially acceptable manner. The College of Forest Resources will work closely with other University entities, including the College of Ocean and Fishery Sciences, the Evans School of Public Affairs, the College of Architecture and Urban Planning, the Jackson School of International Studies, the College of Engineering, the College of Arts and Sciences, the Information School, the Joint Institute on Atmosphere and Oceans, the School of Law, the School of Business, the Program on the Environment, and the School of Marine Affairs.

The College of Forest Resources believes that our environmental and natural resource systems must be managed sustainably by seeking the appropriate balance between ecological, economic, and social factors. Finding such a balance is a complex task involving the analysis of tradeoffs across this “triple bottom line.” The nature of the decision environment coupled with the presence of multiple stakeholders and objectives, simultaneously operating across a variety of spatial and temporal scales, adds to the complexity of many contemporary natural resource and environmental issues. Resolving conflicts in this decision environment is a daunting task. And, all indications are that this is the manner by which such issues will be analyzed and resolved in the coming years. The NWEF provides a collaborative environment that encourages various groups to utilize the best science to help resolve their issues.

The Northwest Environmental Forum can be the leading edge for the Earth Institute, where case study public policy analysis integrates with applied and long-term basic research. Interactions with researchers, scientists, and scholars in the Forum and Earth Institute will help all users define future collaborative research agenda. The NWEF will be a portal for many new exciting initiatives to enter into the research fabric of the University.

LIKELY USERS

• Government: Federal and state land managers; fisheries, wildlife, and marine mammal agencies, parks and recreation agencies, tribal resource managers, urban growth planners, water resources managers; federal and state environmental protection agencies
• Industry: Agriculture and range operators, forestland managers, oil and mining explorers, real estate developers, energy companies, horticulture, urban forestry and garden suppliers
• NGO and others: Land conservancy organizations, watershed councils, environmental groups

SOME SPECIFIC APPLICATIONS

Water and watersheds: The science of physical and biological interactions of Pacific Northwest river systems, where climate alterations trigger flow changes and flow alterations affect fish survival, has not until recently been part of public policy discussions. Over the last decade the Bonneville Power Administration has spent $3.4 billion for salmon recovery but many runs have steadily declined. In the Puget Sound region, population growth has eroded riverine habitat, coastal estuaries, and near-shore ecosystems despite 25 years of regulatory and land use controls.

Many political leaders have come to realize that they urgently need to find a way to better use physical and biological information to manage natural resources in an atmosphere of social change and potential economic disruption. Despite the development of models, computer simulations, and technologies, too much data about natural resources are unused by those who need them most. Scientists are frustrated at a political process that seems to undervalue their knowledge, political leaders don’t know how to take advantage of the collective capabilities of science in the region, and the public is frustrated by decisions supposedly based on science that ignore their values. Some political leaders have observed that solutions for watershed and water planning require independent, credible, and innovative institutions to facilitate meaningful discussions and help direct the region’s science capabilities to provide resources that will be relevant to salmon and watershed protection. The respected university institutions of the Pacific Northwest, in particular the UW, can assemble their collective capabilities, along with those of state, federal, tribal, and industrial organizations, to assist Bonneville and the Northwest Power Planning Council to more effectively direct financial resources and commission critical research that is relevant to the entire region.

Washington forests: Regional growth impacts are stressing our open spaces. Forest ecosystems are in danger of becoming severely stressed by a combination of climate-triggered heat and insect damage, public overuse, and fire susceptibility. A three degree Fahrenheit increase in ambient temperature can trigger a five-fold increase in forest fires. Urban parks are particularly susceptible to heat, air pollution, and low-water stress. A determination of future critical forest ecosystems, both rural and urban, could help direct scarce public expenditures to protect forests and help commercial forest owners focus their management. The Environmental Forum can convene science and forest interests to determine a fire protection strategy for Washington forests, and use the atmospheric, water, forestry, wildlife, fisheries, and information science capabilities at the University to characterize and translate the knowledge necessary to make decisions and commission new research.

The Internet and the Environment: Technological capabilities are critical to integrate and display information to critical publics and decision makers. Yet such integration, common in the corporate and scientific worlds, is not well developed in the natural resources management world. If science is to be assimilated as an integral piece in natural resources planning and decisions, such knowledge integration is critical. Collaborative problem solving environments, normal in biotechnology and other endeavors, would be normalized in the Environmental Forum. Models and data would be integrated, new science incorporated, and public interaction afforded in the collaborative environment. Information sciences would be melded with natural sciences to illustrate and clarify knowledge that will lead to social improvements and innovative research. Software and hardware innovations will be needed to solve environmental problems by using the internet and its connectivity. Providers of technological tools will likely leverage new technical resources for the UW.