UNOLS COUNCIL – Phone/Web
Conference
Wednesday and Thursday, July 11 & 12, 2007, 2:00 pm – 4:00 PM EDT
(each day)
Executive Summary:
The UNOLS Council convened a phone/web conference on July 11 and 12, 2007. This conference served as the summer meeting. UNOLS Fleet schedules, estimated operation costs, 2008 ship scheduling, and agency budget projections were discussed. The Council endorsed the draft 2007/2008 UNOLS Council slate. An ad-hoc committee on data management best practices was formed and will be asked to provide a status report during the fall Council meeting. There was a Council discussion on two charter issues: 1) Opening the Office host to all UNOLS Institutions (extend beyond operators), and 2) Changing the term from 3-year to 5-year to conform to NSF timelines. The Charter currently does not exclude the non-operator institutions from hosting the office. The Council agreed that it is most important that the UNOLS Executive Secretary possess the skills and expertise required to host the office. All also agreed with changing the Office term from three years to five years. Other topics addressed included crew and marine technician retention issues, academic fleet renewal activities and plans, and frequency spectrum management.
Action Items:
|
Minutes of the March 2007
Council Meeting - Incorporate
clarifications and corrections on pages 5, 10, and 25. (DeSilva) |
|
Subcommittee Report on Recommendations on Ship Lay-Ups and Early
Retirements: ·
The
agency reps will send recommendations regarding 2008 Fleet operations and
ship lay-ups to the ad-hoc committee of Mary Jane Perry (Chair), Vernon
Asper, and Marcia McNutt. ·
The subcommittee will prepare their response to
the recommendations within 30 days. |
|
2007/2008 UNOLS Council
slate – The Council endorsed the
slate. ·
The
Office will finalize the slate information for distribution to the
membership. ·
All
nominees will be contacted and thanked for their willingness to serve and to
let them know whether or not they are included on the slate. |
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Form Subcommittee on Data Management Best Practices – The proposed subcommittee membership along with the list of reviewers was approved. · Marcia McNutt will contact each individual to confirm their willingness to serve. · Marcia will contact Steve Miller and Bob Arko to determine their willingness to serve as co-chairs. · Once the committee is formed, they will be asked to finalize their charge and send it to the Council for approval. · The subcommittee will be asked to provide a status report at the fall Council meeting. · The UNOLS Office will send a thank you note to those volunteers who were not selected for the sub committee. |
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UNOLS Office RFP – The Council endorsed the suggested revisions to the UNOLS Charter regarding Office host competition and term length as presented by Mike Prince. · Committee Chairs have been asked to review their respective annexes for any items that should be updated. · The Office with compile all Charter revisions and circulate a final draft to the Council for endorsement. · The Charter re-adoption and revisions will be included as a ballot measure at the Annual meeting. · Mike Price will contact Dolly Dieter, Bob Houtman, and Beth White regarding issues raised by Linda Goad regarding the process for recompetition and selection of the UNOLS Office. |
|
Crew and Marine Technician Retention and Hiring Issues – The RVTEC and RVOC will brainstorm and present proposed solutions to the Council (Hawkins & Martin) |
|
RVOC Safety Standards – later this year the draft RVSS will be
sent to the Council for adoption. |
|
RVTEC/PI Communication Issues – Additional definition on this item is needed by RVTEC for presentation to Council (RVTEC) |
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Ocean Class SMRs – FIC will review community survey feedback to the Ocean Class SMRs and provide a response to Bob Houtman (ONR). (Hebert) |
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Model of a Future Fleet Schedule - Mike Prince will continue work on the model of a future fleet schedule. Additional work will include: · Finish the model that uses 2006 as the basis. · Create a model that includes seismic work · Include OOI projections (when better known) · Model Fleet operating costs (use cost ratios) · Create another model using a different year as the basis |
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Global Class Science |
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UNOLS
Brochure: ·
The Council can send any additional changes to the UNOLS
Office. ·
Reposition the airplane image closer to the SCOAR
description (Office). ·
The office will make any final revisions and provide it
for a final review before printing on recycled paper. |
|
Frequency Spectrum
Management –
·
RVTEC is tasked with preparing a written preliminary
status report of the Fleet’s RF spectrum use based on the findings of the
subcommittee. Bill Martin is to provide
the report in writing to Peter Wiebe. ·
Peter Wiebe will forward the status report to Dr Otis
Brown and seek his advice on the steps that should be taken next. |
|
Continue
Review of PCAR -
Mike Prince will provide materials to the PCAR committee and resume the
review process. |
|
Codes of Conduct - The Impact of Scientific Studies on the
Environment –
Continue to monitor the activities associated with this issue. |
|
Science Opportunities aboard UNOLS Vessels – The UNOLS Office will activate the web pages for public use. |
|
UNOLS objectives, priorities and goals – The Council should provide input to the Office on objectives, priorities, and goals for the next year. Marcia McNutt will present the material at the Annual Meeting. |
|
SCOAR Chair – Mike Prince will work with the Committee and
Agency reps to find a new SCOAR Chair |
|
MLSOC Meeting – Guidance is needed now as to when, where, and
what venue to hold the next MLSOC meeting.
If the desire is to have it at the Fall AGU, plans need to be made
now. Marcia will talk to Steve
Holbrook about this. |
|
DESSC Meeting with biologists – It was suggested to
hold the winter DESSC Meeting at The Ocean Sciences Meeting on March 2-7,
2008 in |
|
RVTEC – Bill Martin formally invited the UNOLS Chair to the RVTEC meeting on March 6-8, 2007. Marcia might be available on the afternoon of the 6th. Stewart Lamerdin will send an RVTEC agenda to Marcia as soon as it is available. |
Appendices:
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I |
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II |
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III |
|
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IV |
Proposed Membership of the Subcommittee on Data management Best Practices |
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V |
Summary of Comments regarding UNOLS Office host and Proposed Charter Revisions |
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VI |
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VII |
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VIII |
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IX |
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X |
Summary Report:
Day 1:
Wednesday, July 11th
Marcia McNutt, UNOLS Chair, called the meeting to order at 1400 and provided an opportunity for introductions. The agenda is included as Appendix I and the list of participants is included as Appendix II.
Marcia asked if there were any
revisions to the Minutes from the March
2007 Council Meeting:
· There was one clarification on page four to the text regarding the Alaska Region Research Vessel (ARRV) proposal review based on a question from Carin Ashjian.
· Peter Wiebe asked for more clarity regarding the flashback problems on the NOAA vessels – page 5.
· Peter Wiebe suggested that the reference to “brute stack” in regard to multi-channel seismic data needs clarification – page 10
· There is a typo on page 25 – “cruise” was spelt incorrectly.
The UNOLS Office will edit the
minutes to provide clarification to the items identified and to correct the
typo.
A motion was made and passed to accept the
minutes (Wiebe/Diebold).
UNOLS Fleet schedules, estimated operation
costs, and 2008 ship scheduling – Rose
Dufour and Mike Prince provided a ship
scheduling report. Their slides are
included as Appendix III.
There are 4126 days for 2007. NSF’s support is $48,067,583 for
2007. This includes 45 days at sea for
R/V Langseth. Marcia asked if this same funding level is
expected to continue. Linda Goad replied
that the 2008 budget will likely be consistent with 2007. Rose added that ONR and NOAA funding levels
for next year are unclear.
Charts showing the 2008 ship time requests by ship and ship class were
presented. It is clear that many ships
have weak schedules.
During the June 27th scheduling meeting, it was estimated
(based on the ship days requested and the target dates) that ship lay-ups would
be necessary in 2008. During that
meeting, Bob Houtman stated that the Navy-owned Global ships should not be laid
up. Instead, the requested ship time should be evenly divided among the
ships. As a result, large ship schedules
will be light; however, Navy has indicated that additional ship time is
likely. State days other than those for
Peter Wiebe asked about the Atlantis
2008 schedule. Mike replied that there
are about 100 days for
The 2008 ship time requests per vessel class charts indicate light
schedules for the East Coast Regional and Intermediate ships; however, there is
a lot of work for the Pelican that
could potentially be moved to an East Coast ship.
In 2007, the Cape Hatteras had
originally been slated for a lay up, but the Pelican had more work than it could accommodate, so Hatteras was brought to the Gulf to
support some of this work. One of the
projects that was scheduled on Hatteras
was funded privately, but had to be cancelled because they could not get
permits to work in the commercial oil fields.
The project would have left about 60 anchors on the seafloor and as a
result, MMS denied the permit in an effort to avoid users from leaving trash in
the commercial oil fields. The Principal Investigator, Steve Constable, has
left anchors on the bottom in the past, and hadn’t anticipated the recent
permit problem. Sandy Shor commented
that if Constable’s project had not been industry funded, a permit would not
have been required. Marcia mentioned that
DARPA was developing a station keeping mooring (with help from MBARI) that
doesn’t require an anchor. Peter Wiebe
asked if it is possible to make an anchor that would biodegrade. Marcia said that MBARI had used gravel in
burlap bags as biodegradable anchors whenever small anchors would suffice, with
some complaints from geologists about introducing exotic rocks to the
environment. Rose Dufour pointed that
the PI was required to pay a cruise cancellation penalty fee of $70K when he
cancelled the
In 2008 there is about 2 ½ ships worth of work for the four West Coast
Regional and Intermediate ships. The
current draft schedules include a lot of double bookings of ship time requests
on the East Coast ships, but not a lot of double bookings for the West Coast
ships.
The 2008 Letters of Intent (LOIs) were created using the new UNOLS ship
time system. The new system allows
multiple options of a ship schedule.
The status of 2008 agency funding is:
·
NSF –
waiting to hear about the final funding decisions.
·
NOAA –
most of the requests are known, but we will need to wait for the NOAA
appropriation to know what can be scheduled.
There are no ship time requests for Ocean Exploration.
·
Navy –
The Navy ship time might increase, both for ONR and other Navy groups.
Information about Jason2 and
Ocean Bottom Seismometer (OBS) availability is still needed for consideration
in the 2008 large ship schedules. There
are a lot of OBS’ that need a year long deployment and some of these should
have a pass over by R/V Langseth. Also, some of the OBS’ have been lost. During the Laske cruise, 10 out of 37 of the
OBS’ were lost. During the East Pacific
Rise eruption, some OBS’ were buried in lava.
The estimated 2008 ship operating costs are still very rough.
Rose Dufour said that the schedulers have met and will continue to have
phone meetings. There are a lot of
issues that still need to be addressed.
A scheduling meeting is planned for mid-September at NSF.
Rose reported that Liz Tirpac’s supervisor at the Department of State
(DoS) would like any feedback regarding DoS.
Anyone with feedback should contact Liz.
Kendra Daly’s cruise off of
A lot of the ship time that the Navy is interested in is in the northern
portion of the
Agency
Budget Projections:
Navy - Bob Houtman
reported that the Navy budget for UNOLS ship time for 2008 will be about $10M
for the base with another $1M to $2M from other Navy sources. There is a plus up request for another $5M
but its status in the appropriations process is unknown.
NOAA - Beth White said
that they are optimistic that NOAA will have a budget a lot sooner in 2008 than
in 2007. NOAA’s use of UNOLS ships looks
stable for 2008, with perhaps a small increase in ship time over 2007. They are optimistic for the out-years.
The Okeanos Explorer is
currently undergoing conversion in Todd shipyard. The ship is expected to be operational in
mid-summer 2008. There is concern over
the ship’s operating funds. Congress has
recognized that the Ocean Exploration (OE) will have to support Okeanos Explorer out of program funds
and they realize that this isn’t a good situation. Some improvement is a possibility. The ship’s post shipyard shakedown will be in
the southern Juan de Fuca. Beth said
that UNOLS will probably see some requests for OE work. Sandy Shor asked if there has been a
solicitation for OE programs. Reply – No
one had seen anything yet.
Deb Kelley asked if there was an update on plans for the merge between
NURP and OE. Marcia said that she had
heard that OE and NURP will merge and that NURP will morph into advanced
technology centers that would be competed.
It would be a very different NURP than what we know today. Beth White added that there has been some
language on a cooperative institution approach on the East Coast, but NOAA is
still very much in initial discussions.
Peter Wiebe asked about the status of the Deep-ocean Assessment and Reporting of Tsunamis (DART) mooring work. Beth replied that they are moving along to
getting the moorings in place. Rose
added that she has been talking to Shannon McArthur and there might be some
UNOLS ship opportunities for maintenance and servicing, but it comes with short
lead times. There will likely be work
for New Horizon and Seward Johnson.
Subcommittee Report on Recommendations on Ship Lay-Ups and Early
Retirements – A subcommittee of Mary Jane Perry (Chair), Vernon Asper, and
Marcia McNutt was formed to evaluate agency recommendations on ship lay-ups in
2008. Marcia explained that Carl Friehe had been on the committee but
stepped down. The sub-committee must be
made up of representatives from non-ship operator institutions. Marcia volunteered to take the open position
on the subcommittee. The agency
representatives expect to have their recommendations for the subcommittee in
late July after the East coast and West coast scheduling phone meetings. There has already been one recommendation from Navy
to keep all of the Navy-owned Global ships operating in 2008.
Linda Goad stated that NSF cannot make
an award to any one ship that would exceed approximately $6.9M without prior authorization
from the National Science Board. It
would take a huge effort to get permission.
The Global ships each cost about $7.5M annually to operate. If a ship was to be solely funded by NSF in
one particular year, the ship support cannot exceed $6.9M (this would not
include technical support costs). This
presents a potential problem for Langseth
operations which are heavily supported by NSF.
A budget of $6.9M translates to about 200 ship days for Langseth. The agencies would need to make some funding
decisions regarding which research programs would be supported. Julie Morris is considering whether or not to
pursue a fleet-wide waiver to exceed $6.9M for operations in 2009. The technical support funds would not be
included in the $6.9M.
Form Ad-hoc Committee on Data Management Best Practices – During the last Council meeting, it was decided to create an ad-hoc committee to inventory best practices for capturing and archiving data and meta-data. Marcia reported that a call for volunteers was sent from the UNOLS Office and many people responded. Appendix IV lists the key factors applied in the committee selection process. Marcia decided that it was important to have diversity of institutions represented on the Committee. The proposed membership is listed in Appendix IV. NOAA and ONR have been included as reviewers to the ad-hoc committee. NSF is also welcome to have representation on this review and comment group.
Rob Pinkel stated that it is important to get input from the scientists who actually develop sensors. He added that the charge of the committee should be clearly spelled out and well defined. He emphasized the importance of allowing new technology development efforts to have flexibility, so as to not hamper new development. Marcia said that once the committee is formed, they will be asked to fine tune their charge and present it to the Council.
A motion to approve the committee was passed (Wiebe/Perry). Marcia will contact each of the Committee members. She will also send messages to each volunteer who was not selected to serve on the ad-hoc committee. The Council agreed that Steve Miller and Bob Arko should be contacted to determine their willingness to serve as co-chairs.
UNOLS Office RFP – Mike Prince provided background information on
two UNOLS charter issues:
1)
Opening the Office host to all UNOLS Institutions
(extend beyond operators).
2)
Changing the term from 3-year to 5-year to conform
to NSF timelines.
The Office has been at Moss landing Marine Laboratories (MLML) since
2000. It has operated under three-year
cooperative agreements with NSF. The
Office has traditionally been up for renewal every three years. Peter did a formal review of the Office in
2005.
Mike sent a survey to the UNOLS membership with three questions:
1.
Five-year
increments: Should the charter be
changed to reflect five-year terms with an opportunity for competition or
re-competition every five years?
2.
Limit
on tenure at one institution: Should the
charter be changed to allow an institution to compete for a second term with a
limit of ten years total, except under extraordinary circumstances? Or, should we just provide for competition
every five years and let the competition determine the ultimate length of an
institution’s tenure?
3.
Non-operator
Host Institution: Should UNOLS open
competition up to all UNOLS institutions to host the UNOLS Office?
Mike reviewed the feedback received.
The questions and feedback are included as Appendix V. In summary:
1.
Term
– everyone seems to agree with the five-year terms.
2.
Limit
on tenure/competition – Most seem to agree that ten-year max is enough. Some are in favor of a renewable second term
after a thorough review. Others felt
that in addition to allowing renewal after five years, competition should also
be allowed in addition to review.
3.
Non-Operator
Institution Host – Some felt that the host institution should be limited to
operator institutions and others felt that the nominated Executive Secretary
was the most important factor. Several
pointed out that the Charter does not preclude a non-operator from competing
and could be left that way, however, invitations to submit proposals should not
be limited to Operator institutions.
Mike drafted strawman changes to the
Charter based on the input received. The
Charter revisions are included in Appendix V.
Discussion followed:
·
Marcia –
It is important that the Executive Secretary have a strong background in ship
operations and scheduling.
·
Peter
Wiebe – It is beneficial to rotate the Office among the academic
institutions. The Office should not
become a bureaucratic position.
·
Mike
Prince – He agrees that having the Office at a ship operating institution gives
access to people and views. Back in
1999, some people felt that the Office should be closer to DC. There are advantages and disadvantages.
·
Bob
Collier – The science community benefits by having the UNOLS Office at an academic
institution rather than at JOI/CORE.
·
Marcia –
There is always an option at some later time for a closer relationship between
JOI/CORE and UNOLS that would allow the UNOLS Office to continue to rotate and
not be located in
·
Marcia
asked the Council if the charter should be changed to state that the Office
doesn’t have to be hosted by a ship operator, but that the Executive Secretary
must be very knowledgeable in ship operations.
Peter Wiebe replied that the Charter, as currently written, does not
state that non-operator institutions are excluded.
·
There
was a lively discussion on the UNOLS Office selection process. There was disagreement over who makes the
selection of the host institution. In
the past, UNOLS has made the recommendation of who should serve as host.
·
Peter Wiebe
asked the question: if UNOLS makes a recommendation to the agencies for a host
Office and NSF funds another group to host the Office, is UNOLS required to
have them as our host?
·
Peter
Wiebe stated that the review process that he used in 2005 to review the MLML
UNOLS Office wasn’t included in the Charter, but the model worked well and it
should be in the Charter.
·
Mike
will check with all agency representatives on the recompetition host selection issues
raised.
· Mike Prince expressed that his draft Charter revisions give flexibility for any institution to bid on hosting the UNOLS Office and represents the cooperative agreement. The issue on who selects the UNOLS Office is a fundamental change to UNOLS. He feels that the Council can take action on the draft Charter revisions as presented. The final revision must be endorsed by the membership at the Annual meeting.
A motion was made and passed to accept the Charter revisions as presented (Wiebe/Dufour). Mike will circulate the final proposed revisions