A copy of these minutes is available as a pdf at <200710anu.pdf>.
Meeting Minutes
Executive Summary:
The UNOLS Annual Meeting was held at the National Science Foundation (NSF) in
The Annual Meeting also included reports
on fleet renewal plans, agency activities, UNOLS Committees updates, and a
presentation on this year’s accomplishments and goals for 2008.
Appendices:
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III |
2007 UNOLS Highlights (0.9 MB) |
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IV |
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V |
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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 |
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XI |
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XII |
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XIII |
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XIV |
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XV |
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XVI |
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XVII |
Meeting Summary:
·
The new UNOLS Ship time Request and Scheduling
System was introduced.
·
An Ad-Hoc committee to define best practices in
Data Management was formed.
·
A UNOLS Brochure was published.
·
The final draft of the American’s with
Disabilities Act (ADA) Guidelines for UNOLS Vessels is in review
·
Safety Standards for Human Occupied Vehicles are
in review.
·
The Ocean Class Science Mission Requirements were
updated at the request of Navy.
·
Academic Fleet Renewal Activities and Plans are
ongoing.
In addition to the
accomplishments and issues on the slide, Marcia mentioned a few other major
issues that are being addressed by UNOLS.
These include crew and marine technician retention/ hiring, rising fleet
operating costs, and shrinking agency budgets.
UNOLS Membership Votes - Marcia introduced the
ballot items, which included elections for a Non-Operator representative and a
Council Member At-large representative. The
slate of nominees can be viewed at: <http://www.unols.org/meetings/2007/200710anu/slate07.html>. The membership was also asked to vote on proposed
UNOLS Charter revisions and re-adoption.
The proposed revisions to the UNOLS Charter were endorsed by the Council
and can be viewed at <http://www.unols.org/meetings/2007/200710anu/uchart_draft_vers_7_2.pdf>.
Ballots were
distributed for collection later in the meeting.
Request for Proposals to Host the UNOLS Office – Mike Prince reported that the Cooperative Agreement to host the UNOLS
Office by Moss Landing Marine Laboratories (MLML) Office will expire on April
30, 2009. A solicitation for a new host
will be announced in 2008. MLML will not continue as host. A solicitation will be announced in late
2007/early 2008 and ask for letters of intent.
An evaluation team will be formed to review the proposals and provide a
recommendation. Mike encouraged members
to consider hosting the office.
Keynote Address - Dr.
Arden L. Bement, Jr. –
Marcia McNutt introduced Dr. Arden L. Bement, Jr. Dr. Bement has been the Director of NSF for
three years. He holds degrees in metallurgical engineering
and his career has included work in industry, government and academia. Prior to coming to NSF, Dr. Bement served as
director of the National Institute of Standards and Technology of the
Department of Commerce.
Dr. Bement’s full key note address is included as Appendix IV. A high priority and one of NSF’s major responsibilities is maintaining support for the facilities that they own. NSF is committed to completing the Drill Ship, the R/V Langseth conversion, the Hybrid Remotely Operated Vehicle (HROV), The Replacement Human Occupied Vehicle (RHOV), the Alaska Region Research Vessel (ARRV) and the Ocean Observing Initiative (OOI). NSF is also moving forward with the Regional Class vessels acquisition process. Dr. Bement emphasized the importance of balancing the availability of facilities (and facilities funding) with science funding in order to continue a healthy science system.
Discussion followed:
·
Marcia McNutt asked if NSF would contribute
support for an Ocean Studies Board (OSB) study to look at the facilities
required to carry out the recommendations of the Ocean Research Priorities Plan
(ORRP). Dr. Bement indicated that NSF is
involved in the scoping of the study and that they would consider funding this
study. He thinks that it is important that the study address all agency
facilities.
·
Nancy Rabalais asked if Dr. Bement had any
comments regarding the challenges of keeping pace with ship replacement and
maintenance as the ships in the fleet reach their retirement age. Dr. Bement – It all comes to the
balance. As the fleet is upgraded, the Operational
and Maintenance (O&M) costs must be carefully considered. If the O&M costs start escalating to a
level that they impact the funds available for research efforts, renewal will
be slowed down.
· Marcia stated that NSF’s Ocean Sciences section has had success with getting projects into the MRE account (ARRV, OOI, Drill ship). However, the new facilities will be expensive and there might not be enough funds to operate and maintain them all. Dr. Bement – International partnerships should be formed to help support future facilities and research. He referenced the use of the foreign vessel, Oden for McMurdo Station support in the Antarctic.
· Wilf Gardner said that he was glad to hear Dr. Bement mention satellites in his talk. What can NSF do about getting access to the Color satellites? Dr. Bement – There is an NSF partnership with NASA and there was a recent amendment for additional funds to support the Color satellite.
· Sandy Shor recommended that the vacant positions in NSF Geo-Sciences and Ocean Sciences should be filled as soon as possible. Dr. Bement – More federal employees are needed at the high office levels; there simply are not enough people. UNOLS can help by spreading the word in the community and encouraging peers to serve at NSF. A lot can be learned during a three to four year assignment.
· Nancy Rabalais asked about the possibility of encouraging more collaboration with industry to support science. Dr. Bement - As for collaborations, there are a lot of industries that rely on the oceans. Successful ocean models and other research of interest to industry could lend itself for collaborations.
· Denis Wiesenburg asked if NSF would continue to support more and more of the ship operation costs. Dr. Bement – NSF has been working to increase their facility support, but Navy has moved more to modeling and has decreased their use of ships. He doubts that we will see the past ship use levels from the Navy. They see a ship use decline from other agencies and areas as well. On the positive side, Dr. Bement said that in his time in DC, he has never seen support as strong as it is now for NSF on both sides of Congress; however competition for resources has never been greater.
2008 Fleet Operations:
Fleet Operations and UNOLS Recommendations – Liz Brenner, Ship Scheduling Committee (SSC) Co-Chair, summarized the ship
scheduling process over the past year and projected 2008 fleet operations. Her slides are included as Appendix V.
Over the summer, UNOLS ship schedulers held teleconferences; one meeting
each for east and west coast Intermediate/Regional schedulers and one for the Global/Ocean
class schedulers. East and west coast
Intermediates/Regional schedulers were tasked to independently recommend
options that would consolidate work on fewer ships. Problems were encountered as multiple
requests for specific periods of time made it difficult to efficiently
consolidate without moving science programs out of desired time and or weather
windows. ONR recommended not to lay-up
any of the Navy owned ships.
The SSC held a meeting at NSF on 19 September to review ship schedules
and resolve problems and double bookings.
At the conclusion of the meeting, the recommendation was made for
schedulers to identify stand down periods and to refine daily rates. The schedulers
were advised that the rates should be developed with the assumption of no lay
up support. Schedulers were asked by the
funding agencies not to post 2008 schedules until further notice.
A series of charts were presented.
The total estimated fleet operating cost for 2008 is $79.9M and is
higher than can be supported by the current budgets. The average ship day rate is very high in
2008.
A chart showing the 2007 and 2008 operating days and estimated cost by
agency was presented. ONR doesn’t expect
a budget plus-up this year. The next
slide shows a comparison of the estimated operating costs with the available
budgets. NSF, ONR, and NOAA are all
projecting deficits: NSF’s deficit is
$7.3M, ONR = $2.4 M and NOAA = $1.1M.
A bar chart showing the 2008 days
per ship illustrated that other than the Pelican, Sharp, and
Discussion followed:
·
Sandy Shor –
·
Peter Wiebe – Will the delay in posting 2008 schedules impact the science
parties who must make cruise purchases and shipping arrangements? Mike Prince – Most of the people with
potential cruises in early 2008 have been contacted.
·
·
Joaquim Goes – Has there been any effort to contact other foreign
countries to use UNOLS vessels?
·
Bob Knox cautioned that the
·
Linda Goad – To avoid insurance issues associated with foreign cruises,
establish collaborations with the country participating in the cruise, then
hull insurance is not needed. Bob
Houtman reinforced this statement. It is
much more difficult to schedule commercial time on UNOLS ships because UNOLS
vessels cannot compete for business.
There are also insurance issues. Commercial
work does occasionally get scheduled on UNOLS vessels, but it is taken on a
case by case basis.
Federal Agency Reports:
Dolly discussed the status of open vacancies within NSF. NSF is still trying to hire an Assistant
Director. Eric Itsweire is the Acting
Ocean Section Head. Interviews for the
Section Head position are expected soon.
The Integrative Programs Section (IPS) Head position is expected to be
advertised soon. The Oceanographic
Instrumentation and Technical Service Programs Director position
will probably be filled by a visiting scientist.
Ship renewal efforts were planned and initiated when budgets were
strong. The projected operating costs
for these new ships and systems are high.
The balance between facilities funding and science program funding is a
major concern at NSF and will be addressed.
The Regional Class Research Vessel (RCRV) acquisition project started
when the budget was healthy. The cost
for ship construction is going up.
Shipyards are busier than they have been since WWII. Steel, copper and other material costs are
all going up. Labor costs are also going
up. NSF still hopes to build all three ships.
There is concern that if the ship costs get too high it will be
necessary to use the MRE account for funding.
This could result in a delay of about five years.
Dolly reviewed the RCRV project status.
The status is included in Appendix VI. The original Phase I Design
contract was awarded in April 2006. The
current design completion date is 20 March 2008. Phase II, Detailed Design and Construction,
is proposed to start in the first quarter of FY09 and last 27 months. It is doubtful that the solicitation for
operators would go out before the end of FY08.
Office of Naval Research - Bob Houtman provided
a report for ONR. Dr. Etter will be
leaving as the Assistant Secretary of the Navy for Research, Development and
Acquisition by the middle of November 2007.
She has already signed off on the acquisition of the two Ocean Class
Research Vessels (OCRV). Details of the
OCRV acquisition plans are included in Appendix VII.
Acquisition of the OCRVs is budgeted at $185M for two ships to be delivered in FY14/15 with funding in FY11 and FY12 for construction. ONR, with assistance from PEO-Ships, is finalizing documents to initiate the program in FY08. PEO-Ships will do a cost estimate evaluation based on science mission requirements and construction costs. They are still discussing whether to use one, two or more design/build teams.
There are three
organizations within Navy that are involved in the OCRV project. The sponsor is the Oceanographer of the Navy,
the Chief of Naval Research is the mission sponsor, and PEO-Ships is providing
project management support. UNOLS will
be included as part of the process.
In budget news, ONR’s
FY08 facilities budget is $10M with additional support from other parts of the Navy,
for a total of $11.5M. Projected
operating costs currently exceed this level.
Like NSF, the Navy is also on a continuing resolution.
·
Peter Wiebe – In 2006, the Navy used one of the Global
ships to support Navy programs. Bob – This
will not be the case in 2008. Data
analysis and planning will be carried out in 2008.
·
Denis Wiesenburg – Is the Navy seeking the full
$185M OCRV budget in any one year? Bob Houtman
– The $185M would be split over two years in FY11 and FY12.
Dennis Nixon asked if there are
any USCG plans to replace
“NOAA's Office of Marine
and Aviation Operations leadership has recently changed. The two star who provides leadership over the
NOAA Corps and OMAO - Rear Admiral Sam De Bow - has been replaced by Rear Admiral
Jon Bailey, and the one star who provided leadership over the operational
centers, the
On the acquisition
front, Pisces (FSV3), Bell M. Shimada, (FSV4), and Ferdinand
R. Hassler (SWATH) are all still in
various stages of construction at Halter Marine in Mississippi. Delays because of damaged ways caused by
Katrina and keeping the shipyard's interest for the SWATH when larger, less
complicated construction projects are there to be worked on continue to be our
challenges. The second phase of
converting Okeanos Explorer (the ex-Navy T-AGOS Capable), has
been awarded to a yard in
Other than that, budgets
remain pretty stable and I don't anticipate any big spikes in resources
available for charters or other things although we keep trying.”
Oceanographer of the
Navy –
Bob Winokur provided the report for the Oceanographer. He discussed the Congressional line item to
build a new survey ship with a finite amount of money. The new ship will be a TAGS 66 and will be
based on the design of the current TAGS ships.
It will have a moon pool. The
Oceanographer cannot request additional funds for this ship and they will have
to stay within budget. Halter Marine
will build the ship and NAVSEA is managing the shipyard contract.
The Oceanographer is the
resource sponsor for the new OCRV AGORs, and ONR is the program sponsor. It will be problematic to get any additional
funds for these ships so it is important that they stay within budget.
Facility Renewal Plans
and Activities
(not already reported):
The University of Alaska Fairbanks (UAF) signed a Cooperative
Agreement with NSF on 7 August 2007 for the ARRV. There are four Phases to the acquisition
process. The Phase 1 task is to develop
a project execution plan (PEP), establish an earn value management (EVM) system
and refresh the design. This effort is
expected to take nine months and cost ~$2.5M.
Phase 2 will consist of the bid package preparation and shipyard selection. It is expected to take 3 months and cost
$809K. During Phase 3 the ship would be
constructed and outfitted. This would
take 24 months and cost ~$112.5M. The
final phase is for pre-operation testing and trials and would cost ~$7M. The total project is not to exceed
$122,930,218. Details of the phases are
contained in the Appendix.
An ARRV oversight
committee has been formed and held their first meeting in mid September. Detailed activities during Phase I are listed
in the slides. UAF hopes to complete
Phase I by 7
May 2008. If all goes as planned, the
ship would be complete by July 2011.
ARRV project
organizational chart of key personnel is included in the Appendix, as well as
the membership of the oversight committee.
The oversight committee represents the community and includes a naval architect, polar
marine scientists, marine superintendents, marine technical specialists,
Discussion:
·
Rob Pinkel – What is the
annual cycle for the ship? Terry - The ship
can work in seasonal ice and can operate in the
R/V Marcus G. Langseth Conversion –
John Diebold reported on the status of the R/V Langseth conversion. The USCG inspection has been conducted and the Certificate of
Inspection is expected very soon. The
JMS inspection is scheduled for 7-8 November.
Once the inspection is successfully completed, the process of turning
the title over from LDEO the NSF will begin.
Shakedown cruise is optimistically planned for the week after the JMS
inspection. Science operations are
planned for early 2008.
Two meetings will be
scheduled during the week of the AGU Fall Meeting. One meeting will be for the MLSOC and the
other for the community.
John reviewed the R/V Langseth
conversion milestones (Appendix IX).
There are two major components of
the fabrication process proceeding in parallel: the design, fabrication and
testing of the personnel sphere with Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) as the
prime contractor and the design, fabrication and testing of the new vehicle with
Lockheed-Martin (
Bob reviewed the project’s
major milestones and planned activities.
These are listed in Appendix X. On September 5-6, 2007 the Detailed Design
Review (DDR) for the RHOV personnel sphere successfully completed. ABS accepted the hull design. Forging the sphere will begin the first week
of November 2007. About 40 tons of
titanium is needed for the sphere fabrication, but there is a lot of waste
during production. WHOI will try to sell
the waste. It is almost a two-year
process for forging, welding, and testing sphere.
A contract with Lockheed Martin (
Details about the vehicle
buoyancy foam and battery development efforts are included in the slides. Pressure-compensated, Lithium batteries are
being considered. Marcia McNutt
cautioned Bob to talk to MBARI about their experience with batteries.
There have been a few personnel changes
in the RHOV project. Anthony Tarantino
(a former
If all proceeds on schedule,
A comparison chart of
the performance and science specifications between the RHOV and Alvin is
included in the slides. The operating
model for the RHOV would be similar to the existing
Fleet Improvement
Committee(FIC) Report – Dave Hebert, FIC Chair, reported on Committee activities and
issues, which included the Fleet Improvement Plan, future facility utilization
projections and recommendations, ship scheduling model, and ocean observatory projections. His slides are included as Appendix XI.
Dave reviewed the status
of the Fleet Improvement Plan. The FIC
spent much of their recent meeting reviewing the draft document and associated
figures. Sections I, II, and III have
been drafted. They include the introduction,
future science initiatives, and the UNOLS facility composition and utilization
trends. Section IV, which contains the
future fleet utilization projections and future requirements, still needs to be
drafted. Section IV will include an
update to Figure 17 of the 2001 FOFC report.
Figure 17 illustrates the renewal plan timeline and new ship
composition. A slide of the updated
Figure 17 is included in Appendix XI; as well, as additional
projection charts.
During the FIC Meeting,
Mike Prince presented the initial results of modeling the 2006 ship schedules
on the future fleet of 2017. In creating
the model his assumptions were that all scheduled cruises from 2006 will be
available for scheduling in a future year.
The fleet composition for 2017 was based on FIC and agency renewal
plans.
Mike scheduled the 2006
projects onto ships that would be operating in 2017. One exception was that he included Sproul
and Pelican in the 2017 fleet, which doesn’t match the FIC Fleet
Improvement Plan. The model keeps
cruises on the same 2006 ship and time frame as much as possible. Cruises in
2006 that were originally scheduled on ships that are “retired” in 2017 were
rescheduled on the remaining ships, using the ship time request as a guide when
moving dates or ships.
In 2006 the fleet
consisted of 23 active ships. The model
fleet of 2017 includes 19 active ships.
Since R/V Langseth
was not yet in service in 2006, it was not scheduled in 2017. Also, since the ARRV was not available in
2006, there were no requests for its use.
The 2017 model schedules some of the global ship work on the ARRV.
Initial results show
that in 2017, there would be 195 days of unscheduled work in the
Sue Banahan attended the
FIC meeting and provided Ocean Observatory Initiative (OOI) projections. Some of her slides are included in Appendix
XI.
The NSF/MREFC capital
investment for OOI is $331M over five years.
The operation and maintenance (O&M) funding to support OOI would
ramp up during installation until 2014 and then level off at a cap of $50M
annually.
A brief overview of each OOI component is included in the
slide package. The number of Global
Scale Nodes (GSN) has been reduced to four and will include nodes in the
Southern Ocean, Station Papa,
A chart showing the OOI estimated days at sea
projection through 2015 was provided. The
Coastal Arrays in the Pacific and
Interagency Working Group on Facilities (IWGF) –Bob Winokur reported that the IWGF Fleet Status Report is in the final stages of approval at the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) and anticipate that it will be released soon.
Because of the challenges IWG-F faced in finalizing their status report, future IWG-F proposed activities will be very clearly articulated to the Joint Subcommittee on Ocean Science and Technology (JSOST) and approved by JSOST before any work begins. IWG-F has proposed a study to identify the infrastructure required to support future science, which would be broader than just ships. It would address the entire infrastructure needed to support science objectives and be based on the Ocean Research Priorities Plan (ORPP). As a first step, the study proposes to inventory the facilities currently available. IWG-F project has been proposed to the JSOST and are waiting for approval to proceed.
The Ocean Studies Board (OSB) has made a proposal to do a similar study. OSB and IWG-F will have to determine how to coordinate their efforts if both activities move forward.
Bob Winokur thanked UNOLS
for their input to the Fleet Status Report.
Presentations
to Sandy Shor – On behalf of UNOLS, Mike Prince presented Sandy Shor with a
plaque acknowledging UNOLS’ appreciation for
Day one of the UNOLS
Annual Meeting adjourned at 1700. An
evening reception hosted by UNOLS immediately followed.
Annual
Meeting – Day 2, Friday, October 12th
Call Day-2
Order -
Marcia McNutt, UNOLS Chair, called day-2 of the meeting to order at 0830.
There is a search for a President of Ocean Leadership. RADM Dick West, President of CORE, has announced his intention to retire, but he has been asked to stay on board until the new COL President is in place. A well-qualified set of applicants applied for the COL President position. A small group of candidates have been selected for interviews by the Executive Committee.
Discussion:
·
Bob Knox asked if the new
organization would combine the activities of the two JOI and CORE organizations,
or would it expand, or head in a new direction all together. Marcia explained that from the beginning, the
intent was for the whole (
·
Jeff Callahan – Is there any linkage between the
old CORE membership and the new organization?
Marcia – In the last year, there was a big push to have the CORE and JOI
members join each other’s organization. There
were only three members who weren’t already members of the other organization. The total membership is about 95.
·
Peter Wiebe asked about the precautions
taken regarding lobbying efforts. Marcia
explained that
COMMITTEE REPORTS – Marcia McNutt introduced the UNOLS Committee
Chairs who reported on their respective activities:
Ship Scheduling Committee (SSC) – The SSC report was provided earlier in the meeting. In other SSC news, Stan Winslow was appointed as Chair (to replace Rose Dufour and Liz Brenner) and Liz Caporelli was appointed as Chair-Elect.
An important activity has been updating the Research Vessel Safety Standards. The revision of the Research Vessel Safety Standards (RVSS) has been a major effort and has taken longer than anticipated. The overall format has been radically changed to reduce ambiguity, fill gaps in the regulations, and to make requirements more binding.
Two new chapters have been added to the RVSS; “Personal Safety” and “HOV Submersible Safety.” The “personal safety” chapter addresses the American’s with Disabilities Act (ADA).
The current plan is to include the newly developed UNOLS Wire Safe Working Load Standards, and the UNOLS Load Handling System Design Standards as appendices to the RVSS. The wire safe working load standards results will be presented at the RVTEC meeting in November. Over the next several months, a comparison of 46 CFR “Sub-chapter U”, American Bureau of Shipping (ABS), and other design standards (ISO, DNV, etc.), will be conducted by Glosten Associates.
The other
big issue facing both RVOC and RVTEC is personnel recruitment and
retention. This includes both crew and technicians.
The two groups have been gathering information and will formulate possible
solutions. This is a highly complex
issue and a single, simple “fix” is not possible. Creative solutions within current budgetary
constraints must be developed.
The 2008 RVOC meeting has been set for April 22-24, 2008 at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia.
Marcia McNutt asked how the new RVSS would be disseminated and enforced. Dolly stated that the NSF inspections of the ships use the standards as the basis for their inspections.
The annual RVTEC meeting for 2006 was held shortly after the UNOLS Annual meeting. The meeting was condensed to a one-day agenda because the meeting was held in conjunction with INMARTECH 2006. INMARTECH 2006 had over 120 participants from 14 countries.
The 2007 RVTEC meeting will be held on November 6-8 at Moss Landing Marine Laboratories. The agenda has been posted on the UNOLS website. They have invited Matt Hawkins to discuss Safe Working Loads (SWL).
The Radio Frequency (RF)
Subcommittee sent their report to Dr. Peter Wiebe this past summer. Peter
forwarded the report to Dr. Otis Brown. The subcommittee, with UNOLS, will work
to gather RF Spectrum use information from the scientific community. Jerry Miller asked if the RF survey will focus
only on ships. Reply – The purpose would
be to expand the survey to all science uses including in water and air.
The AICC was busy in 2006/2007 and activities included:
·
December 7-8th,
2006 “Icebreaker Retreat”, USCG Base
·
January 9th and 10th
2007 - AICC Meeting in
·
Efforts to foster communication between the icebreaker science community
and the local Alaskan communities adjacent to the science study areas
continue. The 2007 Healy Chief
Scientists, Dave Forcucci (USCG representative), and Carin Ashjian (AICC Chair)
attended the 2007 Alaska Eskimo Whaling Commission Mini-Convention on February
28, 2007 to discuss the Healy cruise plans for 2007. Discussions with the AEWC Chair have been
initiated for a similar exchange prior to the 2008 cruises. In addition, discussion continues with the
Department of State regarding how to improve notification to local communities
of approvals for foreign vessels to operate in US Arctic regions.
·
Prioritized science
and science space upgrades to Healy proposed by Dale Chayes
·
Conducted debriefs of Healy
2006 cruises
·
Monitor and maintain
interest in issues relevant to Arctic icebreakers
USCGC Healy completed three cruises during the 2007 season: the BEST project from April 10-May 12 (Ray Sambrotto, Chief Scientist – Healy 0701), the northern Bering Sea cruise from May 16 – June 18 led by Jackie Grebmeier and Jim Lovvorn, and a Law of the Sea seafloor mapping cruise on the Chukchi Cap/Arctic Ocean from August 17 – September 15 led by Larry Maye