Sponsors and Customers

Resource Sponsors

The Naval Research Laboratory is not an appropriated activity. We are a Working Capital Fund activity, which means that all direct and indirect costs, including overhead, are recovered through sponsor-funded research projects. Funding for the Marine Meteorology Division, in particular, comes primarily from the Chief of Naval Research (CNR) , which includes funds for the internally competed NRL Base program; the Oceanographer of the Navy (N096); and the Space and Naval Warfare Systems Command (SPAWAR PMW-155) . Other projects are funded by DOD agencies such as the Modeling and Simulation Coordination Office (MSCO) , the U.S. Air Force, the U.S. Army, the Naval Surface Warfare Center, Dahlgren , and the High Performance Computing Modernization Program . Some funding is also provided by other government agencies such as the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the Department of Energy, the Federal Aviation Administration, and joint agency programs such as the Joint Center for Satellite Data Assimilation.

Research Categories

Research funding within DOD is divided into several categories. The NRL Marine Meteorology Division has broad-spectrum funding support for basic research, applied research and development, validation and verification, and operational transition of environmental products. The Division also on occasion receives small amounts of OM&N (Operations Maintenance Navy) and OPN (Other Procurement Navy) funds for specific support of the operational community. This broad funding base provides the Marine Meteorology Division with a unique capability within the atmospheric sciences community to conduct a research program that integrates basic research with development and transition of operational products in a highly focused manner. In addition, the systems we develop and transition to operations are effective tools for use in our basic research program, so the program interaction and connectivity flows in both directions.

• 6.1 Basic Research
  • Involves innovation and discovery, and provides fundamental building blocks to more applied research
• 6.2 Applied Research
  • Transitions 6.1 science into practical areas of high Navy relevance, providing proof of concept and developing new applications
• 6.3 Advanced Technology Demonstration
  • Provides demonstrations of emerging technologies that have high Navy relevance
• 6.4 Demonstration and Validation
  • Provides the link between R&D and operations; refines, evaluates and transitions intellectual products
• 6.5 Engineering and Manufacturing Development
  • Fields new engineering systems

Operational Customers

The primary customer for Naval Research Laboratory data assimilation and model products and many of our satellite products is Fleet Numerical Meteorology and Oceanography Center (FNMOC) , which is co-located with our Division in Monterey, California. However, the Marine Meteorology Division also develops products for other operational Navy centers that fall under the cognizance of the Naval Meteorology and Oceanography Command . These products include regional data assimilation and prediction systems similar to those that are run operationally at FNMOC, a large variety of satellite-based products, tactical decision aids, forecast guides, and training materials. In the new Web-centric Navy, many of these same products can now be made available directly to our shipboard users, and the Division is involved in developing other technologies, such as our port studies, our NOWCAST system, and the Target Acquisition Weapons Software, that are designed specifically with shipboard applications and users in mind.

Marine Meteorology Division has developed an on-scene version of the Navy's regional mesoscale prediction system, COAMPS™, which runs on a workstation and includes a user friendly Graphical User Interface (GUI). The GUI allows the users to easily set up their own model grids and tailor the model output products to their specific needs. The Navy's operational version of this system (COAMPS/On-Scene or COAMPS-OS™) has been deployed to the regional Navy centers around the globe and is maintained by FNMOC. NRL has also designed a version of COAMPS-OS™that can readily feed high-resolution meteorological fields to chemical and biological transport and dispersion models. Additional customers for this system, who are supported directly by the Marine Meteorology Division, include the Defense Threat Reduction Agency , U.S. Strategic Command , Air Force Technical Applications Center, and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory's National Atmospheric Release Advisory Center, which provides a national emergency response service for real-time assessment of hazardous incidents involving nuclear, chemical, biological, or natural material. Most of these agencies receive their global boundary conditions from the NRL-developed Navy Operational Global Atmospheric Prediction System run at FNMOC.

Another customer for NRL science and technology is the Modeling and Simulation Coordination Office (MSCO) . Modeling and Simulation (M&S) is the use of computer models to simulate the behavior of systems (aircraft, ships, sensors, etc.) and forces (ship battlegroups, army platoons, etc). Its many applications include training, analysis, mission planning, and acquisition. To get the full benefit of M&S in reducing costs and increasing safety, a representation of the natural environment is necessary. NRL is involved in helping define that natural environment by providing the M&S community with access to time histories of meteorological and oceanographic observations and numerical prediction model output.

Research Customers

Atmospheric and oceanographic research scientists are interested in obtaining analysis and model products from Naval Research Laboratory prediction systems such as NOGAPS and COAMPS™. Time histories of these products, ranging from several days to several years, can provide enlightening information about the behavior of the atmosphere. Scientists can analyze the data produced from these models to study individual weather events or entire seasons of weather activity. In addition, time histories such as those provided by the high resolution COAMPS™ re-analyses are very useful for forcing ocean models, and have been developed specifically for that purpose.

Through effort made by projects such as MEL, the Master Environmental Library, and GODAE, the Global Ocean Data Assimilation Experiment , both of which have NRL involvement, Navy model products and observations are now being made freely available to the research community. In addition, COAMPS™ software is publicly available for downloading from the COAMPS™ website , an opportunity that has already been leveraged by more than 150 registered users. NRL also has plans to contribute software from COAMPS™ to the Weather Research and Forecast (WRF) model development effort . This new openness on the part of the Navy has generated a new set of enthusiastic customers for Navy environmental products and will, in turn, lead to a larger group of scientists collaborating with NRL to improve the Navy's prediction systems.

Other Partnerships

The Marine Meteorology Division has a number of relationships with industry and academia, both as collaborators and contractors. The Laboratory welcomes and encourages productive working relationships with both government and non-government activities and is always willing to explore how the skills and expertise of others can help us enhance the Navy's combat readiness. For more information about technology transfer, contracts, and small business opportunities, please refer to the main NRL DC web site section on "Doing Business".