Water

The BLM Headquarters Wildlife Program advances the Department of the Interior's priorities to address the climate crisis, restore balance on public lands and waters, advance environmental justice, and invest in a clean energy future. Specific BLM Headquarters Wildlife Program priorities include:protect wildlife habitat, migration, habitat connectivity that supports biodiversity;increase resilience to climate change and help leverage natural climate solutions;contribute to conserving at least 30 percent of our lands and waters by the year 2030;support State agencies to meet State wildlife population objectives;engage communities of color, low-income families, and rural and indigenous communities to enhance economic opportunities related to wildlife; anduse the best science and data available to make decisions. The BLM Headquarters Wildlife Program works with partner organizations to meet the goals above on national or regional scale through: Activities that maintain or restore habitats for upland game, waterfowl, big game, pollinators, sensitives species, and watchable wildlife species. Conserving priority wildlife habitat (vegetation communities, water resources, or connectivity) or reducing threats to habitat or species.Monitoring and inventorying wildlife populations and habitats to provide complete, current, and accurate information on the distribution, abundance, and habitat of wildlife that depend on BLM managed public lands.Assessing wildlife habitat and measuring related resource management goals and objectives.Enhancing the understanding of opportunities to conserve wildlife populations that depend on BLM managed lands.Improving how BLM uses and integrates coordinated wildlife monitoring data such as Integrated Monitoring in Bird Conservation Regions (IMBCR) and North American Bat Monitoring Program (NaBat). Doing new research on success in meeting the objectives of wildlife habitat and land use plans at the ecosystem and watershed level.Performing education projects (including citizen science and student-based science) to facilitate wildlife stewardship and conservation for species that depend on BLM managed lands.Increasing public awareness of wildlife resources, conservation challenges and successes on BLM managed lands, including with a targeted focus on communities of color, low-income families, and rural and indigenous communities.

The Hydrologic Sciences Program is a disciplinary program within the Division of Earth Sciences. Hydrologic science has a distinct focus on continental water processes at all scales, and the program supports research with a primary focus on these processes. The program supports fundamental research about water on and beneath the Earth's surface, as well as relationships of water with material and living components of the environment. A major focus is the study of hydrologic processes (e.g., rainfall and runoff; infiltration and subsurface flow; evaporation and transpiration), as well as fluxes of water (e.g. in soils, aquifers, and streams). Many projects involve the study of hydrologic transport (e.g., of dissolved solutes, sediment), coupling of hydrological processes with other systems (e.g., ecosystem processes, geochemical cycles, food and energy systems, socio-ecological systems), or hydrologic responses to change (e.g., changes in land use, climate, or watershed management). Observational, experimental, theoretical, and modeling approaches are supported.

The Hydrological Sciences Program focuses on linking the fluxes of water and the components carried by water across boundaries between interacting components of the terrestrial system, as well as the mechanisms by which these fluxes co-organize over a variety of temporal and spatial scales. The program supports the study of hydrologic processes (e.g., rainfall and runoff; infiltration and subsurface flow; evaporation and transpiration), as well as fluxes of water (e.g. in soils, aquifers, and streams). Many projects involve the study of hydrologic transport (e.g., of dissolved solutes, sediment), coupling of hydrological processes with other systems (e.g., ecosystem processes, geochemical cycles, food and energy systems, socio-ecological systems), or hydrologic responses to change (e.g., changes in land use, climate, or watershed management). The program is interested in how hydrological processes couple to and interact with the geosphere, the critical zone, the landscape, and ecosystems, as well as how the water cycle and its coupled processes are altered by land use and climate. Observational, experimental, theoretical, and modeling approaches are supported.

The Hydrologic Sciences Program is committed to supporting the most meritorious research in any relevant area, including but not limited to: current and future changes to the water cycle in response to global change; how hydrologic processes, water availability, and water quality are altered in human-impacted waterscapes; advancing our capabilities in integrated and realistic modeling of hydrologic systems from pore to continental scales using the full model continuum (from data-driven to process-based); applications of data fusion and assimilation to advance hydrologic sciences; and applications of new technologies to inform understanding of fundamental hydrological processes across scales (e.g. geophysical methods, remote sensing). The Hydrologic Sciences Program is also interested in developing collaborative research with federal agency partners and leveraging capabilities of NSF-supported facilities. Additional information on current research needs in Hydrologic Sciences can be found in the following reports:

National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2020. A Vision for NSF Earth Sciences 2020-2030: Earth in Time. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. https://doi.org/10.17226/25761.
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2021. Next Generation Earth Systems Science at the National Science Foundation. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. https://doi.org/10.17226/26042.
National Research Council. 2012. Challenges and Opportunities in the Hydrologic Sciences. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. https://doi.org/10.17226/13293.
Hydrologic science has a distinct focus on continental water processes at all scales, and the program supports research with a primary focus on these processes. Hydrologic science is also linked to ocean, atmospheric, and solid Earth sciences. Further, hydrological processes are crucial for society and ecosystems, and solutions to water issues are often at the interface of disciplines (e.g., environmental science, environmental engineering, or social science). Therefore, interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary proposals submitted to the Hydrologic Sciences program may require joint review with related disciplinary or integrated programs and may be considered for joint support. Before submission of a proposal that may cross disciplinary boundaries, principal investigators are strongly encouraged to contact the cognizant Program Officers in all relevant programs.

A broad portfolio of Broader Impacts activities is supported by the Hydrologic Sciences program, as described below in Section VI.A. Successful projects will include creative, well-integrated, and effective broader impact activities developed within the context of the mission, goals, and resources of the organizations and people involved. The expertise of collaborators, the proposal budget, and budget justification should reflect this integration. Example activities might include but are not limited to those that create effective methods of engagement with local communities or the public at large; develop infrastructure in the lab or the field; translate research to benefit broader societal needs; involve early career researchers and students with diverse experiences and backgrounds; and/or foster new partnerships (e.g., with Minority Serving Institutions, two-year colleges, or internationally). Plans for undergraduate and graduate student mentoring should include evidence-based strategies for effective recruitment, retention and/or training to be provided. We welcome innovative efforts that advance belonging, accessibility, justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion or identify and remove barriers that have historically excluded some groups from the geosciences.

Other types of NSF proposals, such as Research Coordination Networks (RCN), Rapid Response Research (RAPID), and conference proposals, must be discussed with a Program Officer prior to submission. Additional guidance on RAPID proposals can be found in the Proposal Preparation Instructions section below.

Projects currently and previously supported by the program can be found by using the NSF Award Search (Program Information) engine and entering Element Code 1579.