COMPARATIVO ENTRE MUNICIPIOS

Another useful exercise using the value loop results is to determine the most significant outputs from NASA/NOAA and inputs to NASA/NOAA. This information can be used to establish priorities for the Earth Observations Program by aligning the outputs of NASA/NOAA with those that the analysis indicates will create the most value throughout the stakeholder network. This section presents the most significant NASA/NOAA outputs, and the following section presents the most significant inputs.

Figure 65 below shows the most significant NASA/NOAA outputs. The numeric scores for each NASA/NOAA output are listed in Appendix F. I computed the scores for each output using the weighted occurrence technique—each output’s score corresponds to the sum of all value loops that begin with that output. The model contains 67 outputs from NASA/NOAA, and the top 25 outputs are shown in the figure below. The most significant outputs can be interpreted as the outputs that have the greatest potential for producing value within the stakeholder network. Since each value loop ends with NASA/NOAA, these outputs also provide an indication of how NASA/NOAA should align its outputs to create the strongest feedback loops to its own inputs.

In general, the list of the most important NASA/NOAA outputs is intuitive, but there are a few notable surprises. The highest scoring outputs are science data, access to science system, and funding to Scientists. Following these are future plans information flows to S&T Advisory Bodies, Scientists, and Commercial Data Providers. The appearance of Commercial Data Providers here was somewhat surprising, but consistent with the earlier value loop analysis.

The next three flows are future plans information, program cooperation, and cost sharing between NASA/NOAA and International Partners. This was also somewhat of a surprise, although consistent with the earlier value flow analysis. This underscores the potential value that cooperation with International Partners can bring to the Earth Observations Program.

Following the International Partner outputs are the future plans information and funding outputs to Commercial Industry. Like the earlier value loop analysis, this underscores the potential value that launch services from Commercial Industry can provide to NASA/NOAA.

Among the next few value flows are compliance with policy direction and future plans information to the Government. Between these outputs are the land- and weather-related science data flows to Commercial Data Users. Again, it was somewhat surprising for the outputs to Commercial Data Users to score among the top 25 outputs, but this highlights the potential for Commercial Data Users to create new products, services, and markets for NASA/NOAA space- acquired data—all of which provide strong feedback loops back to NASA/NOAA.

The next four outputs in Figure 65 are Earth observations-related products and services and employment to the Public. Given the emphasis placed on societal benefits in the decadal survey, we expected to see direct outputs to the Public in the list of top NASA/NOAA outputs. This reinforces one of the primary messages of the decadal survey: The Earth Observations Program must consider societal benefits as well as scientific benefits when designing and prioritizing future missions.

Following the outputs to the Public is cooperation with Federal Agencies. The relative ranking of this output with the higher-scoring International Partner outputs further confirms the previous analyses that shows that NASA/NOAA should prioritize cooperation with International Partners over cooperation with other Federal Agencies.

Perhaps the biggest surprise was the next value flow—climate-related science knowledge from NASA/NOAA to the Government, which ranks 22nd _{in the list. We expected this to be one of}

the top ten outputs of NASA/NOAA. However, as Figure 64 above shows, science knowledge from Scientists and science policy advice from S&T Advisory Bodies provide greater value to the Government than science knowledge from NASA/NOAA.

The final three outputs in the top 25 list are educational material to Educators and science content to the Public and the Media. The analysis of the top value loops in Section 4.3 showed that the other important inputs to Educators are science knowledge from Scientists and inspired students from the Public. This means that to seriously engage the Educators, NASA/NOAA should also work closely with Scientists to develop appropriate educational science content. The analyses also indicate that the high-value NASA/NOAA outputs to the Public are goods & services value flows, rather than information value flows (e.g. science knowledge). Finally, as previously discussed, due to the nature of the beneficial outputs of the Earth Observations Program, the Media plays a relatively limited role in the stakeholder network.

The top 25 NASA/NOAA outputs contain only one value flow to Federal Agencies and none to Defense or NGOs. The lack of important outputs to Federal Agencies contradicts some of the recommendations of the decadal survey. The decadal survey recommends that NASA/NOAA increase cooperation with both International Partners and other Federal Agencies. This analysis, however, indicates that investing resources to cooperate with Agencies will not provide as many strong feedback loops as would cooperation with International Partners.

The lack of important outputs to Defense was surprising, given that both NASA/NOAA and Defense have significant Earth Observations Programs. However, after the interview with the former Secretary of the Air Force (Widnall 2008), it became clear that cooperation between NASA and the Department of Defense historically has been limited. This is in part due to cultural differences between the two organizations, and because the objectives of NASA and the Department of Defense are significantly different.

The lack of outputs to the NGOs is consistent with the previous value flow and value loop analyses, all of which indicate that NGOs play only a minor role in the stakeholder value network.

By combining the information regarding NASA/NOAA’s most important outputs with the information about the top-scoring value loops, I created a prioritized list of program goals for the NASA/NOAA Earth Observations Program. These program goals are presented in Section 5.2.

In summary, the analysis of the most significant NASA/NOAA outputs indicates that NASA/NOAA should prioritize its outputs in approximately this order:

1. Data and resources to Scientists

2. Future plans information and funding to S&T Advisory Bodies 3. Program cooperation and cost-sharing with International Partners 4. Future plans information and funding to Commercial Industry

5. Compliance with policy and future plans information to the Government 6. Data and future plans information to Commercial Data Users

7. Earth observations-related products & services and employment to the Public

These priorities provide the foundation for the program-level recommendations provided in Section 5.2.