II
119THCONGRESS
1
STSESSION S. 322
To improve the lead time, accuracy, and dissemination of forecasts of
atmospheric rivers throughout the United States, and for other purposes.
IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES
JANUARY29, 2025
Mr. P
ADILLA(for himself and Ms. MURKOWSKI) introduced the following bill;
which was read twice and referred to the Committee on Commerce,
Science, and Transportation
A BILL
To improve the lead time, accuracy, and dissemination of
forecasts of atmospheric rivers throughout the United
States, and for other purposes.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-1
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 2
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 3
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Improving Atmos-4
pheric River Forecasts Act’’. 5
SEC. 2. ATMOSPHERIC RIVERS FORECAST IMPROVEMENT 6
PROGRAM. 7
(a) I
NGENERAL.—The Under Secretary, in collabo-8
ration with the weather enterprise in the United States 9
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and institutions of higher education, shall establish an at-1
mospheric river forecast improvement program (in this 2
section referred to as the ‘‘program’’). 3
(b) P
ROGRAMELEMENTS.—In carrying out the pro-4
gram, the Under Secretary shall seek to reduce the loss 5
of life and property and economic losses from atmospheric 6
rivers through the development and extension of, and re-7
search on, accurate, effective, and actionable forecasts and 8
warnings, including by— 9
(1) establishing quantitative atmospheric river 10
forecast skill metrics that include the benefits of dy-11
namical modeling, data assimilation, and machine 12
learning improvements in the probabilistic forecasts 13
of landfall location, extreme wind and precipitation, 14
and cascading impacts; 15
(2) developing an atmospheric river forecast 16
system within a unified forecast system, and advanc-17
ing next-generation coupled modeling systems, with 18
the capability of providing seasonal to short-range 19
atmospheric river forecasts that include forecasts of 20
snow accumulation and other hydrologic compo-21
nents; 22
(3) advancing scientific understanding of the 23
roles of atmospheric rivers in subseasonal-to-sea-24
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sonal precipitation and probabilistic predictions at 1
subseasonal and seasonal scales; 2
(4) developing tools and improved forecast 3
products to predict periods of active or inactive at-4
mospheric river landfalls and inland penetration over 5
the United States with a focus on addressing stake-6
holder and public needs related to perceiving, com-7
prehending, and responding to atmospheric river 8
forecast improvements; 9
(5) enhancing the transition of research to op-10
erations through the testbeds of the National Oce-11
anic and Atmospheric Administration, including the 12
evaluation of physical and social science, technology, 13
and other research to develop products and services 14
for implementation and use by relevant stakeholders; 15
and 16
(6) incorporating social, behavioral, risk, com-17
munication, and economic sciences, including by col-18
lecting voluntary data regarding hazardous weather 19
or water events. 20
(c) I
NNOVATIVEOBSERVATIONS, DATAASSIMILA-21
TION, ANDMODELING.—The Under Secretary shall en-22
sure the program periodically examines, tests, and evalu-23
ates the value of incorporating innovative observations, 24
such as observations from radar, observations from crewed 25
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or uncrewed aircraft, novel airborne and satellite-based 1
measurements, data from ocean buoys, data from soil 2
moisture monitoring systems, reservoir storage data, ob-3
servations from mesonets, or any observations, measure-4
ments, or data from other emerging technologies, with re-5
spect to the improvement of atmospheric river analyses, 6
modeling, forecasts, predictions, and warnings. 7
(d) I
MPROVEDMODELING.— 8
(1) I
N GENERAL.—Under the program, the 9
Under Secretary may improve modeling for precipi-10
tation forecasts, with an emphasis on forecasting for 11
complex terrain. 12
(2) I
MPROVED PRECIPITATION FORECASTS .— 13
Improved precipitation forecasts pursuant to im-14
proved modeling under paragraph (1) should support 15
improved water resource management and resilience 16
to extreme water-related events, from floods to 17
drought, which may include the use of enhanced 18
streamflow prediction. 19
(3) E
LEMENTS.—In improving modeling under 20
paragraph (1), the Under Secretary may— 21
(A) develop, test, and operationalize proto-22
type high-resolution Atmospheric River Analysis 23
and Forecasting System models through a re-24
search and operations partnership with partners 25
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outside the National Oceanic and Atmospheric 1
Administration; 2
(B) enhance data assimilation of current 3
and new satellite and ocean observations; 4
(C) improve data processing techniques; 5
(D) use artificial intelligence and machine 6
learning methods as applicable; 7
(E) ensure the surface and subsurface ob-8
servations of the ocean meet the needs of at-9
mospheric river analysis and forecasting pre-10
dictions on time scales from days, to weeks, to 11
months, to seasons; and 12
(F) improve or establish baseline weather 13
monitoring service in areas that have histori-14
cally experienced, or are predicted to experi-15
ence, atmospheric rivers. 16
(e) A
TMOSPHERICRIVERRECONNAISSANCE.— 17
(1) I
N GENERAL.—The Under Secretary shall 18
acquire and sustain adequate crewed and uncrewed 19
aircraft, scientific equipment, and personnel nec-20
essary to meet mission requirements annually from 21
November 1 through March 31 to— 22
(A) ensure atmospheric river air reconnais-23
sance observations are available throughout the 24
expected seasons of atmospheric rivers; 25
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(B) meet air reconnaissance and research 1
mission requirements of the National Oceanic 2
and Atmospheric Administration, including with 3
respect to tropical cyclones, high-impact weath-4
er, sea ice, atmospheric chemistry, climate, air 5
quality for public health, fire weather research 6
and operations, and other missions, including 7
marine animal surveys, post-damage surveys, 8
and coastal erosion reconnaissance; 9
(C) ensure data and information collected 10
by the aircraft are made available to all users 11
for research and operations purposes; 12
(D) participate in the research and oper-13
ations partnership that guides flight planning 14
and uses research methods to improve and ex-15
pand the capabilities and effectiveness of atmos-16
pheric river reconnaissance over time; 17
(E) develop data management strategies to 18
ensure that data and metadata are adequately 19
stewarded, maintained, and archived in accord-20
ance with collective benefit, authority to control, 21
responsibility, and ethics principles (commonly 22
known as ‘‘CARE’’ principles), findable, acces-23
sible, interoperable, and reusable principles 24
(commonly known as ‘‘FAIR’’ principles), and 25
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the Foundations for Evidence-Based Policy-1
making Act of 2018 (Public Law 115–435; 132 2
Stat. 5529) and the amendments made by that 3
Act, and preserve and curate such data and 4
metadata in accordance with chapter 31 of title 5
44, United States Code (commonly known as 6
the ‘‘Federal Records Act of 1950’’); 7
(F) maintain or establish within the Office 8
of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research not fewer 9
than one atmospheric river observatory, which 10
shall include water vapor flux analyses and 11
forecasts, radar and disdrometer precipitation 12
analyses, and snow level radars in all States 13
along the West Coast of the United States, in-14
cluding Alaska, to ensure equal and comprehen-15
sive coverage of that region; and 16
(G) undertake such other additional activi-17
ties as the Under Secretary, in consultation 18
with the Secretary of the Air Force, considers 19
appropriate to improve and grow the atmos-20
pheric river reconnaissance mission. 21
(f) I
MPROVEDATMOSPHERICRIVERHAZARDCOM-22
MUNICATION.—Under the program, the Under Secretary 23
shall consider research and development activities to— 24
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(1) as appropriate, develop and refine methods 1
to categorize the intensity of atmospheric rivers on 2
a quantitative scale and the impacts of such a scale 3
in hazard communication; 4
(2) develop best practices for communication of 5
atmospheric river events and hazards across regions 6
of the United States; 7
(3) gather information from areas prone to at-8
mospheric rivers regarding levels of knowledge and 9
preparedness, including responses to early forecasts 10
and warnings by the National Oceanic and Atmos-11
pheric Administration; and 12
(4) explore strategies and effectiveness of com-13
municating that atmospheric river events are bene-14
ficial at lower intensities versus hazardous at higher 15
intensities. 16
(g) P
ROGRAMPLAN.—Not later than 270 days after 17
the date of the enactment of this Act, the Under Sec-18
retary, in consultation with the Secretary of the Air Force 19
or the Commander of the 53rd Weather Reconnaissance 20
Squadron of the Air Force Reserve Command, shall— 21
(1) develop a plan that details the specific re-22
search, development, data acquisition, partnerships 23
with institutions of higher education, and technology 24
transfer activities, as well as corresponding resources 25
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and timelines, necessary to achieve the goals of the 1
program under subsection (b); 2
(2) submit that plan to the Committee on Com-3
merce, Science, and Transportation of the Senate 4
and the Committee on Science, Space, and Tech-5
nology of the House of Representatives; and 6
(3) make that plan available to the public. 7
(h) D
EFINITIONS.—In this section: 8
(1) I
NSTITUTION OF HIGHER EDUCATION .—The 9
term ‘‘institution of higher education’’ has the 10
meaning given that term in section 101(a) of the 11
Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1001(a)). 12
(2) S
EASONAL; SUBSEASONAL; UNDER SEC-13
RETARY; WEATHER ENTERPRISE .—The terms ‘‘sea-14
sonal’’, ‘‘subseasonal’’, ‘‘Under Secretary’’, and 15
‘‘weather enterprise’’ have the meanings given those 16
terms in section 2 of the Weather Research and 17
Forecasting Innovation Act of 2017 (15 U.S.C. 18
8501). 19
Æ
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