Uses for Space Equipment : Scripps Launches Plan for Technology Center

In a cooperative venture with private industry, Scripps Institution of Oceanography hopes to open a federally funded center this fall to develop commercial applications for space technology.

The center would receive oceanographic data from satellites worldwide, process it and supply the information by computer to private interests such as commercial fishermen, oil companies, and even commodities brokers with an interest in changes in ocean weather.

The public-private partnership would be something of a first for Scripps. But it would follow the model of the San Diego Supercomputer Center and the Center for Magnetic Recording Research at UC San Diego, both of which unite the university and private industry.

‘Resource for Scientists’

“It’s an opportunity for us to really make available some of the new technologies that we’re developing and have been using for some time,” said Tom Collins, assistant director at Scripps. “It’s also an opportunity for us to provide a resource for scientists to use.”

Under the proposal, to be submitted later this month to the National Aeronautic and Space Administration, the center would receive detailed information about such things as ocean temperatures and currents from remote-sensing devices aboard satellites orbiting the earth.

Computer firms working with the center would develop new hardware and software for transmitting the information to private industries and individuals such as weather forecasters, aerospace firms and commercial shippers.

Anticipated applications of the technology include helping fishermen find fish, enabling oil companies to skirt heavy weather while transporting large drilling equipment across oceans, and helping utilities anticipate weather changes through improved meteorology.

Even commodities and futures traders might have a new tool. They could be able to anticipate dramatic ocean changes such as an El Nino, which reduced the number of fish available to South America and thus raised demand for, and the value of, American soybeans.

“We would act as a funnel for all this different information,” said John Bates, a research meteorologist working on the proposal with Catherine Gautier, assistant director of the California Space Institute at Scripps.

NASA Proposal

According to Bates, Scripps scientists were approached by NASA and urged to consider making a proposal to the space agency, which has been offering seed money to establish university-industry centers for the commercial development of space-related technologies.

So far, nine centers have received funding over the last two years to cover research in areas ranging from robotics to growing crystals in space. If funding is approved for Scripps, the facility would be the first center in the West.

It would capitalize on many recent and anticipated advances, Bates said.

First, several spacecraft are to be launched in the early 1990s carrying a collection of sensors for use in oceanography. Those are to include microwave sensors capable of penetrating clouds and taking measurements at the ocean’s surface, Bates said.

Those launchings are to coincide with the so-called world ocean circulation experiment, an international effort to collect oceanographic information on an unprecedented scale. Using satellites from numerous countries, that project is expected to bring in large quantities of new data.

Finally, advances in computer technology have recently produced computers large enough to do numerical modeling of oceans.

‘Revolutionize Knowledge’

“A number of different pieces are sort of falling together which we believe is really going to revolutionize our knowledge of the oceans and make possible forecasts of one, two and three days of the ocean weather,” Bates said.

The Scripps proposal, due in Washington April 24, will ask NASA for $800,000 a year over the five-year period of the grant. The center’s organizers hope to match that figure with pledges from industries interested in participating.

Toward that end, a La Jolla-based consulting firm, Nuventures Consultants, is conducting both an economic forecast for the proposed center and a preliminary assessment of how satellite remote sensing technology might be used in commercial applications.

Jack Kelleher, a consultant with Nuventures, said Friday that fishermen could use oceanographic data to determine where schools of fish might go or to help boats avoid ice flows and big waves. Utility firms could benefit by more precise measurements of weather over the ocean in order to predict storms and power outages. Oil companies transporting sensitive drilling equipment across oceans could use the information in plotting routes.

Information System

At the same time, Scripps scientists hope that computer firms might join the center and work on developing systems for transmitting the oceanographic information to the “end users” in a form that is convenient and useful.

For example, some might develop fast and efficient programs for use in small computers, or systems that specialize in image processing. Others might build affordable computer work stations suitable for tuna boats, for example.

Asked how the rights to systems developed at the center would be divided, Collins noted that much of the existing space technology is already in the public domain. He said the University of California system, of which Scripps is a part, has “a multitude of people” who specialize in such questions.

“It’s hard to say who is going to get what,” Collins said. “But there will be a sharing.”

If the proposal is approved, funding will become available in October. Collins said the center would open shortly after that.