FY2025 Weather Program Office Research Programs Announcement - Observations

NOAA’s Weather Program Office (WPO, wpo.noaa.gov/nofo) is soliciting proposals for the Observations grant competition from this funding opportunity notification. The program competition's approximate total award funding per year is $2,100,000.00.

In alignment with the Weather Research and Forecasting Innovation Act of 2017 (Public Law 115-25), this funding opportunity will allow NOAA to support new weather, water, and earth system observing and forecasting applications, including improved analysis techniques, better statistical or dynamic forecast models and techniques, development of calibrated, probabilistic forecasts, and communication of that information to better inform the public. In particular, this NOFO will seek projects that are responsive to the priorities articulated in the Science Advisory Board's 2021 Priorities for Weather Research Report (https://sab.noaa.gov/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/PWR-Report_Final_12-9-21.pdf) as well as the National Weather Service’s strategic priority to advance probabilistic forecasting and decision support services (https://www.weather.gov/media/wrn/NWS-2023-Strategic-Plan.pdf).

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Applicants are responsible for ensuring that they are eligible for this competition and identify with the appropriate title listed hereafter. The following entities are eligible and encouraged to participate in this funding opportunity, in conjunction with the Weather Program office: any public or private corporation, partnership, or other association or entity or any State, political subdivision of a State, Tribal government or agency or officer thereof. Non-NOAA federal agencies and their personnel are not permitted to receive federal funding under this competition; however, federal scientists and other employees can serve as uncompensated partners or co-Principal Investigators on applications. Federal labs and offices can also make available specialized expertise, facilities or equipment to applicants but cannot be compensated under this competition for their use, nor can the value of such assets be used as a match. If any applicants requesting funding are ineligible, the application(s) will be rejected without review.To be eligible to apply or receive an award, applicant organizations must complete and maintain three system registrations and access to include: SAM.gov, Grants.gov, and eRA Commons. For each, the complete registration process can take 4 to 6 weeks, so applicants must begin this activity as soon as possible and well before the proposal due date. For more information on how to meet these registration and application submission requirements without errors, we advise all to carefully review relevant eRA Applicant and Grantee Training modules: https://www.commerce.gov/ocio/programs/gems/applicant-and-grantee-training. Additionally, we advise that all applicants carefully read “Additional Application Package Forms” within the “Full Proposal Required Elements” section below.No foreign applicants based outside of the U.S. may request funding.Applicability to Federal Employees and Federal Contractors: Federal employees (hereafter referred to as “federal collaborator(s)”) may serve as co-Principal Investigators (co-PIs) or co-Investigators (co-Is) but their salary costs are ineligible expenses to be covered by awards from this NOFO. NOAA Federal applicants are required to partner with one or more eligible non-federal institution(s) who would submit the application for the competition through Grants.gov per instructions in Section IV.K “Other Submission Requirements.” Eligibility also depends on the statutory authority that permits NOAA to fund the proposed activity. For the purposes of this funding announcement, prospective PIs that are also employed as federal contractors have the same eligibility restrictions as Federal employees.Costs incurred by NOAA federal collaborators are eligible for funding through this NOFO only if they fit into one of the categories listed below. Further details are provided in the attached General Information Sheet.Allowed: NOAA federal collaborator travel is only eligible in critical project-dependent cases. Other allowable expenses include project-critical equipment, indirect costs for NOAA affiliate institutions, infrastructure, and testbed-related costs.NOT Allowed: Conference and workshop travel. Any other direct funding for federal institutions, including employee salaries or other costs not listed as eligible in Section III.A, will not be considered as part of this funding opportunity.All funded investigators must assure and verify, if requested, that they will not be allocated for greater than 100% of their annual employment time should their proposal be selected for funding. NOAA will verify this requirement if the proposal is recommended for funding.

All questions regarding this announcement should be sent to oar.wpo.nofocompetition@noaa.gov with the specific name of the competition and program manager, as chronicled below, placed in the subject line to route the inquiry to the appropriate program. Observations: Mark Vincent