B -- OSCAR OPERATION, MAINTENANCE AND TESTING

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, National Environmental Satellite Data Information Service (NESDIS) has a requirement as a follow-on contract to install, and verify proper operation of latest version of the OSCAR software system on a workstation at the NESDIS Laboratory for Satellite Altimetry (LSA) in Silver Spring, MD. NOAA intends to negotiate this requirement on a sole source basis with Earth and Space Research (ESR) of 175 Parfitt Way SW N210 Baunbridge Island, WA 98110 pursuant to Statutory Authority: 41 USC 253 (C) (1) ? only one responsible source for a 12-month period of performance with no additional option periods. OSCAR is the only real time ocean surface current analysis product available. It was developed by ESR and supported by the National Ocean Partnership Program agencies, NOAA and NASA. ESR is the developer of OSCAR pilot project global processing system development and improvement which is located at the ESR facility in Seattle. The OSCAR website (www.oscar.noaa.gov) is maintained and maintained at NOAA/PMEL, Seattle. ESR will investigate and report on the possibility of including the ASCAT (Advanced Scatterometer on the European MetOP) wind fields for OSCAR, continue ongoing calibration and validation analysis relative to the surface velocity program (SVP) drifters, explore methods to compute de-biased merged drifter and satellite derived current fields, and continue to maintain the present computation and test-bed system at ESR and will continue to provide direction for the maintenance and development of the web server at PMEL to provide upgrades as well as continuing to serve global fields for climate monitoring and research applications. ESR will continue to provide monthly tropical ocean surface velocity and anomaly maps to the NOAA Climate Diagnostics Bulletin, analyze ENSO conditions, provide data for NCEP?s use in ENSO prediction and otherwise lend support to NOAA?s ENSO and climate monitoring. This procurement is to establish the OSCAR capability at NOAA?s National Center for Environmental Prediction (NCEP) Ocean Prediction Center (OPC). ESR is unique capability for the OSCAR follow-on are based on the present NOAA system and its end product being started and developed at Earth System Research (ESR) in 2001. ESR participated in the OSCAR-II project and expanded the capability to monitor ocean surface currents on the entire global oceans within 60 degrees of the equator. The OSCAR products were made available in near Real-Time on the Web to the ocean research community at www.oscar.noaa.gov. The experience gained in the OSCAR Pilot project and the OSCAR-II project has made ESR a leader in the estimation of ocean surface current for the global oceans. This product can now be transferred to an operational environment to support NOAA?s critical missions for early warnings and protection of life and property. The transition to an operational product will require a new level of product accuracy, consistency, and continuity. ESR will have to improve the calibration and validation capabilities to allow the incorporation of the OSCAR product in the operational NOAA ocean models. Also, the continuity of operations has to allow for methods to respond to contingencies such as interruptions of input satellite data or down-time of computer operations. In 2007-2008, ESR will expand the OSCAR system to improve the operational applications of the global ocean currents in model analyses, in NOAA research ship operations, and the transfer of OSCAR for NOAA?s near real-time operational applications. The end product will be a stand-alone system at NESDIS capable of producing the ocean surface currents. Once it is verified and checkout, the system will be transferred by NESDIS to NOAA?s National Center for Environmental Prediction (NCEP) Ocean Prediction Center (OPC) for operational implementation. The experience gained by ESR during the original NOPP OSCAR research project will be invaluable in providing an operational system to NOAA?s NCEP Ocean Prediction Center. Disruption of the existing working relationship between NOAA and ESR would significantly delay the implementation of OSCAR to the operational NOAA Ocean Prediction Center. ESR is the only responsible and capable source to ensure that the data is provided to NOAA on schedule It is believed that only this entity can satisfy the agency requirement to provide scientific and technical expertise. Interested persons must demonstrate their capability in order to be considered for this opportunity. This is not a request for Competitive proposals. Accordingly, no competitive solicitation is planned. Information submitted in response to this notice will be used solely to determine whether or not to open up for competitive procedures. All responsible sources that can meet the requirements and provide the items as listed above may respond to this solicitation by submitting its capabilities to the attention of the Contracting Officer for evaluation. Responses can also be faxed to (301) 713-4155 or emailed to Joel.L.Perlroth@noaa.gov See Note 22