The United States is planning to restructure its climate-change research programmes in an effort to make them more relevant to government policy.

White House officials say that the reorganization will help the government to answer scientific questions that influence policy, as well as improving coordination of the entire research effort.

At the moment, climate-change research is coordinated by the US Global Change Research Program (USGCRP), which was set up in 1989 by former President George Bush.

But officials in the current administration say that the USGCRP — which is overseen by one of seven government committees that deal with technical issues — is too far removed from cabinet-level decisions. They also say that its scope excludes large chunks of climate-change research, including, for example, about half of the related activities at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Under the proposals, a new Committee on Climate Change Science and Technology Integration, whose members will include most members of the cabinet, will be responsible for making recommendations to the president on climate-change issues. In cooperation with a working group on climate-change science and technology, the new committee will set research priorities for climate change, White House documents say.

Two new offices, a Climate Change Science Program Office and a Climate Change Technology Program Office, will coordinate the government's climate-change research.

John Marburger, director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, will help to run the integration committee. He says that the new structure will increase the impact of climate-change research on policy by focusing research on the government's priorities.

But Richard Moss, director of the USGCRP coordination office, says that it will be a challenge for people carrying out long-term basic research to compete with those in areas that have potential for short-term policy application.

Marburger aims to have the system running by the end of the year, and does not envisage problems along the way. “I don't think there are too many different ways of accomplishing what's needed,” he says.