Cooperative Agreement for CESU-affiliated Partner with North Atlantic Coast Cooperative Ecosystem Studies Unit | G22AS00380

Opportunity Information: Apply for G22AS00380

This opportunity is a US Geological Survey (USGS) cooperative agreement aimed specifically at a partner organization within the North Atlantic Coast Cooperative Ecosystem Studies Unit (CESU) network. The core purpose is to support research that improves how coastal flood risk is assessed in highly urbanized areas by explicitly accounting for rainfall and runoff alongside coastal storm surge. The USGS is highlighting a major gap in many current flood risk assessments: they often focus on coastal water levels and storm surge but do not adequately include the added flooding that comes from intense rainfall and the resulting runoff moving through complex city drainage systems. As climate change drives both heavier rainfall events and higher coastal flood levels, the mismatch between what models capture and what communities experience is expected to grow, making this research increasingly important for realistic risk estimation and planning.

The work sought under this grant centers on "coupled" flooding, meaning events where coastal surge and rainfall-driven flooding happen together and interact. In dense urban settings, this coupling can be especially damaging because rainfall has limited places to infiltrate, runoff accumulates quickly on impervious surfaces, and drainage networks can be overwhelmed or even backflow when coastal water levels are high. Accurate prediction in these environments requires detailed understanding of urban drainage infrastructure and landscape features, and it often calls for combining data-driven methods (such as statistical or machine learning approaches built from observations) with numerical or physics-based models (such as hydrodynamic or hydrologic simulations). The USGS is looking for a partner capable of bringing those modeling approaches together and applying them to real-world urban coastal flood problems.

A central theme of the opportunity is environmental justice and disproportionate impacts. The description notes that lower-income communities are often hit harder by these kinds of flooding events, and the research is expected to pay particular attention to impacts on lower-income and minority communities. In practice, this implies the project should not only model flood hazards in a technical sense, but also examine where risks concentrate, how exposure and vulnerability differ across neighborhoods, and how compounded flooding can translate into unequal outcomes. The intent is to produce knowledge that helps address bias in existing assessments and supports more equitable flood preparedness and adaptation decisions.

Administratively, this is a discretionary funding opportunity issued as a cooperative agreement, which generally means the federal agency expects substantial involvement during the project period (for example, collaboration on technical direction, data sharing, or iterative review of methods and results), rather than a hands-off grant. The funding activity category is science and technology and other research and development under CFDA (now commonly referred to as Assistance Listing) 15.808. Eligibility is limited: applicants must already be participating partners in the North Atlantic Coast CESU program, reflecting the CESU model of leveraging established research partnerships to deliver applied science, technical assistance, and education tied to federal needs.

Key details from the notice include the funding opportunity number G22AS00380, an award ceiling of $450,000, and an original closing date of July 1, 2022, with the opportunity created on May 31, 2022. The sponsor agency is the USGS. Overall, the project focus is clear: develop and advance methods for assessing coastal flood risk in urban environments by integrating rainfall-runoff processes with coastal surge dynamics, using a mix of observational data, urban drainage knowledge, and both data-driven and numerical modeling, while explicitly considering disproportionate risks and impacts on underserved communities.

• The Geological Survey in the science and technology and other research and development sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "Cooperative Agreement for CESU-affiliated Partner with North Atlantic Coast Cooperative Ecosystem Studies Unit" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 15.808.
• This funding opportunity was created on 2022-05-31.
• Applicants must submit their applications by 2022-07-01. (Agency may still review applications by suitable applicants for the remaining/unused allocated funding in 2026.)
• Each selected applicant is eligible to receive up to $450,000.00 in funding.
• Eligible applicants include: Others.

Apply for G22AS00380

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