Welcome to Delta Science Plan 2019
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Delta Science Plan 2025
The Delta Science Program leads the development of the Delta Science Plan, a shared framework that provides vision, principles, and approaches for better coordinating science in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta and more effectively communicating the outcomes of science activities and their management implications to policymakers. Initially released in 2013, the Delta Science Plan fulfills a recommendation in the Delta Plan (GR1) and supports requirements in the 2009 Delta Reform Act, which calls for the use of science in developing and implementing all Delta policies and management. The document is intended to be used by the broad Delta science community and was developed through an open, transparent, and inclusive process. The Delta Science Plan proposes mechanisms to conduct science to achieve the vision of One Delta, One Science. This vision refers to an open Delta science community that works collaboratively to build a shared body of scientific knowledge with the capacity to adapt and inform water, environmental, and societal decisions. To achieve this shared vision, the 2019 Delta Science Plan identifies six objectives collectively supported by 26 actions. Together, these actions guide science's development, coordination, and communication to provide relevant, credible, and legitimate decision-support for policy and management actions. The Delta Science Plan is also an element of the three-part Delta Science Strategy, a collection of guidance documents to achieve the vision of One Delta, One Science. The other two elements are the State of Bay-Delta Science and the Science Action Agenda.
The Delta Science Plan's third iteration is underway, with the final version due to be released in 2025.
We want to hear from you on the development of the 2025 Delta Science Plan. Save the date and join us from February 20-21, 2025, to share your input on priority actions, tools, and strategies to address the Grand Challenges to Delta science! The public workshop aims to engage the Delta science community, including agencies, non-governmental organizations, community-based organizations, tribes, and others with an interest in Delta science, in developing the 2025 Delta Science Plan. The information gathered in this workshop will directly inform the draft 2025 Delta Science Plan, which will be released Fall 2025 for public review.
Access the final Grand Challenges essay, "Grand Challenges in Delta Science: Planning for Science in a Dynamic System."
View the information sheet and comments received during public review period, which includes the responses to those comments.
The Delta Science Program has developed Grand Challenges to Delta science that will be used to guide the development of the third iteration of the Delta Science Plan. These Grand Challenges were described by reviewing visionary literature relevant to the science of the Delta, its watershed, and the broader San Francisco Estuary (Figure 1). The visionary documents include peer-reviewed literature, agency and workshop reports, scientific reports, official memos, and review products from the Delta Independent Science Board (Delta ISB). The first three grand challenges are pulled from the literature, however, the fourth grand challenge, although supported by peer reviewed journal articles, is not well reflected in Delta scientific literature brought into decision- making but was important enough to be elevated as a Grand Challenge. With this literature review, we brought in the ideas of many voices and organizations to identify the critical challenges to Delta science. The development of the Grand Challenges is not meant to replace these visionary documents but rather to assemble the information from these works into a centralized location and to build out actionable steps from this work.
Figure 1. Process for developing the Grand Challenges to Delta science.
The four Grand Challenges outlined in the 2025 Delta Science Plan include: