SOLICITATION NOTICE
A -- SPECIALIZED SCIENTIFIC AND TECHNICAL SUPPORT TO THE GLOBAL MODELING AND ASSIMILATION OFFICE (GMAO)
- Notice Date
- 3/2/2005
- Notice Type
- Solicitation Notice
- NAICS
- 541710
— Research and Development in the Physical, Engineering, and Life Sciences
- Contracting Office
- NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center, Code 210.Y, Greenbelt, MD 20771
- ZIP Code
- 20771
- Solicitation Number
- NNG0572010-GDE
- Response Due
- 3/17/2005
- Archive Date
- 3/2/2006
- Description
- NASA/GSFC has a requirement to continue specialized scientific and technical support to the Global Modeling and Assimilation Office (GMAO) and the Sounder Research Team in the Laboratory for Atmospheres. This support includes, but is not limited to, the following: 1) the development of the Goddard Earth Observing System (GEOS) atmospheric model and an integrated land surface model to simulate the atmospheric general circulation, provide a component of the atmospheric analysis system to assimilate the Earth Observing System (EOS) data, and transport of chemical constituents in the troposphere, and stratosphere; 2) the development and testing of atmospheric data assimilation systems that advance the usefulness of satellite data and contribute to observing system development; 3) development of assimilation procedures to use satellite-based rainfall data to improve GMAO models and analyses; 4) generation of products in support of NASA instrument teams and climate research; 5) generation and analysis of products from the Television Infrared Observation Satellite Operational Vertical Sounder and retrievals from the Advanced Infrared Sounder (AIRS) on EOS/Aqua; and 6) development of systems for generation of surface wind analyses, and observing system impact studies. NASA/GSFC intends to acquire additional services from SAIC Corporation from April 1, 2005 through November 31, 2005 under the authority of 10 U.S.C. 2304 (c)(1) Only One Responsible Source using a Task Order. This extension of service is required to complete a full and open competition. It is not practical or cost effective to complete a full and open competition for 7 months as a precursor to the award of a follow-on contract, which will be conducted under full and open competition. To compete a contract for only 7 months introduces risks to the completion of critical milestones to support GMAO. The phase-in time and lead-time for new contractor personnel to become minimally experienced and functional to meet the government requirements will result in unacceptable delays in GMAO milestone schedules. It is not practical to conduct two competitions for the same requirement in one year due to the cost of the competition and risks to program objectives. The cost increase will allow GMAO to complete the following critical milestones: 1) completion and full validation of GEOS-5, an improved atmospheric assimilation system that will be used for a NASA deliverable to the President's Climate Change Science Program beginning in January 2006; 2) provision of meteorology and atmospheric constituent products in support of an Aura validation campaign in July 2005; 3) continued analysis product of the historical data stream as a deliverable to the CERES project and other climate analysis projects at NASA/Langley Research Center, with a delivery milestone in September 2005; 4) continued real-time and near-real time meteorology products in support of Aura instrument team retrievals and MODIS land products; 5) commitments to NOAA/National Centers for Environmental Prediction through the NOAA/NASA/DoD Joint Center for Satellite Data Assimilation in the continued development of the atmospheric data assimilation system and the advance of AIRS and MODIS satellite data assimilation. The support to be provided by SAIC under this extension is a continuation of work provided for more than 10 years. SAIC possesses unique and specialized experience critical to the successful completion of the above milestones. The experience of the team is essential in the identification of and recovery from operational system failures and in the quality assurance of products delivered to the end users. SAIC also provides the technical expertise to integrate the highly specialized model and analysis software into an operational system needed to analyze the system performance in a validation framework. SAIC also has the highly specialized scientific background needed to identify science issues that need to be addressed in system tuning. The operational software scripts and systems, the quality assurance software and the validation software suite have been developed and tested by SAIC staff, all with specialized science or software engineering backgrounds. SAIC is the only company with the capability of providing the technical support without a reduction in service. Any other contractor would be required to (1) train people in the operational procedures established for the generation of these specialized products; (2) learn the GMAO atmospheric and land surface models and atmospheric analysis systems (containing hundreds of thousands lines of code) to a sufficient technical level to be able to make modifications to the code as a result of tuning and/or validation runs; and (3) hire an adequate number of staff from the limited pool of specialized scientists who have experience in the development and evaluation of models and assimilation systems and in the use of satellite data streams to meet all the milestones listed above. The Government does not intend to acquire commercial items using FAR Part 12. See Note 26. See note 22. Interested organizations may submit their capabilities and qualifications to perform the effort in writing to the identified point of contact not later than 4:30 p.m. local time on March 17, 2005. Such capabilities/qualifications will be evaluated solely for the purpose of determining whether or not to conduct this procurement on a competitive basis. A determination by the Government not to compete this proposed effort on a full and open competition basis, based upon responses to this notice, is solely within the discretion of the government. Oral communications are acceptable in response to this notice. All responsible sources may submit an offer which shall be considered by the agency. An Ombudsman has been appointed. See NASA Specific Note "B". Any referenced notes may be viewed at the following URLs linked below.
- Web Link
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- Record
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