170 



So, again, I think Admiral Watkins' proposal of bringing this to- 

 gether in a holistic way is something I support and I look forward 

 to supporting. Admiral, as one member up here, and I know my 

 colleagues on the panel will look forward to joining to do that as 

 well. 



Mr, Weldon. Mr. Kennedy, what state were you referring to? 



[Laughter.] 



Mr. Kennedy. I won't say right now. I beg your indulgence. 



[Laughter.] 



Mr. Weldon. Ms. Johnson is not here. Mr. Meehan? 



Mr. Taylor? 



Mr. Taylor. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to thank the 

 panel for their patience today. Above all, I want to thank my con- 

 stituent. Admiral Gaffhey, for coming up today. 



My question is not just directed to your community, but what I 

 see in the science, the government-sponsored science community in 

 general. 



And that is a great deal of research that has private-sector uses 

 and applicability. Somehow, the word just isn't passed to the pri- 

 vate sector. 



And in the case of some of the things you've told me today, I 

 think it's really ironic that I can get a surplus Navy 671 engine or 

 a hatch or an anchorchain, advertised throughout the country in 

 "Boats and Harbors" and other publications. But some of the great 

 research you've done like showing the correlation between thermal 

 climes and fish populations 



Down at the NOAA station at the Stennis Space Center, for ex- 

 ample, they can pinpoint the ten most likely places to catch tuna 

 on any given day, by taking NOAA's research together with remote 

 sensing from satellites and correlating the two. 



I'm sure that's just one of a thousand things that you have dis- 

 covered that somehow just isn't marketed. And since we are in an 

 age of budget-tightening where, especially with the gentleman to 

 my left running things, they're a business-oriented group. There's 

 nothing wrong with that. That's good. 



My question is how, without jeopardizing national defense, can 

 you make some of these things that you have found available to the 

 private sector so that the American citizens can get some sort of 

 return on them? 



And what would be your means of marketing this, or at least let- 

 ting people know it's available? 



Dr. Baker. Let me comment on that because I think that's a very 

 important point, Congressman Taylor. And something that we have 

 been concerned about in this Administration is about how we can 

 use that kind of information and how you can make that transfer, 

 because there is a lot of valuable information. But how do you 

 make the transfer and still preserve national security, is really the 

 issue? 



One of the things that the Vice President did was to continue to 

 encourage this group of scientists who have all the clearances to 

 look at the systems, and this is DOD scientists and cbnl scientists 

 from NOAA, National Science Foundation, and the academic com- 

 munity, to look at those data sets and say, are there some that in 

 fact might be released, or is there some information in those data 



