[Congressional Bills 118th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 7362 Introduced in House (IH)]

<DOC>






118th CONGRESS
  2d Session
                                H. R. 7362

To establish cooperative agreements for wildland fire research, and for 
                            other purposes.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                           February 15, 2024

 Ms. Bonamici (for herself, Mr. Newhouse, Mr. Duarte, Ms. Tokuda, Mr. 
   Valadao, and Mr. Curtis) introduced the following bill; which was 
                referred to the Committee on Agriculture

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
To establish cooperative agreements for wildland fire research, and for 
                            other purposes.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Satellites Preventing Agricultural 
Crises and Emergencies Act of 2024'' or the ``SPACE Act of 2024''.

SEC. 2. ESTABLISHING COOPERATIVE AGREEMENTS FOR WILDLAND FIRE RESEARCH.

    (a) Cooperative Agreements.--
            (1) In general.--The Secretary of Agriculture shall enter 
        into cooperative agreements with land-grant colleges and 
        universities with a demonstrable capacity to collect data, 
        interpret, report on, and otherwise conduct research on 
        wildland fire sciences for the purpose of promoting and 
        researching the use of available satellite data in order to 
        predict, control, monitor, or otherwise mitigate wildland fire 
        risk, including relating to the following:
                    (A) Smoke detection, land temperature, fire 
                weather, fuel composition, soil moisture, and other 
                metrics.
                    (B) Advanced remote sensing technologies, including 
                light detection and ranging, forest carbon monitoring, 
                and use of geostationary and geosynchronous remote 
                sensing resources.
                    (C) Resource deployment, wildland fire management, 
                and area mapping.
                    (D) Wildland fire behavior and predictive modeling 
                from historic, real-time, and near real-time acquired 
                data.
            (2) Requirements.--In entering cooperative agreements under 
        paragraph (1), the Secretary of Agriculture shall--
                    (A) make available to recipient institutions 
                satellite data acquired by the Agriculture Research 
                Service, the National Agriculture Imagery Program, the 
                National Institute of Food and Agriculture, and other 
                research agencies determined relevant by the Secretary, 
                including such data that--
                            (i) provide real or near-real time images 
                        of earth's landmass;
                            (ii) can be gathered in multiple spectral 
                        bands, including infrared; and
                            (iii) provide historical data sets to mode, 
                        forecast, and track wildland fires; and
                    (B) require recipient institutions to share 
                scientific research and reports, including wildland 
                fire forecasts, models, smoke drift patterns, gaps and 
                deficits in available data, and any other materials 
                produced by resources provided by the Department of 
                Agriculture determined necessary by the Secretary.
    (b) Report.--Not later than one year after the date of the 
enactment of this Act, the Secretary of Agriculture shall submit to the 
Committee on Agriculture of the House of Representatives and the 
Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry of the Senate a 
report regarding opportunities to expand wildland fire research 
cooperative agreements, improve the distribution of remote sensing 
resources, and expand cooperative agreements to include interagency 
groups with access to remote sensing data relevant to wildland fire 
research.

SEC. 3. REPORT ON SATELLITE-DRIVEN WILDLAND FIRE RESEARCH.

    Not later than 180 days after the date of the enactment of this 
Act, the Secretary of Agriculture, in consultation with the heads of 
other Federal departments or agencies the Secretary determines 
appropriate, shall submit to Congress a report that contains 
information relating to the following:
            (1) The needed resources and possible timeline for 
        implementation for integrating satellite and remote sensing 
        technologies, including commercial data acquisitions, as well 
        as airspace management technology and drones, to collect, 
        interpret, and distribute data on wildland fire, for the 
        following purposes:
                    (A) Forecasting fire growth and fire behavior 
                modeling.
                    (B) Developing fire containment strategies.
                    (C) Improving operational resource deployment.
                    (D) Producing daily fire progression maps.
            (2) The need and opportunities to deploy aerial resources, 
        including drones, to provide field observations in regions 
        experiencing multiple wildland fires.
            (3) The capacity for remote sensing instruments, including 
        infrared technology, to detect fine vegetation stress and fuel 
        moisture with increased frequency.
            (4) An estimate of the cost to carry out paragraphs (1) 
        through (3), including to collect, acquire, and provide to the 
        Agricultural Research Services, the National Agriculture 
        Imagery Program, the National Institute of Food and 
        Agriculture, the U.S. Forest Service, the National Interagency 
        Fire Center, and federally funded research entities, including 
        land-grant colleges and universities, the information relating 
        thereto.
                                 <all>