Science Assessments for a Changing World

Credit: Sillerkiil/Wikimedia, CC BY-SA 4.0 Scientific assessments are the bridge between fundamental research and the solutions we need to address society’s most pressing challenges. The U.S. National Climate Assessment, the Arctic Report Card, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reports: Scientist-led projects such as these synthesize the most advanced research of our time into practical pathways for communities, policymakers, businesses, and others who must take action against rising sea levels, intensifying heat waves, and myriad other impacts from changes in Earth systems. However, these important assessments are losing governmental support. In the United States, key programs and the institutions behind them have been weakened or dismantled. Even before these recent changes, there were growing gaps between what assessments deliver and what decisionmakers need. Reports often arrive years apart, address broad questions, and speak largely to national and global scales when the choices in front of a county, utility, or water management district are far more local. To be more useful, assessments must be more frequent, more focused, and more closely tied to the people and places they are meant to serve. The scientific community has an opportunity to build something new. Today AGU is launching the Initiative for Science Assessments, a durable and independent program led by scientists and supported by AGU’s infrastructure. This initiative is meant to complement government-supported efforts rather than replace them and to strengthen the global, national, and local assessment landscape. This initiative is meant to complement government-supported efforts rather than replace them and to strengthen the global, national, and local assessment landscape. AGU will bring its world-class experience in publishing to support development of shared standards across assessment projects, ensuring both the highest-quality science and transparency of the process that produces it. AGU’s ability to convene global networks of experts means that every assessment can draw on leading scientific expertise from across disciplines and across practice areas. To leverage their work into solutions, Earth and space scientists need to collaborate with biologists, ecologists, sociologists, medical researchers, and others whose work spans the processes that define Earth systems. This initiative is a deliberate effort to link that capacity more directly to the decisions that people face now, working with the engineers, farmers, public health officials, tribal leaders, and emergency managers who can turn findings into action. We are embarking on a new era of coproduction for AGU, one in which our aims go beyond publishing assessments to creating trusted processes that connect scientific understanding with the people and institutions that need it most. There is much more that AGU will announce in the coming months, but right now, the Initiative for Science Assessments is searching for an inaugural cohort of guest associate editors who will lead the first round of assessments to be published in Earth’s Future. Reach out to AGU if you are interested or have suggestions for others who may be. Join us in San Francisco this December for AGU’s Annual Meeting, where we will be creating space for the community to hear more about the initiative and learn how to participate. AGU’s Initiative for Science Assessments is grounded in a simple idea: When people have access to trustworthy, understandable, and actionable scientific information, they are better equipped to make decisions. And in a changing world, helping people make informed decisions may be one of the most important contributions science can make. Author Information Kelly Caylor ([email protected]), Editor in Chief, Earth’s Future, AGU, and Department of Geography, Bren School of Environmental Science and Management, University of California, Santa Barbara; and Steven A. Hauck II, Chair, Publications Committee, AGU, and Department of Earth, Environmental, and Planetary Sciences, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland Citation: Caylor, K., and S. A. Hauck II (2026), Science assessments for a changing world, Eos, 107, https://doi.org/10.1029/2026EO260341. Published on 28 October 2026. Text © 2026. AGU. CC BY-NC-ND 3.0Except where otherwise noted, images are subject to copyright. Any reuse without express permission from the copyright owner is prohibited.