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Eric Beightel Appointed Federal Permitting Improvement Steering Council Executive Director
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Eric Beightel Appointed Federal Permitting Improvement Steering Council Executive Director

President Biden has appointed Eric Beightel, a two-decade environmental and transportation industry veteran, as executive director of the Federal Permitting Improvement Steering Council.

He will succeed outgoing executive director Christine Harada, who will transition to a new role within the Biden administration in July, the Permitting Council said Wednesday.

In his new position, Beightel will oversee a portfolio of large-scale infrastructure projects in renewable energy, broadband and electricity transmission sectors and work to improve the coordination and transparency of the federal infrastructure authorization process.

Beightel will join the Permitting Council from engineering and construction services firm HDR, where he was associate vice president and national lead for infrastructure policy and environmental strategy.

His government career included roles as a senior environmental policy adviser within the Department of Transportation’s Office of the Assistant Secretary for Policy and a policy adviser at the Office of Management and Budget.

The Permitting Council was established in 2015 under the Fixing America’s Surface Transportation Act to coordinate the government’s environmental reviews and authorizations for certain infrastructure projects.

US & India Partner to Boost Defense Innovation Collaboration for Startups
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US & India Partner to Boost Defense Innovation Collaboration for Startups

The U.S. and India have launched a strategic partnership to expand the countries’ collaboration to advance defense technology and manufacturing innovations.

The India-U.S. Defense Acceleration Ecosystem aims to build connections between American and Indian start-ups through various initiatives, including joint prize challenges, roundtable events and mentor-protege programs, the Department of Defense said Wednesday.

INDUS-X will launch an accelerator program to give start-ups access to defense commercialization, funding opportunities, business development and product refinement opportunities.

In addition, the program will boost information sharing among Indian and American universities and accelerator partners on their best practices in defense innovation, fielding and commercialization.

The Department of Defense’s Office of the Secretary of Defense and the Indian Ministry of Defense’s Innovations for Defense Excellence will jointly lead the INDUS-X activities.

A senior adviser group will assess the progress of the collaboration’s agenda and make recommendations for future initiatives.

USDA & NASA Extend Partnership to Address Challenges in Food Security, Climate Change
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USDA & NASA Extend Partnership to Address Challenges in Food Security, Climate Change

The Department of Agriculture and NASA have signed a memorandum of understanding to continue their partnership on multiple initiatives.

The two agencies’ collaborative projects include student outreach programs to promote careers in agriculture and science, technology, engineering and mathematics, USDA said Wednesday.

Since 2015, NASA and USDA have been working together on initiatives such as plant-related studies on the International Space Station. More recently, the federal organizations established programs such as Crop-CASMA, an online resource that contains weekly crop progress report from the National Agricultural Statistics Service to inform farmers’ planting strategies.

Scientists from the USDA Agricultural Research Service and NASA are also designing a plant health monitoring system that uses hyperspectral imaging to support plant growth chambers in space missions.

“From ensuring that future generations are able to reach new heights as they pursue careers in STEM and agriculture, to providing producers with critical data and improving global agricultural practices, USDA is honored to strengthen our partnership with NASA,” Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack remarked. “We recognize the critical interface between planet-wide food security, climate change, and space, and together we are advancing cutting edge innovation, research, and workforce development to tackle some of Earth’s greatest challenges.”

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Deltek Analysis Looks at Federal Spending on Cloud-Based Big Data Tech in Past 3 Fiscal Years
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Deltek Analysis Looks at Federal Spending on Cloud-Based Big Data Tech in Past 3 Fiscal Years

A new Deltek analysis shows that federal government spending on cloud-based big data technology platforms dropped from $789 million in fiscal year 2020 to $539 million in FY 2021 but rose by 65 percent to $891 million in FY 2022.

Spending of federal civilian agencies on cloud-based big data platforms remained steady in FY 2021 but increased by $116 million the following fiscal year, reaching $553 million in FY 2022, Alex Rossino, an advisory research analyst at Deltek, wrote in the market analysis piece published Wednesday.

Among the top civilian spenders were the departments of Energy and State, recording $68.5 million and $12 million, respectively, in FY 2022.

Following a decline in FY 2021, the Department of Defense’s spending on the technology climbed by 232 percent to $339 million in FY 2022, up from $102 million the previous fiscal year.

Analytics landed the top spot when it comes to the types of big data technologies being procured by agencies in the last three fiscal years, followed by storage and high-performance computing.

“Summing up, if the trend shown for FY 2022 holds, it suggests that spending on cloud-based big data technology will continue rising in FY 2023. Presumably, that means it will continue for the years to come,” Rossino noted.

“This is likely to be the case as quantum computing gets closer to reality,” he added.

Air Force’s MQ-9 Reaper Conducts 1st Dirt Landing
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Air Force’s MQ-9 Reaper Conducts 1st Dirt Landing

The U.S. Air Force’s MQ-9 Reaper remotely piloted aircraft has carried out its first landing on a dirt landing zone as part of a training exercise held at the Nine Mile Training Center near Fort Stockton, Texas.

During the event, the unmanned aerial vehicle, which was traditionally operated using line-of-sight antennas, demonstrated its ability to take off and land from anywhere in the world and support missions in austere environments, the Air Force said Wednesday.

“This capability will be critical in ‘tomorrow’s fight’ and nests perfectly with the Air Force’s Agile Combat Employment concept that focuses on smaller footprints, distributed operations and increased survivability while generating combat power,” said Lt. Col. Brian Flanigan, director of operations of the 2nd Special Operations Squadron.

The Air Force Special Operations Command exercise involved the participation of airmen from the 26th Special Tactics Squadron from Cannon Air Force Base, New Mexico.

MQ-9 Reaper is built by General Atomics’ aeronautical systems division to support intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance; close air support; combat search and rescue; and precision strike operations.

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GAO Report Cites Inconsistency in Cybercrime Reporting Mechanisms Among Federal Agencies
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GAO Report Cites Inconsistency in Cybercrime Reporting Mechanisms Among Federal Agencies

A report by the Government Accountability Office found that federal agencies have different approaches to reporting cybercrime, due in part to their varying definitions of the criminal activity.

In a report published Tuesday, GAO said that the lack of connection among the reporting mechanisms poses a challenge to establishing shared metrics, which could be addressed through the Better Cybercrime Metrics Act of 2022.

The study focused on 12 agencies including the FBI, Department of Justice, Internal Revenue Service and Department of the Treasury. GAO learned that these agencies have no standardized definition of cybercrime or approach to identifying, investigating and prosecuting such violations.

Eight of the 12 departments admitted to having difficulty in measuring the extent or impact of online criminal incidents. They also said they needed guidance in defining metrics for evaluating the impact of efforts to avoid or address the criminal cases.

GAO emphasized that the development of a cybercrime taxonomy under the Better Cybercrime Metrics Act could help the federal offices overcome their challenges. The Department of Justice is tasked with creating the taxonomy and notification categories in its national incident-based reporting system, expected for completion in May 2024.

EXPANSIA Enters DOD’s Military Spouse Employment Partnership; Adam Jarnagin Quoted
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EXPANSIA Enters DOD’s Military Spouse Employment Partnership; Adam Jarnagin Quoted

Strategy and integration consulting firm EXPANSIA, a Service-Disabled Veteran-Owned Small Business, has joined hundreds of organizations participating in the U.S. Department of Defense’s Military Spouse Employment Partnership.

As a member, EXPANSIA will support the MSEP mission to connect military spouses with member employers working to provide the demographic with employment opportunities, the Nashua, New Hampshire-based company announced on Monday.

“EXPANSIA is honored to join MSEP’s elite group of employers-partners that recognize the contribution, service and sacrifice those military spouses and their families make every day,” said Adam Jarnagin, CEO of EXPANSIA.

He said that since its establishment, the firm has been committed to creating well-paying jobs for military spouses.

“We did it not just because it was the right thing to do for those who faced constant challenges in maintaining employment but also because these employees are highly skilled, diverse and excel at problem-solving, which is the DNA of any successful employee,” Jarnagin continued.

EXPANSIA, said Jarnagin, views MSEP as a strategic partner in its continued growth.

The company’s entry into the program brings the number of member organizations to over 660. In total, over 250,000 military spouses employed by MSEP partners have been reported since its launch in 2011.

Tynel Jarnagin, EXPANSIA co-founder and a former military spouse, noted her personal experience with the unique challenges in transitioning to civilian life and the difficulties faced by the families of active-duty service members.

That understanding, she said, is why she is proud to connect with MSEP and offer meaningful employment opportunities to military spouses to boost their professional careers.

“Investing in our military families strengthens our workforce and our nation as a whole,” she emphasized.

FedRAMP Adds New Features to Cloud Product Marketplace
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FedRAMP Adds New Features to Cloud Product Marketplace

The Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program has debuted the upgraded version of its searchable database of cloud products and services approved for use across the federal government.

The upgraded FedRAMP Marketplace features a human-centered design and implements accessibility best practices enabling users to find information about cloud service offerings more quickly, the compliance organization announced.

Users can now locate CSOs by FedRAMP ID number and provider, search cloud service providers by business categories and visualize where the offerings are in the FedRAMP authorization process.

FedRAMP’s Program Management Office held a series of feedback sessions to gather user insights and identify needed improvements. The PMO also considered capabilities requested over the past years.

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National Energy Tech Lab Uses Cerebras AI Processor to Make Research Simulation Energy-Efficient
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National Energy Tech Lab Uses Cerebras AI Processor to Make Research Simulation Energy-Efficient

The National Energy Technology Laboratory collaborated with Cerebras Systems, a startup that develops artificial intelligence computing technology, to create a wafer scale-based programming interface for research project simulations.

NETL said Tuesday the Wafer-scale Engine Field Equation Application, or WFA, has the potential to expedite the generation of simulation data using less amounts of energy.

Cerebras is the designer of this wafer-scale engine, which has proven to be 1,500 times more energy efficient than existing computing technologies used in research.

Laboratory scientists were able to demonstrate that the WFA can streamline computational fluid dynamic projects by helping to break down memory and network firewalls during the process.

“We began to make a general-purpose tensor algebra library that could support CFD on the WSE. This library eventually became known as the WFA,” said Dirk Van Essendelft, an NETL researcher.

“Applications for WFA include materials modeling, molecular dynamics and AI-accelerated scientific modeling, among others,” Essendelft informed.

The partnership is working to implement the WFA in commercial applications.

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President Biden Highlights Need to Manage AI-Related Risks
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President Biden Highlights Need to Manage AI-Related Risks

President Joe Biden has stressed the need to manage the risks posed by artificial intelligence to national security, the economy and society as the U.S. sees the technological changes driven by AI and further explores the opportunities the technology offers.

“My administration is committed — is committed to safeguarding America’s rights and safety, from protecting privacy, to addressing bias and disinformation, to making sure AI systems are safe before they are released,” Biden said Tuesday prior to the start of a meeting with a group of tech leaders in San Francisco.

The president mentioned some of the efforts of his administration to advance ethical AI development, including the proposed AI Bill of Rights, an executive order to address bias in AI design and use and a strategy to fund responsible development of the technology.

Biden said Vice President Kamala Harris will meet with civil rights leaders and consumer protection groups in July to further facilitate engagement on AI.

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