Maj. Gen. Heather Pringle, commander of the Air Force Research Laboratory, has underscored the importance of upgrading the infrastructure at AFRL sites across the U.S. to enhance science and technology capabilities for warfighters.

“Expanding, securing and upgrading the infrastructure at AFRL enhances our mission effectiveness while we pay close attention to its cost-effectiveness and sustainability,” Pringle said in a statement published Friday.

Among these projects are the installation of new equipment at AFRL’s Rocket Propulsion Division to advance the production of rocket components and the construction of a new gate and entry point at the Information Directorate in Rome, New York, to comply with the Department of the Air Force’s security requirements.

In November 2022, AFRL initiated the construction of a $4.5 million Facility for Radiation Tolerance Research on Electronics for Space and Strategic Systems at Kirtland Air Force Base in New Mexico.

The facility will operate as part of the Space Vehicles Directorate, which develops new technologies and capabilities for space missions.

AFRL also unveiled a new Advanced Munitions Technology Complex at Eglin Air Force Base, Florida, that will support the development of next-generation weapon systems for the U.S.

The Social Security Administration intends to launch a new IT strategic plan that prioritizes customer-centric and data-driven initiatives, according to the agency’s information and data officials. 

In an interview with Federal News Network, SSA Deputy Chief Information Officer Patrick Newbold and Chief Data Officer Rob King discussed how they are collaborating to bolster information availability, quality, security and usability based on progress from their strategy over the past 5 years.

Newbold stated that the new plan aims to digitize and reduce paper-based information and processing, and to improve employee experience by enhancing access to data needed to support their customers.

He added that the agency is looking into its applications programming interface platforms to optimize the use of both legacy and new systems. As part of their API-first strategy, SSA will expose data at the application level to expedite digital modernization.

King explained that they are analyzing information for an “apples-to-apples” comparison with the business community, stakeholders and policymakers.

“We’re defining our data with the metadata so we know where our data lives and on what systems. We know how it feeds business processes and then we can bring it together to have that ‘apples-to-apples’ data. Then we can put it into the various pipelines that we can then use to feed the digital strategy as well as advanced decision making and unified decision making and reporting,” King explained.

The Biden administration has unveiled a national strategy to develop a thorough set of statistics to capture the economic value of natural assets, such as animals, land, minerals, water and plants.

The National Strategy to Develop Statistics for Environmental-Economic Decisions aims to include natural capital in the national economic accounting system to organize data that enable measurement of the quantity and value of the nation’s natural assets, the White House said Thursday. 

As part of the multi-year effort, the administration will use existing authorities and build on ongoing natural capital measurement efforts to better establish the role of nature in long-term economic growth forecasts.

An interagency working group led by the Office of Science and Technology Policy, the Office of Management and Budget and the Department of Commerce was responsible for creating the strategy.

OSTP Director Arati Prabhakar, Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo and OMB Director Shalanda Young Clearly said in a letter introducing the report that quantifying the value of natural capital is aimed to result in precise economic growth forecasts and provide a broader view of economic progress.