The United States Global Change Research Program

"The United States Global Change Research Program is an organization that "coordinates and integrates federal research on changes in the global environment and their implications for society." The USGCRP website is extremely attractive and visually appealing. The main page features a map of the US with tabbed sections titled Regional Climate Information, e.g. Southwest, Southeast, and Sectoral Climate Information.

Clicking on a geographic section retrieves key climate-related concerns for that area. The Sectoral section is divided into areas such as Water Resources, Agriculture, Human Health, and Transportation, with a Key Messages section in each of these subsections. Tabbed sections at the top of the main page, including News, Publications, and Resources (with a useful For Educators subsection), provide additional valuable information. The website is graphics heavy; depending on Internet speeds, some pages could take a little while to load. The site is well designed with regard to functionality, including options for printing and e-mailing on various pages and RSS feeds for news pages. The site's Web 2.0 features allow users to share content via social media tools. All of the links and the content appear to be very up-to-date; this reviewer found only one dead link to an outside report. Some content is a little buried, but this may be unavoidable. The search feature does allow users to find much of this content; however, this reviewer did not have much success using the "search only" limiter on the results page. The scope of the content is broad, providing basic information to general audiences and more in-depth information to professionals wishing to keep current on important climate issues. Summing Up: Highly recommended. All levels/libraries". CHOICE, ACRL March 2012 -- W. Weston, San Diego State University