Predicting environmental outcomes, from the effects of pollutants on local beaches to global climate effects, will soon be faster and more effective, thanks to a new online tool for scientific collaboration sponsored by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and built by Purdue University.

The Integrated Environmental Modeling Hub (http://iemHUB.org), version 1.0, was unveiled Thursday (July 8) at the International Congress on Environmental Modeling and Software in Ottawa, Canada.

The site allows environmental researchers to analyze environmental problems and combine environmental models so that a more complete picture can be produced.

The EPA uses integrated modeling assessments to inform decision making in support of its broad mission of protecting human health and safeguarding the environment, said Noha Gaber, executive director of the EPA's Council for Regulatory Environmental Modeling.

"At a time when environmental challenges are increasingly recognized to traverse multiple media, stressors and scales, the EPA is committed to enhancing its abilities to ensure sustainability and treatment of the environment as an integrated whole," Gaber said. "iemHUB will provide a clearinghouse of resources for environmental scientists and engineers."

According to Gaber, the iemHUB serves the broader public in two important ways.

"First, the hub offers transparency to how environmental predictions are being made," she said. "Second, the iemHUB offers policy-makers the opportunity to ask 'what if' questions. They can ask researcher, 'If this happens, what are our options?' and the answers will be more readily available."

The HUB is being released by the EPA-supported Community of Practice for Integrated Environmental Modeling (CIEM). Although supported by the EPA, the iemHUB is intended to be a community-driven technology free of direct oversight by any individual organization. 

Michael McLennan, senior research scientist at Purdue University, said the iemHUB provides end-to-end support for modeling tools.

"The iemHUB offers project support, allows others to develop modeling codes collaboratively, post questions and answers about the models, provides support tickets and wish lists to improve the models, and offers connection to national computing resources," he said.

The iemHUB also allows environmental models to be tagged, and models that connect on computing grids can be combined using these tags. Once tagged, the environmental models can be grouped together with related seminars, teaching materials, and other online resources.