Welcome to www.northslope.org, the web portal for the North Slope Science Initiative. The North Slope Science Initiative (NSSI) is an inter-agency effort to increase collaboration at the local, state, and federal levels to address the research, inventory, and monitoring needs as they relate to development activities on the North Slope.

Scope, Mission and Vision of the North Slope Science Initiative - The North Slope Science Initiative (NSSI) was developed by federal, state and local governments with trust responsibilities for land and ocean management, to facilitate and improve collection and dissemination of ecosystem information pertaining to the Alaskan North Slope region, including coastal and offshore regions. The mission of the NSSI is to improve scientific and regulatory understanding of terrestrial, aquatic and marine ecosystems for consideration in the context of resource development activities and climate change. The vision of the NSSI is to identify those data and information needs management agencies and governments will need in the future to develop management scenarios using the best information and mitigation to conserve the environments of the North Slope. The NSSI adopts a strategic framework to provide resource managers with the data and analyses they need to help evaluate multiple simultaneous goals and objectives related to each agency’s mission on the North Slope. The NSSI uses and complements the information produced under other North Slope science programs, both internal and external. The NSSI also facilitates information sharing among agencies, non‐governmental organizations, industry, academia, international programs and members of the public to increase communication and reduce redundancy among science programs.

The North Slope is a region found in the far north of Alaska, bordered by the foothills of the Brooks Range to the south and the Arctic Ocean to the north. The region encompasses 89,000 square miles, comprised of diverse and unique ecosystems. This area, however, is most well known for its oil fields, which are among the largest in the United States. The North Slope of Alaska is thought to have the greatest remaining oil potential of any onshore area in the United States. The USGS is conducting an intensive examination of its geology and petroleum potential with current research focused on conventional oil and gas resources of the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska (NPR-A) on the western portion of the North Slope.

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