National Information Collaboration on Ecohydraulics (NICE): Beneficial Use for Fisheries | W81EWF 24 SOI 0008

Opportunity Information: Apply for W81EWF 24 SOI 0008

The National Information Collaboration on Ecohydraulics (NICE): Beneficial Use for Fisheries opportunity is a research-focused cooperative agreement from the U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center (ERDC) aimed at improving how navigation infrastructure and sediment management decisions account for fish and fisheries outcomes. The work sits at the intersection of engineering and ecology (ecohydraulics), reflecting a growing need to understand how locks, dams, and navigation channels affect fish movement, habitat use, and overall ecosystem function. A key motivation is that many existing dams, particularly across the Mississippi Basin and the southeastern United States, were not designed with fish passage in mind. At the same time, some structures are now being considered as tools for managing aquatic nuisance species, while several native fish populations have gained additional protections under the Endangered Species Act (ESA). These competing priorities create an applied management challenge: enabling or improving fish movement where appropriate without disrupting navigation operations.

The specific project goal is to collect and develop data that clarifies how beneficial use of dredged material can support fisheries, and to translate that knowledge into better-informed navigation channel maintenance in environmentally sensitive areas. Beneficial use generally refers to placing dredged sediment in ways that create or enhance habitat rather than treating it purely as waste, such as building or restoring shallow-water areas, wetlands, or other ecologically valuable features. The opportunity notes that multiple beneficial use demonstration projects are already underway in the Chesapeake Bay region and in other major systems such as San Francisco Bay and the Lower Columbia River, signaling that the work is intended to inform real-world, scalable management decisions rather than remain purely theoretical.

A central scientific focus is understanding how fish, including ESA-listed species, find and use beneficial use sites and how that site use translates into population-relevant outcomes. In practice, this means moving beyond simple presence-absence observations and toward a stronger understanding of movement pathways, habitat selection, and the functional value of these sites for feeding, refuge, migration staging, or other life-history needs. The opportunity emphasizes the need for multidimensional (high-resolution, spatially explicit) models that describe how water flows into, through, and out of beneficial use areas, and then link those flow fields to fish behavior and distribution. Because shallow-water restoration and sediment-placement sites can have complex circulation patterns, the project is framed around capturing and modeling flow in ways that can realistically predict how fish will respond under different designs or operating conditions.

The research scope also highlights how conditions at beneficial use sites change over time, especially as emergent vegetation establishes and expands. Vegetation can alter currents, water depth, and edge habitat structure, which in turn can affect prey availability, predator refuge, and fish access. The interconnected sediment budget is also flagged as important, indicating the project is expected to consider how sediment moves and accumulates across the site and surrounding areas, not just at a single placement footprint. Taken together, the intent is to build a more complete picture of the physical and biological feedbacks that determine whether beneficial use actions actually produce sustained fisheries benefits.

A notable deliverable implied by the description is the creation of high-resolution, multidimensional fish tracks in shallow-water locations that are either current beneficial use sites or strong candidates for future projects. This suggests intensive field monitoring of fish movement (for example, detailed telemetry-based tracking) paired with hydrodynamic measurements and modeling. The field studies will be conducted in the Chesapeake Bay ecosystem, aligning the effort with an area where beneficial use work is active and where fish and habitat management are high priorities.

Administratively, this is a discretionary funding opportunity using a cooperative agreement, meaning substantial federal involvement is likely during project execution (for example, coordination on study design, data standards, or integration with ERDC and NICE research objectives). The opportunity is identified as Funding Opportunity Number W81EWF 24 SOI 0008 under CFDA 12.630, with an anticipated single award. The maximum funding amount listed is $450,000. Eligibility is restricted to non-federal partners of the Chesapeake Watershed Cooperative Ecosystems Studies Unit (CESU), which narrows the applicant pool to organizations within that established partnership framework. The original closing date was January 26, 2024, and the opportunity was created on November 27, 2023.

Overall, the grant is designed to strengthen the evidence base and modeling capability needed to predict fisheries outcomes from navigation-related actions, particularly beneficial use of dredged material, while keeping navigation needs in view. By combining fish movement tracking, multidimensional hydrodynamic modeling, and attention to vegetation and sediment dynamics, the project aims to produce practical, engineering-relevant insights that can guide how beneficial use sites are designed, evaluated, and managed to support fish populations, including species with ESA protections.

• The Engineer Research and Development Center in the science and technology and other research and development sector is offering a public funding opportunity titled "National Information Collaboration on Ecohydraulics (NICE): Beneficial Use for Fisheries" and is now available to receive applicants.
• Interested and eligible applicants and submit their applications by referencing the CFDA number(s): 12.630.
• This funding opportunity was created on 2023-11-27.
• Applicants must submit their applications by 2024-01-26. (Agency may still review applications by suitable applicants for the remaining/unused allocated funding in 2026.)
• Each selected applicant is eligible to receive up to $450,000.00 in funding.
• The number of recipients for this funding is limited to 1 candidate(s).
• Eligible applicants include: Others.

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