Beyond the computer models, experiments and studies, there's a critical component that keeps science and technology moving ahead in this world — it's called money.

You need it to buy equipment and supplies, and also to pay salaries for researchers and students.

But when the federal government and predecessors of the Department of Energy first created a series of environmental research parks associated with the nation's national laboratory system, money was a component that was mostly left out.

The result is that the parks, including one at Los Alamos, have been little used. And the valuable science that could be taking place in them — such as studying how global climate change will directly impact a variety of ecosystems — has happened slowly and in some cases not at all.

"These things were created in the '70s at the end of the Nixon era, but they never had any money, ever," said Nate McDowell, director of the Los Alamos National Environmental Research Park. "There has been some great research at these sites, but funding for that research has always had to come from other sources, and it hasn't been very stable."

After learning about the parks earlier this year, U.S. Rep. Ben Ray Luján decided he would try to do something about the funding problem. So he put together a bill (HR 2729), which recently passed the House, aimed at providing $5 million in annual funding for each of the six parks scattered across the country.

"I found out that they didn't have dedicated support and they didn't have funding to continue research," Lujan said. "But it's important that we study the biology, ecology, water systems and other things in these areas. It's an important step to truly understand the impact of climate change."

The six parks that would get the funding surround national labs in New Mexico, Georgia, Idaho, Tennessee, Illinois and Nevada. They represent about half of the ecosystems present in the United States.

The Los Alamos park covers 28,400 acres of juniper-piñon forest and grassland and is home to five vegetation zones. There are more than 900 species of vascular plants, 57 species of mammals, more than 200 species of birds and a host of other wildlife.

And scientists can use the park to understand how the lab, human behavior and other factors will change the mix of plants and animals in the ecosystem.

"Part of what they were set up to do was to look at energy impacts on the environment," McDowell said. "So for something like coal, you could look at the consequences to the air but also to resources like piñon trees, juniper trees and water quality."

Experiments to study things like increasing global carbon dioxide levels can be done at the parks, and that information can subsequently be used to make computer models of climate change more accurate, McDowell said.

"So one way you could study carbon dioxide enrichment is you could fumigate a forest with CO2 and then see the effects," McDowell said. "We're right now doing some studies on precipitation, which is expected to decline in the Southwest as the climate continues to change."

In the precipitation study, scientists dug trenches to reduce the amount of water in a piñon and juniper forest over a two-year period.

"It's probably not a huge surprise, but the piñon died, and after two years, the juniper started to die," McDowell said. "That means if we have a drought here that lasts longer than a couple of years, we might not just lose our piñon forests but also our juniper."

Other studies could heat parts of the forest to see how trees and wildlife respond to predicted environmental stresses.

And at least starting now researchers could collect a standardized body of data across all the research parks as a way of monitoring global climate change in the real world, he said.

"There's a lot we can learn by just looking at things and how they change over time," McDowell said. "And we know already that things are changing, and here in the Southwest we believe that overall things are going to get hotter and drier."

The lab has done some stream and bird monitoring at the park over the years, but beyond that, with no funding, researchers haven't been able to tackle some of the bigger scientific issues that experiments in the park might answer.

"We hope that we could create a early warning network of ecological impacts through these parks," McDowell said.

High on his priority list, should the funding go through, will be to set up a sustainable observation network to monitor greenhouse gasses and their impacts on trees and key animal species. He'd also like to try to quantify how much carbon dioxide exists in the water and plants at the parks. And he wants to set up experiments that will look at changes in precipitation, temperature and carbon dioxide.

"Climate models desperately need those kinds of experiments," McDowell said. "That sort of work will give policy makers better information about what's going to happen."

Luján's bill has been referred to the Energy and Natural Resources Committee, which Sen. Jeff Bingaman chairs.

Jude McCartin, a spokeswoman for Bingaman's office, said the senator supports the legislation, although it may not be heard until after the break because of the current debate over health care reform.

"There will be a hearing on it in the near future," McCartin said.

McDowell said he's glad to see some serious consideration for the science that's possible in the area, and he hopes government officials will take a close look at it.

"It's really nice to see science being valued and what we do being seen as useful," McDowell said. "I'm really hopeful."

Contact Sue Vorenberg at svorenberg@sfnewmexican.com.