National Academies Study Calls for Restoration of Climate Sensors

A new report from the National Academy of Sciences calls for restoration of orbiting climate sensors that have been cut by the Bush administration.

The report was issued July 10, 2008, by the Space Studies Board of the National Research Council and published by the National Academies Press.

"To continue the study of long-term climate change, NASA and NOAA need to restore a number of sensors that were previously planned for future Earth-observing satellites but cancelled," the report concluded. It recommends a recovery strategy and stresses "the need for a clearer national policy toward acquiring long-term climate records.

While cutting such basic climate data-gathering over the past eight years, the Bush administration has repeatedly insisted that not enough is known about climate change to justify US action to regulate greenhouse emissions.

• "Ensuring the Climate Record from the NPOESS and GOES-R Spacecraft: Elements of a Strategy to Recover Measurement Capabilities Lost in Program Restructuring," Space Studies Board, National Academies Press, July 2008.