Dismantling NOAA threatens the world’s ability to monitor the levels of carbon dioxide

Even at the best times, long -term notes can be very fragile. It is difficult to persuade financing agencies to put money in long -term notes because, by virtue of the definition, is a continuation; It has been done before. Most financing entities, from science agencies to charitable organizations, want to be associated with exciting and pioneering work, and very routine notes on scratching. (Dave Kelling scored in his autobiography, Earth monitoring rewards and penaltiesAt one time, the director of the National Science Foundation Program called for financing that he generates two annual discoveries from his record of carbon dioxide levels.)

Another security vulnerability stems from the fact that the community of researchers who conduct sustainable measurements of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere may be less than 30. graduate students interested in learning to conduct this gym work are a rare commodity. Patience and attention is required to be careful, and years may be needed to collect enough data to answer the main questions or discover pioneering discoveries. Researchers should be very diligent and permanent to ensure that the 1958 measurements are comparable to that day. Calibration is an endless routine work. This scientific endeavor is not for everyone.

Unlike, although the Keeling curve has achieved creative global importance, this can actually hinder, rather than help in financing. Environmental programs tend to organize them through geographical and discipline – National Water Quality Program for American Geological Survey, NSF North Pole, and American forest service, for example. Amid these concentrated efforts, the large image can be lost. With the development of the field of climate change, we have found it increasingly difficult to find shepherds who accept the responsibility for measuring Earth’s signs as a whole.

The original Mona Lua measurements began during the International Geophysical Year in 1957/1958. This was a tremendous and wonderful effort led by the United States, including 67 countries, with a (simply) to measure every possible physical feature on Earth in one year. This led to many important scientific discoveries and the creation of many measurement programs around the world. The Antarctic Station, for example, has created a biological climate research house that is still ongoing today. It was the time of tremendous optimism, international cooperation (even during the height of the Cold War), vast dreams, and global cooperation. The United States was proud to drive.

This feeling of endeavor continued in the seventies of the twentieth century, when President Richard Nixon – the conservative Republican – prepared noa to understand the surroundings and atmosphere of the world better. By the eighties of the last century, NOAA grew in its scope, along with the Skrips voltage, to become the heart of global climate science. Now, just three short months of Trump administration, we are considering the US leadership concession in the oceanic sciences, air covering and the loss of the largest and most important monitoring network for carbon dioxide, other greenhouse gases and their calibration laboratories.

Our colleagues live in NOAA day after day, I am not sure whether tomorrow will be at work. We pray to prevail in common sense and that you will spare the worst. Regardless of its fate, we will remain in the battle to maintain the world’s ability to measure the levels of carbon dioxide with any support we can hide, and it is a small around the new dark age of climate science.