NASA’s Role in Climate Assessment

A 'Blue Marble' image of the Earth taken from the VIIRS instrument aboard NASA's most recently launched Earth-observing satellite - Suomi NPP. This composite image uses a number of swaths of the Earth's surface taken on January 4, 2012. The NPP satellite was renamed 'Suomi NPP' on January 24, 2012 to honor the late Verner E. Suomi of the University of Wisconsin.  Suomi NPP is NASA's next Earth-observing research satellite. It is the first of a new generation of satellites that will observe many facets of our changing Earth.  Suomi NPP is carrying five instruments on board. The biggest and most important instrument is The Visible/Infrared Imager Radiometer Suite or VIIRS.  Image Credit: NASA/NOAA/GSFC/Suomi NPP/VIIRS/Norman Kuring
A ‘Blue Marble’ image of the Earth taken from the VIIRS instrument aboard NASA’s Earth-observing satellite – Suomi NPP. This composite image uses a number of swaths of the Earth’s surface taken on January 4, 2012. The satellite is the first of a new generation of satellites that will observe many facets of our changing Earth.
Suomi NPP is carrying five instruments on board. The biggest and most important instrument is The Visible/Infrared Imager Radiometer Suite or VIIRS.
Image Credit: NASA/NOAA/GSFC/Suomi NPP/VIIRS/Norman Kuring

NASA’s role in studying and protecting our home planet has never been stronger. Climate change is a problem we must deal with right now, and our Earth science satellite missions have become ever more vital to documenting and understanding our home planet, predicting the ramifications of this change, and sharing information across the globe for everyone’s benefit.

Today, the Third U.S. National Climate Assessment was released.  The report is the most authoritative and comprehensive source of scientific information ever generated about climate-change impacts on all major regions of the United States and critical sectors of society and the national economy. It presents an influential body of practical, useable knowledge that decision-makers will use to anticipate and prepare for the impacts of climate change.

The assessment reports on a broad range of topics that illuminate the interconnectedness of everything tied to climate. The focused approaches used to conduct the analyses in this report will help us build the capability to do better and more regular climate assessments in the future.  I am proud that NASA data and NASA scientists contributed to the research reported in many of the Assessment’s chapters.

We can already see the impacts of climate change around the world, especially through the lens of our satellites. The U.S. National Climate Assessment combined observations from NASA’s incredible fleet of Earth observation satellites with surface-based and satellite data from our interagency and international partners, to help us understand what’s going on globally in areas such as polar ice, precipitation extremes, temperature change, sea level rise and forest ecosystems.

Five NASA Earth Science missions will be launched into space in 2014 alone. Together with NASA’s existing fleet of satellites, airborne missions, researchers, and the unique platform of the International Space Station (ISS), these new missions will help answer some of the critical challenges facing our planet today and in the future.

The Global Precipitation Measurement core observatory launched in February is already helping us learn more about rainfall patterns worldwide. The Orbiting Carbon Observatory (OCO-2), slated for a July launch, will map the greenhouse gas globally, providing new insights into where and how it moves into and out of the atmosphere. The RapidScat instrument to measure wind speed and direction over the oceans, and the CATS lidar instrument to measure aerosols and cloud properties will be installed on the ISS.  The Soil Moisture Active Passive (SMAP) mission will launch in November, to measure soil moisture over the globe and freeze-thaw timing.

All of the data NASA collects is widely disseminated and helps many people to make wise decisions about how we care for our planet, as well as predict and cope with changes in climate and extreme weather events. The National Climate Assessment is an example of how critical the NASA data and research are.

Please take some time to review this important document at: www.globalchange.gov.

President Obama’s National Space Transportation Policy: A Bold Vision for Space

The President has signed an updated National Space Transportation Policy, which ensures that the United States remains the world’s leader in space exploration and scientific discovery, while positioning America to out-innovate our competitors and inspire the next generation of technology leaders.  This plan codifies the current, bipartisan priorities of NASA and provides further direction to other Federal agencies in realizing the President’s bold vision for space.

Under the policy, NASA will continue to lead the expansion of a domestic commercial space industry for low-Earth orbit transportation, while developing a heavy lift launch capability to take humans further than they have ever explored – to an asteroid in the next decade and to Mars by the 2030s.

NASA is well on its way to fulfilling many of the goals of this policy.  Last week, we announced that our Commercial Cargo program has completed all of its milestones and the two companies under contract to NASA, SpaceX and Orbital Sciences, have begun cargo delivery to the International Space Station. 

Our next step is successful commercial crew milestones.  NASA is committed to launching U.S. astronauts aboard domestic spacecraft as soon as possible.  Already, we have tasked three companies, SpaceX, Boeing, and Sierra Nevada to develop spacecraft capable of safely transporting humans to the space station, returning that capability to the United States where it belongs.

This week, the agency’s Commercial Crew Program (CCP) requested proposals from companies to develop crew transportation systems that meet NASA certification requirements and begin conducting crewed flights to the space station. This phase of the CCP, called Commercial Crew Transportation Capability (CCtCap), will enable NASA to certify that a company’s crew transportation system is safe, reliable and cost-effective.  The certification process will assess progress throughout the production and testing of one or more integrated space transportation systems, which include rockets, spacecraft and ground operations. Requirements under CCtCap also will include at least one crewed flight demonstration test to the space station before certification can be granted.

The President’s updated policy ensures the availability of domestic space transportation capabilities that are reliable, efficient, affordable, innovative and competitive, in support of national security, civil, scientific and economic interests.  The policy also advocates for advancements in space technologies to expand the Nations’ capabilities in the skies and in space, fuel economic growth, create new jobs and reinforce opportunities for a skilled American aerospace workforce.

The development of a commercial space sector for low-Earth orbit transportation is freeing NASA to develop a heavy lift launch capability to travel further into space than ever before. NASA has already made steady progress on the development of the next generation heavy lift launch vehicle, the Space Launch System (SLS).  NASA is also well on its way to developing the Orion crew capsule, which will take astronauts further into deep space than humans have ever explored.  Next year, NASA will launch the first test flight of the Orion crew capsule. The President’s budget request fully funds NASA’s development of these next generation systems, which will carry U.S. astronauts on deep space exploration missions to an asteroid and Mars. Full funding of the President’s request will enable an uncrewed flight test of Orion in 2014 and the SLS in 2017.