365 Days of Climate Awareness 76 - NASA and climate monitoring

NASA, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, was officially created on October 1, 1958 under the Eisenhower administration, in order to "provide for research into the problems of flight within and outside the Earth's atmosphere, and for other purposes." Establishing NASA was at least partly a panic response to the Soviets' lead in the space race, and like so many other federal agencies, its mission has expanded immensely since its founding.

NASA climate satellite fleet.  Larger version

NASA's vision is now "to discover and expand knowledge for the benefit of humanity." NASA is responsible for the majority of satellite-based earth monitoring (and has a significant hand in the satellite missions which NOAA officially runs). It's a very safe statement that without NASA, our understanding of our planet and changing climate would be far less and far hazier.

NASA EOS imagery: atmospheric water vapor, August 2021.

There are currently thirty active NASA satellites in orbit, tasked entirely or at least partly with monitoring aspects of the earth system, from incoming radiation to local variations in gravity. Among these is a subset of five, part of the Earth Observation System (EOS), whose mission is focused on long-term components of the climate, including radiation, the atmosphere, the ice sheets, and the ocean.

                           

Orbital types.

Satellites provide many advantages as platforms for observation. Depending on the orbit, which can range from more distant and geostationary to faster, low-earth orbits, they provide powerful snapshots of regional or global conditions. Synoptic data (Greek: "syn", with, "optikos", visible) means data gathered at one moment in time. Almost always, looking at a full-hemisphere or global plot of a given data feature is the product of two or more orbital passes, with the data merged digitally. Combining this global synoptic view with higher-resolution, local measurements is an extremely powerful strategy for understanding our planet, the biosphere and our changing climate.

Tomorrow: NOAA and climate science.

Be well!