Dr. Katherine Calvin, the chief scientist and senior climate advisor for NASA, in an hybrid briefing organised by the United States Department of State Foreign Press Centers, outlines the role NASA and space technologies play in studying climate change and in developing scientific responses to that challenge. Excerpts:
CLIMATE change We know this from Earth’s – observations made on and above the Earth’s surface – the planet’s climate is changing. We’re seeing increases in temperature. The animation I’m showing is showing you changes in surface temperature over time. And what we know is that 2021 was tied for the sixth-warmest year on record, and collectively the last eight years have been the warmest since modern recordkeeping began. It’s not just increases in temperature that we’re experiencing. We’re also seeing other changes in the Earth, things like declines in Arctic Sea ice, increases in sea level, and changes in extreme events like heatwaves.
So what NASA is doing with respect to climate, we have a broad portfolio of climate research. So we are the U.S. space agency that conducts end-to-end research about our home planet from observations, models in applied sciences, technology development, and much more. So – go to the next slide.
What I want to do is talk through each of those a little bit more, and so I’m going to start with observations. So this animation is of the current Earth Observing Fleet. NASA has more than two dozen satellites and instruments in orbit, including several on the International Space Station, that are continually looking at the Earth. And we can see things like vegetation, clouds and precipitation, changes in the mass of ice sheets, and much more. We’ve been making these observations for decades, so we can see not just the state of the Earth today but also how it’s changed over time.
Just as a concrete example on that, you’ll see in this animation a couple of satellites labeled Landsat. So Landsat satellites, they observe the vegetation, urban areas, snow – they look at land use and land cover, so they can see where we have trees, where there are crops, where there are urban areas. We have just celebrated our 50th anniversary of Landsat, so we have 50 years of observations of the land. And what we can see when we look through that time series and look starting from 1972 through to today is you’ll see that there are increases in urban areas – so our cities are getting bigger; we’ll see declines in forest area in some parts of the world. And those all have implications for climate, and we can help understand that through our satellite observations.
Each of the satellites and instruments we have in orbit is designed to measure something different. So we can see different aspects of the Earth and use them together to get a more complete picture of how the planet has changed over time and provide that information publicly to scientists and to the public.
We work with other agencies while we’re doing these observations. So many of the missions on this animation are NASA, but we also have collaborations with other partners either within the United States or internationally. So Landsat that I just mentioned is in partnership with USGS, another U.S. Government agency.
International partners
We also have international partners. So if you go to the next slide – one of our upcoming missions is called SWOT, the Surface Water and Ocean Topography mission. This mission is in partnership with the French space agency, and includes contributions from the UK and Canadian space agencies. SWOT is targeted for launch on December 5th of this year, so just in a few months. And what SWOT will tell us is more about water on the Earth’s surface. So it will provide information about the amount of water flowing through rivers and lakes. It’ll also give us more information about the ocean. And the ocean plays a really important role in climate change. It absorbs heat and carbon dioxide, and so it impacts how much warming we experience and how much we might experience in the future. And SWOT will give us more information about the ocean to help us better understand those processes. So it is targeted for launch in December 5th.
We are also working towards planning the next set of Earth-observing missions, called the Earth System Observatory. These missions are going to be designed to work together to provide a comprehensive understanding of the Earth – everything from surface up through to the atmosphere. And we’re working on that now, and it’ll be launched by the end of the decade.
Our satellite and Earth-observing missions, we design them for – both to answer science questions, so some of the most important questions about Earth and how it’s changed, we can use satellites to help us better understand that. But we also provide that information to help people on the ground respond to changes that they might be experiencing.
So we have a disaster team that works with local response agencies and local governments before, during, and after disasters occur to provide near real time information about what’s happening on Earth. So just as an example there, for a wildfire we can see where fires are burning, we can see burn scars and burn perimeters, we can provide information about emissions associated with fire and the air quality concerns that might emerge from those emissions. And we work to provide that information as near real time as possible.
Working in the space
We also live and work in space. So we have two decades of operation on the International Space Station. And part of what happens on the International Space Station is we have Earth-observing instruments mounted on the side of it. This particular animation – this is the International Space Station; this is designed for a recent instrument we’ve installed on the station, our EMIT mission. And this is an instrument that’ll help us better understand mineral dust. Mineral dust has an important role in air quality and in local climate. And so this instrument was installed this summer and will be providing information about that using the International Space Station as a mounting platform.
And we have several other Earth-observing instruments on the International Space Station that provide information about our Earth that we use for climate research and other applications.
We also live and work in space. And some of the technologies we develop to live there have benefits here on Earth. So we have – we think about sustainability when we’re going to space; we have to bring everything with us. And so some of what we develop can be used for sustainability here on Earth. Just as one concrete example, we grow crops on the International Space Station. And some of the research that NASA’s done in growing crops is used here on Earth. So we’ve done research into LED lighting that’s now used in indoor agriculture facilities around the world.
There’s also a fertilizer that’s been developed with input from NASA researchers that directs nutrients to plant roots at the rate that they need it. On the space station, that means we’re getting the nutrients to the plant with minimal inputs. Here on Earth, that means less runoff into rivers and lakes. And so we’re continually thinking about how what we develop for space has implications here on Earth.
Aeronautic research
In addition to living and working in space, space is one part of our portfolio, but we also do a lot of research on aeronautics. So our aeronautics team has been working with the aviation industry for decades to help understand and reduce energy use and emissions associated with aircraft. So we’ve been working on – in a few different areas; one is on technology development, another on sustainable aviation fuels, and another on airline operations. And so we’re working towards reducing energy and emissions associated with aircraft. And later this year we will be testing an all-electric airplane, the X-57. So this will be a test of battery and electric technologies.
And part of what we do with this is we provide that information to industry so that they can use it in their own design and operations. And this is part of a theme at NASA. All that we do, we make available to the public. So we try to provide that information. And so we have a big effort towards open science throughout the agency – not just in aeronautics, not just in climate, but in everything we do, we make information available to the public.
For climate, one of the things we’re really thinking about is how do we not just get information to the public, but how do we ensure that people know how to use it. So late last year the administrator announced a concept for the Earth Information Center. And the Earth Information Center is one way for us to get information to people that need it about climate and the Earth. And so this will be rolled out as a – we’re in the planning phase now to be rolled out as a phased approach, with both an in-person space where we can engage with people and help learn from and teach what we know about climate, as well as a virtual presence so we can provide that information to people when and where they need it. And this will be in collaboration with other federal agencies within the United States. It’s part of a broader effort towards open science and open data, again, throughout NASA.
Major missions
One of our other major programs and missions ongoing right now is Artemis, and so Artemis-I launch is scheduled for no earlier than September 27th. Artemis-I is the test mission; it’s going to test the rocket, the SLS, and the Orion spacecraft. It will orbit the moon before returning to Earth. It is an uncrewed test flight. It is the first, though, of a series of increasingly complex missions that will allow us to explore the moon in preparation for missions to Mars. And loaded on board Orion right now is several science payloads. So there’s a science loaded on the Artemis-I that will help us better understand radiation and the moon. So there are 10 CubeSats we’ll be launching along with it, and then there are also payloads in the Orion capsule, things like dosimeters that will help us understand radiation. There are three mannequins that will also help understand the radiation environment. And so we’re really excited about the science there. The launch is no earlier than September 27th, with more information coming from NASA daily on that as we get closer.
Cooperation with partners
We continue to work with all of our international partners for ongoing safe operation of the International Space Station. With respect to climate, the research that NASA produces on climate is available around the world to anyone that needs it, and we have collaborations with several international partners. Just as an example, we have a dashboard that we put together with the Japanese space agency and the European space agency to provide information about how the COVID-related pandemic and lockdowns have affected the environment.
Just in terms of climate research on the International Space Station, I mentioned earlier the EMIT instrument that was put on International Space Station this summer. This is a NASA instrument that was launched on a SpaceX commercial resupply, and it was installed on the space station by the Canadian robotic arm. And the data that we provide and collect from EMIT will be provided internationally to anyone that wants to use it.
Greenhouse gas emissions
There’s a lot of different ways that we can look at greenhouse gas emission. So one of our other agencies, the Environmental Protection Agency, they actually have inventory information, so they provide bottom-up inventories of how much emissions are. What we can do from satellites is we can observe concentrations of greenhouse gas and we can infer the emissions from it. So we have two instruments – or two – a satellite and an instrument currently in orbit that are looking at carbon dioxide. So the Orbital Carbon Observatory-2 is a satellite that’s looking at carbon dioxide, and then there’s an instrument on the International Space Station, OCO-3, that’s also looking at carbon dioxide.
There are an increasing number of other missions around the world that provide information like this, so some of the European satellites can provide information. There’s a Japanese satellite, GOSAT, that has methane and carbon dioxide information. And there’s more planned both – all around the world for this kind of information.
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