USA Climate Program Threatened by Budget Cuts
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More Aging Earth Headlines >> 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 10 - 11 - 12 - 13 - 14 - 15 - 16 - 17 - 18 - 19 - 20 - 21 - 22 - 23 - 24 - 25 - 26 - 27 - Aging Earth Home USA Climate Program Threatened by Budget Cuts 2007 September - The Bush administration's climate research program has helped scientists clarify some basic facts about global warming, but has done little to provide much-needed information about how society might mitigate or adapt to the changing climate, a National Academy of Sciences committee said today. The independent panel warned that the progress of the program is threatened by a lack of strong leadership and budgetary authority and by the administration's plan to reduce the number of satellites and other instruments used to monitor the climate. The panel also criticized the Climate Change Science Program, CCSP, for failing to adequately communicate its research with stakeholders and for completing only two of 21 planned assessments of climate science. "Discovery science and understanding of the climate system are proceeding well, but use of that knowledge and support decision making and to manage risks and opportunities of climate change is proceeding slowly," the 15 member committee concluded in its report. The Bush administration created the CCSP in 2002 to facilitate climate change research across 13 federal agencies - the program essentially absorbed the U.S. Global Change Research Program, USGCRP. In January a different National Academy panel warned that half the scientific instruments on the nation's environmental satellites are expected to stop working by 2010. The Bush administration has delayed or canceled a number of planned satellite missions and recommended not replacing some aging satellites for budgetary reasons. These instruments are "critical for documenting how the climate has changed," Ramanathan told reporters. "The committee is very concerned about this." The panel highlighted bureaucratic delays as the main reason for CCSP's failure to deliver its promised reports on climate science. The 21 reports were all supposed to have been released by 2006, but only two have been completed. In addition, the CCSP has not done a good job in communicating the results of its research with stakeholders outside of the scientific world or the federal government, the committee said. "Efforts to identify or engage in a two-way dialogue with state and local officials, nongovernmental organizations, and the climate change technology community have generally been limited and ad hoc," the report said. "As a result, the program is not gaining the input it needs on what scientifically based CCSP products to create, and opportunities to inform decision making are being missed." The CCSP did not answer requests for comment on the study. The National Academy of Sciences committee plans to issue recommendations for how to improve the CCSP program next year. Copies of "Evaluating Progress Of The U.S. Climate Change Science Program: Methods And Preliminary Results" will be available from the National Academies Press; tel. 202-334-3313 or 1-800-624-6242 or on the Internet at http://www.nap.edu. More Aging Earth Headlines >> 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 10 - 11 - 12 - 13 - 14 - 15 - 16 - 17 - 18 - 19 - 20 - 21 - 22 - 23 - 24 - 25 - 26 - 27 - Aging Earth Home © 2009; Aging Earth .com |