U.S. Says Climate Satellites Too Costly
United States Is Cutting Back On Efforts To Monitor Global Warming From Space
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A confidential report to the White House warns that U.S. scientists will soon lose much of their ability to monitor warming from space using a costly and problem-plagued satellite initiative. (CBS/iStockphoto)
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Global Warming
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A confidential report to the White House, obtained by The Associated Press, warns that U.S. scientists will soon lose much of their ability to monitor warming from space using a costly and problem-plagued satellite initiative begun more than a decade ago.
Because of technology glitches and a near-doubling in the original $6.5 billion cost, the Defense Department has decided to downsize and launch four satellites paired into two orbits, instead of six satellites and three orbits.
The satellites were intended to gather weather and climate data, replacing existing satellites as they come to the end of their useful lifetimes beginning in the next couple of years.
The reduced system of four satellites will now focus on weather forecasting. Most of the climate instruments needed to collect more precise data over long periods are being eliminated.
Instead, the Pentagon and two partners — the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and NASA — will rely on European satellites for most of the climate data.
"Unfortunately, the recent loss of climate sensors ... places the overall climate program in serious jeopardy," NOAA and NASA scientists told the White House in the Dec. 11 report obtained by the AP.
They said they will face major gaps in data that can be collected only from satellites about ice caps and sheets, surface levels of seas and lakes, sizes of glaciers, surface radiation, water vapor, snow cover and atmospheric carbon dioxide.
Rick Piltz, director of Climate Science Watch, a watchdog program of the Washington-based Government Accountability Project, called the situation a crisis.
"We're going to start being blinded in our ability to observe the planet," said Piltz, whose group provided the AP with the previously undisclosed report. "It's criminal negligence, and the leaders in the climate science community are ringing the alarm bells on this crisis."
Mr. Bush has repeatedly cited his administration's record on researching global warming as a response to criticism of his opposition to forced reductions in the greenhouse gases blamed for it. The administration has been spending about $5 billion a year on global warming: $2 billion on climate research and $3 billion on technologies for combating it.
Last week, Mr. Bush proposed the idea of the 15 largest global-warming polluters — the United States is the largest, followed closely by China — meeting to set goals for fixing the problem while leaving it up to each nation just how to do it. The problem will be a major topic at this week's summit of world leaders in Europe.
Mr. Bush requested $331 million for work on the scaled-back satellite system next year in his 2008 budget proposal. Congress has yet to act on it.
The American Association for the Advancement of Science and the National Academy of Sciences have both cautioned that downsizing the satellite program will result in major gaps in the continuity and quality of the data gathered about the Earth from space.
© MMVII The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.



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See all 53 Comments- George W Bush.
This is power misused for ideological purposes.
I'm ashamed of my government. What decent government de-funds scientists because they don't like what the scientists say?
No decent government does this.
Though I'll agree, why reinvent the wheel?
Don't like the data? Just quit collecting it. Then you can use all that money you saved for something REALLY important. For example, the Bridge to Nowhere in Alaska. Yeah!!
Don't like the data? Just quit collecting it. Then you can use all that money you saved for something REALLY important. For example, the Bridge to Nowhere in Alaska. Yeah!!
Posted by jimfinster at 07:41 PM : Jun 04, 2007"
It's not brilliant- it's the act of a sociopath.
A Mnemonic for anti-social persnolity disorder (A sociopath) is as follows:
* C - cannot follow law
* O - obligations ignored
* R - remorselessness
* R - recklessness
* U - underhandedness
* P - planning deficit
* T - temper
You be the judge.
they finally found the missing link!
...in the White House.
Direction of the Hegemon%u2019s space policy was assumed by Imbustus Vulturinus, who convened a secret group of five Oligarchs of the religious-totalitarian movement. Bereft of any knowledge of science, these persons were recommended by their large financial contributions to the imperial clique and their fanatical opinions on the use of space to subjugate all the nations of Earth. This group was convened on an irregular schedule to compose recommendations on particular space policy issues. Vulturinus then proceeded to implement their recommendations. Vulturinus%u2019 orders flowed to an oversight board in the Office of Management and Budget and thence to the Administrator of the Hegemon%u2019s space agency. Michael Griffin attained his position by swearing absolute fealty to Vulturinus and the totalitarian faction of the legislature. The ultimate object of the space policy oligarchs was to turn the Earth and the solar system outside Earth into one vast prison. More immediately, scientific inquiries into matters threatening the propaganda of the Oligarchy, such as global climate change, were quietly starved. Likewise, the search for life outside the Earth was terminated. Such discoveries would conflict with the teachings of the religious totalitarian clique supporting Dumas. Little did the Oligarchs suspect that by substituting blind superstition for reasoned inquiry, they would finally pull down their own house.
...in the White House.
Posted by billpl at 08:03 PM : Jun 04, 2007
Well, that is pretty charitable. Have you been to bushorchimp.com?
Saving the planet by gathering data that might be helpful: The equivalent of a month or two of Iraq. Too expensive.
I think Bush and his cronies have just proven Darwin's theory.
Hiring GW Bush to head the gov't is like hiring a stock analyst who thinks the stock market is all baloney. What a great gig: he congratulates himself and is rewarded by his employers the more incompetently he does his job...
Everything is too costly except for corporate welfare and endless war.
CBS. Please, Don't bother us with non-news articles like this one. This is not news. It is meaningless, without any reference in cost of other "important" things.
The white house has now a Alice-in-wonderland six impossible things before brekfast attitude
Isn't it time to quit complaining passively and take it to the streets, or do we wait until the patient is dead, and then talk about what medicine we should have given?
Now, from all appearances, Bush is still frozen in denial about global warming, though his speechwriters struggle to make it appear Bush agrees there is a problem with greenhouse emissions.
Clearly, Bush is no friend of science or exploration at all-- especially when he might address rationally something Bush finds an "inconvenient truth". Bush even deleted portions of governmental research recognizing global warming-- and warned US scientists not to cross the political taboo again.
The real problem Bush and some of the GOP have with global warming is not its existence, but its cost. For Bush and some of the GOP, money is the only issue, not science, because global warming redress threatens a principal GOP cash cow-- the oil industry.
It would be equally insane under any partisan government. Please keep the irrelevant and pointless partisan rhetoric to yourself, and join the solution, your kids (assuming you have them) and possibly yourself in your all too soon to come senior years will be the ones suffering. This is not off in the future, it is happening now.
They always run over budget cuz the gov't doesn't police them adequately once they've won the contract. But notice that the program is going through, only the 'climate' related payload items are being taken off, while the 'weather-prediction' items stay on. That smacks of a cover-up since the scientific payloads aren't that different for either aspect. I think Bush and his handlers just don't want the data. Total Global Warming rip-off.
Boo!
No matter how you attempt to explain away this Administrations staunch anti-environmentalism regime, the blunt, blatant, UNDENIABLE fact of the matter is that under Bush and the GOP, every suggestion, report, and request for action in this topic has been forcefully resisted.
You don't like the cost of the programs? Neither do I. But here's what I like a lot less: the fact that programs like this were allowed to become necessary in the first place.
What say you on this issue?
Or would you rather just wait and see if we can get a cheaper one? Waste not, want not, you will have to make those quick and decisive decisions.
You do know if you have any problems in the decision making arena, just roll over and ask Bill what he would do. Now, if you should roll over and find him pre-occupied with that petite French naked maid, just give him a few seconds and then he can let you have your turn.
Then, when he tells you what to do then by all means DO IT, he has been the smartest we have had in many many moons Hillary, it is all about taking care of business when it rises, if you had, Monica would not of been there, where every good wife should be. Truth hurts, so be it. Suck it up ! ! !
I vote you will say the %u201CCHEAPER ONE%u201D
How about you Mr & Mrs Public?????
Being purpofully ignorant of overwhelming evidence is a choice, not a right.
So what should you as ordinary citizen do to help fight this grave and mortal danger? Well, nothing. Just continue about your daily life, go shopping, especially for one of those great big SUVs. We need to show those Middle-Easterners that we're rich enough to continue to buy their oil, and willing to pay through the roof for it, too. Oh, and don't forget to get one of those cute "Support our Troops" magnets for your SUV. The troops in Iraq really appreciate that.
Global heating is a no brainer: interrupt infrared radiation on its voyage out of the planet without changing incoming visible radiation, and the planet's going to heat up - first law of thermodynamics. There are 2 ways something can heat, it can warm and it can change phase (ice-water or water-vapor). The warming part isn't what has everyone freaked, its the changing phase part, cuz that's what drives climate patterns, and ocean circulation patterns and levels. At the very least, if you like the weather you've been having, kiss it goodbye. But it could get better for you locally. It's just a huge, unnatural experiment which, for some people, will likely be disastrous.
Why am I not surprised?
Satellites to Costly, Cut medicare by 10% in 08.
Give AMNESTY to 12 to 20 million illegal aliens, and give them immediate access to the medicare system.
Cut funding to the FDA, and inspect only less than two percent of imported food thats comes from countries like China etc.
BUT HEY! build a Radar System in the Czech Republic, and install INTERCEPTER MISSILES in Poland.
Do you feel as safe as I do?
ditto on your comment.......
Thomas Jefferson once said:
"I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies . . . If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around [the banks] . . . will deprive the people of all property until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered . . . The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people, to whom it properly belongs." -- Thomas Jefferson -- The Debate Over The Recharter Of The Bank Bill, (1809)
"As for the bankruptcy bill, too many Americans have been copying big business %u2013 and they shouldn't be allowed to do that. Folks just don't understand that companies that declare bankruptcy %u2013 like US Air, Winn-Dixie, and Kmart %u2013 are living, breathing entities. And a bankrupt company like, say, Interstate Bakeries (they make Ho Hos and Ding Dongs) is more important than any one citizen, regardless of whether or not he or she makes Ding Dongs for a living. You follow? Another problem is that personal bankruptcies were cleaning out the credit card industry. According to CardWeb.com, profits in the card biz grew from $ 12.9 billion in 1995 to $ 31.6 billion last year. That's only a 144% increase in a decade, which is a scandal. Earnings should have been up at least 300%!
"I guess what I'm suggesting is a return to the Gilded Age, when it was %u2018anything goes%u2019 and everything did. The way we're stifling wages, ending personal bankruptcies, and blocking lawsuits, soon even corpulent guys in top hats may be coming back into style."
http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0331-33.htm
Man made climate change is real and the next generation will be the ones that suffer from its effects.
But fear not! The Rapture will come first!! LOL
This pack of liars lies about everything even when they don't have to-- they are just chronic liars. If it weren't for 911 his whole presidency would have been lableled a crock of u-know-what long ago. Isntead it's taken 6 years and thousands and thousands of lives and thousands of billions dollars. Can't say this country doesn't give a suckerer and even break.
The cost of the war will be at least $300 per taxpayer. The cost of global warming... who knows? I would guess, as a ballpark estimate, $1000 per taxpayer. Then there are the lives, political instability, and environmental destruction for generations to come. I think we should start taxing gas to pay for this tragic war. Maybe people would think more about what the costs really are. Imagine the benefits if the world could cut it's dependence on middle east oil.
http://www.InteliOrg.com
He suggests hanging a rock from a string to predict the weather.
Who needs accurate weather reports?
Besides, those crazy satellites keep coming up with evidence of "Global Warming," so by getting rid of those pesky satellites we'll be getting rid of global warming, too! Sheer genius, Georgie!
http://www.InteliOrg.com
Posted by DrColes at 12:43 PM : Jun 05, 2007
Oh, not THAT group again! Anyone who touts NASA's Tim Griffin as one of their "experts" on global warming deserves to be mocked mercilessly. Griffin's ex-CIA, and a Bush political appointee, he has no climatology expertise. He's shown himself to be of the same caliber as many other Bush appointees such as Michael "Yes, Katrina was on my watch" Brown - meaning politically loyal, and virtually no expertise in the job he was appointed to do.
Please DrColes, let's try a little harder next time to come up with something other than junk science to back up your points. Oh, sorry, I forgot, there is no science to back up your points, other than the junk kind.
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