"The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) maintains a network of weather-monitoring stations known as the U.S. Historical Climatology Network (USHCN), which monitors the nation's climate and analyzes long-term surface temperature trends.
Recent reports have shown that some stations in the USHCN are not sited in accordance with NOAA's standards, which state that temperature instruments should be located away from extensive paved surfaces or obstructions such as buildings and trees.
GAO was asked to examine (1) how NOAA chose stations for the USHCN, (2) the extent to which these stations meet siting standards and other requirements, and (3) the extent to which NOAA tracks USHCN stations' adherence to siting standards and other requirements and has established a policy for addressing nonadherence to siting standards.
GAO reviewed data and documents, interviewed key NOAA officials, surveyed the 116 NOAA weather forecast offices responsible for managing stations in the USHCN, and visited 8 forecast offices.
In choosing USHCN stations from a larger set of existing weather-monitoring stations, NOAA placed a high priority on achieving a relatively uniform geographic distribution of stations across the contiguous 48 states. NOAA balanced geographic distribution with other factors, including a desire for a long history of temperature records, limited periods of missing data, and stability of a station's location and other measurement conditions, since changes in such conditions can cause temperature shifts unrelated to climate trends.
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NOAA had to make certain exceptions, such as including many stations that had incomplete temperature records. In general, the extent to which the stations met NOAA's siting standards played a limited role in the designation process, in part because NOAA officials considered other factors, such as geographic distribution and a long history of records, to be more important.
USHCN stations meet NOAA's siting standards and management requirements to varying degrees.
According to GAO's survey of weather forecast offices, about 42 percent of the active stations in 2010 did not meet one or more of the siting standards.
With regard to management requirements, GAO found that the weather forecast offices had generally but not always met the requirements to conduct annual station inspections and to update station records. NOAA officials told GAO that it is important to annually visit stations and keep records up to date, including siting conditions, so that NOAA and other users of the data know the conditions under which they were recorded.
NOAA officials identified a variety of challenges that contribute to some stations not adhering to siting standards and management requirements, including the use of temperature-measuring equipment that is connected by a cable to an indoor readout device--which can require installing equipment closer to buildings than specified in the siting standards.
NOAA does not centrally track whether USHCN stations adhere to siting standards and the requirement to update station records, and it does not have an agencywide policy regarding stations that do not meet its siting standards.
Performance management guidelines call for using performance information to assess program results. NOAA's information systems, however, are not designed to centrally track whether stations in the USHCN meet its siting standards or the requirement to update station records.
Without centrally available information, NOAA cannot easily measure the performance of the USHCN in meeting siting standards and management requirements.
Furthermore, federal internal control standards call for agencies to document their policies and procedures to help managers achieve desired results. NOAA has not developed an agencywide policy, however, that clarifies for agency staff whether stations that do not adhere to siting standards should remain open because the continuity of the data is important, or should be moved or closed.
As a result, weather forecast offices do not have a basis for making consistent decisions to address stations that do not meet the siting standards. GAO recommends that NOAA enhance its information systems to centrally capture information useful in managing the USHCN and develop a policy on how to address stations that do not meet its siting standards. NOAA agreed with GAO's recommendations."
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"As noted in NOAA's comments to the GAO report, delivery of the redesigned database was still scheduled by the end of FY2013, subject to funding."
Recommendations for Executive Action
Recommendation: To improve the National Weather Service's (NWS) ability to manage the USHCN in accordance with performance management guidelines and federal internal control standards, as well as to strengthen congressional and public confidence in the data the network provides, the Acting Secretary of Commerce should direct the Administrator of NOAA to enhance NWS's information system to centrally capture information that would be useful in managing stations in the USHCN, including (1) more complete data on siting conditions (including when siting conditions change), which would allow the agency to assess the extent to which the stations meet its siting standards, and (2) existing data on when station records were last updated to monitor whether the records are being updated at least once every 5 years as NWS requires.
Agency Affected: Department of Commerce
Status: Open
Comments:
As of June 2012, the updated metadata database of stations was continuing to advance through development. In NWS's requirements-based management process, the effort to update the database is formally known as project 10-008, Cooperative Station Services Accountability (CSSA) Redesign. On May 11, the project was approved through the second of formal "gates," which approved the high-level operational requirements and concept of operations for the redesigned CSSA.
The project had forwarded a contract request through the NOAA-wide IT contract services and was awaiting word on when the contract solicitation would be posted. As noted in NOAA's comments to the GAO report, delivery of the redesigned database was still scheduled by the end of FY2013, subject to funding.
Recommendation: To improve the National Weather Service's (NWS) ability to manage the USHCN in accordance with performance management guidelines and federal internal control standards, as well as to strengthen congressional and public confidence in the data the network provides, the Acting Secretary of Commerce should direct the Administrator of NOAA to develop an NWS agencywide policy, in consultation with the National Climatic Data Center, on the actions weather forecast offices should take to address stations that do not meet siting standards.
Agency Affected: Department of Commerce
Status: Open
Comments:
As of June 2012, NWSI 10-1302 was in formal review and the section on rooftop stations had been revised. The National Climatic Data Center had agreed to offer an official exemption notice to maintain a rooftop station at its current location. If a rooftop station was moved for any reason, it would permanently lose the exemption. The intent of the rooftop exemption policy is to maintain the continuity of the data at long term, historical locations.
In consideration of other sites deemed poorly sited,
NWS was intending to continue to work with the National Climatic Data Center to devise a
rating system and documentation that would need agreement by both parties.
The intent of the rating system would be to take into consideration the purpose of the station, the historical significance, and other parameters, and to allow the users of the data to feel confident in the data they are using. This rating system would not preclude any NWS effort to fix siting issues as per already established NWS instruction. Due to the need to permanently document ratings, NWS determined that
implementation of the rating system would need to wait
until a new metadata database is in place."
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Alternate link:
8/31/11, "Climate Monitoring: NOAA Can Improve Management of the U.S. Historical Climatology Network," GAO
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“NOAA has stopped measuring greenhouse gas levels at a dozen ground stations, eliminated some aircraft monitoring and cut the frequency of remaining measurements in half.”...
9/4/12, “NOAA: Budget woes force a halt to climate monitoring at 12 ground stations,” eenews.net , Lauren Morello
"The federal government is cutting back its ability to monitor greenhouse gas emissions, and scientists are crying foul.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration spends roughly $6 million per year to sample carbon dioxide, methane and nearly 20 other gases using a global network of ground stations, tall towers and aircraft….
The cuts come at a time when governments are pushing for more detailed information about sources and sinks of greenhouse gases. Scientists say the decision to shrink NOAA’s monitoring network — the world’s largest — threatens their ability to provide those answers.
“The reality is that countries are making commitments that will cost millions, if not billions, of investment in climate-related work, and governments want more certainty about what’s happening, what other countries are doing,” said Pep Canadell, executive director of the Global Carbon Project. “We barely have enough to provide what a lot of agencies are asking for.
The prospect of having fewer sampling stations around the world is a frightening one.”
Canadell is one of more than 50 researchers who signed a letter, published last week in the journal Science, warning that additional cuts to NOAA’s monitoring program could harm U.S. national security and render useless the hundreds of millions of dollars that several nations, including the United States, have spent developing new CO2-monitoring satellites.…
Cuts could reverberate internationally
Continuous measurements of atmospheric CO2, carbon monoxide and methane form the backbone of NOAA’s monitoring network.
They are collected at the agency’s six observatories — in Hawaii, Alaska, Greenland, Antarctica, American Samoa and California — and seven tall towers scattered across the United States.
NOAA supplements those measurements with air samples collected regularly in flasks on the ground and in the air, which provide information about a broader range of gases and help expand geographic coverage that helps scientists understand local variations in greenhouse gas output.
The majority of the monitoring sites are run by “volunteers” who submit samples and data to NOAA at no cost. At other sites, the agency must pay for measurements — like air samples collected in flasks during regular flights of small, private planes
at 15 U.S. sites.
Those pay-to-play sites were first on the chopping block when the recent budget cuts began. Now, with NOAA managers anticipating a 5 percent budget reduction in fiscal 2013, scientists in and out of the agency say they’re worried that the greenhouse gas monitoring program will be forced to cut personnel.
Many say they’re concerned that if NOAA’s program continues to shrink, monitoring efforts in other countries could suffer. In addition to operating the largest global network measuring greenhouse gases and ozone-depleting substances, NOAA maintains standards that ensure other countries doing similar work are of high quality and in compatible formats.
The U.S. effort has served as a model — and a continuing reference — for programs in Europe, China, India and Brazil. …
- Satellite data ‘wasted’ without ground monitoring
According to recent reports by the National Academy of Sciences and JASON, an independent group of scientists that advises the government, that kind of satellite coverage will be crucial to determine whether individual nations comply with emissions cuts outlined in future climate pacts.
But satellites cannot supplant ground-based monitoring networks, said Sander Houweling, an atmospheric scientist at Utrecht University in the Netherlands who helped organize the Science letter.
“In the foreseeable future, it is not going to be like that,” Houweling said. “With measurements from satellites, we have to learn how to make sure they are on the same scale as ground-based measurements. In the current phase, we are exploring how to make use of measurements taken from space.”
Canadell of the Global Carbon Project agreed. “This is not threatening the need for these atmospheric, high-precision measurements,” he said. “To the contrary, it makes them even more critical. Otherwise, these
hundreds of millions of dollars we spend
on every single satellite get wasted.“”
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