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NASA has big plans to tackle climate change and its devastating global impacts with a new climate action plan the agency released on Thursday, October 7.
Climate change and its effects pose such an imminent threat to life as we know it around the world that it is now described as the ‘climate crisis’, as the United Nations wrote. US President Joe Biden aims to tackle the crisis with a “whole-of-government” approach that uses the National Climate Task Force, which includes leaders from dozens of federal agencies and departments, according to a statement from the White House. As part of this approach, NASA (along with 22 other major agencies) has developed a new climate action plan.
“NASA has unique assets that it must protect – the scientific equipment and capabilities that allow us to understand this climate crisis on Earth as well as to explore the universe,” said Bill Nelson, administrator of NASA. said in a statement from NASA. Fortunately, we have the ingenuity and the engineering capacity to ensure that our agency’s resources remain resilient in the face of this growing threat. NASA is committed to protecting our mission in the decades to come, and with the data that we supply to the world, we will help others the agencies make sure they can do the same.
Climate action plans for the 23 federal agencies involved, and you can read the full text here.
Related: Nobel Prize in Physics goes to trio whose research alerted the world to climate change
While so many different federal agencies contribute to this approach, NASA is one of the few agencies to conduct its own climate research. NASA scientists have used tools like Earth monitoring satellites to study the Earth’s climate and collect valuable data for many years. This has included studying ice loss, ozone levels, sea level rise, temperature, precipitation, extreme weather conditions and more, NASA described in the report. communicated.
However, with its extensive infrastructure, NASA facilities not only contribute to climate literacy – they are also threatened by the impacts of climate change, NASA said in the statement, adding that two-thirds of NASA assets are found in particularly high risk locations.
In fact, according to the NASA statement, about “two-thirds of the agency’s assets, measured by replacement value, are located within 16 feet of mean sea level along the U.S. coast. these assets are located in areas already experiencing high water levels and other impacts of sea level rise. Temperature, precipitation and extreme weather events are expected to affect them. ‘others.
With both its strengths and concerns in mind, NASA developed its climate action plan and submitted it for review by the National Climate Task Force, the Federal Chief Sustainability Officer of the White House Council on Environmental Quality. and the Office of Management and Budget (OMB).
NASA’s plan includes five main focus areas:
- Identify aspects of climate change that threaten access to space;
- Integrate climate risk analysis and adaptation strategies into general NASA plans;
- Integrate climate change resilience planning information into NASA’s plans for its centers;
- Develop new generation climate models and update climate modeling techniques;
- Collaborate with aviation partners to reduce carbon dioxide and develop climate solutions.
Members of the public can share their comments on NASA’s climate action plan, as well as the plans of the other 22 agencies through November 6, 2021, by submitting comments. here.
Email Chelsea Gohd at [email protected] or follow her on Twitter @chelsea_gohd. Follow us on twitter @Spacedotcom and on Facebook.
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