satellites

Key Points: March 12–15 saw the most intense severe weather outbreak of the year through March 31 after powerful storms brought baseball-sized hail and more than 20 tornadoes to portions of the Midwest, resulting in significant damage…

Rachel Carson was a marine biologist, environmentalist, conservationist, and writer during the Great Environmental Awakening (1960-1973). She is known best for Silent Spring (1962) that challenged the use of chemical pesticides,…

Highlights: Temperatures were above average over much of the globe, while parts of western North America, central Asia, and western Australia were cooler than average.  Northern Hemisphere snow cover extent and Antarctic sea ice extent…

The world’s ocean is constantly moving. Ocean currents (movement of water from one location to another) are easier to see closer to shore, but currents are found from the ocean's surface down to the seafloor. The Atlantic Meridional…

NCEI is excited to announce the release of the newest member of the GHCN suite of data products. The Global Historical Climatology Network hourly (GHCNh) is NCEI’s next generation hourly large-scale dataset composed of weather station…

The event of the decade is set to occur next week—a total solar eclipse is ready to travel across America from Texas to Maine. In order to view this special event, climate conditions all need to be in alignment. In honor of Earth Month,…

Orbit Fab wants to build “gas stations” for satellites — which means it needs the gas cap, a mechanism for transferring propellant from an orbital tanker to the customer spacecraft. That docking mechanism, called RAFTI, is now…

NOAA and its partners have released the latest Regional Climate Impacts and Outlooks, which recap winter conditions and provide insight into what might be expected this spring. Winter Temperature Recap The meteorological winter…

Methane Satellites 101: More Eyes Take to the Skies Why we need these sky-high sensors, and what we can do with the data. We are in a race against time to clean up centuries of pollution in our atmosphere and rebalance our climate.…

Methane Satellites 101: More Eyes Take to the Skies Why we need these sky-high sensors, and what we can do with the data. We are in a race against time to clean up centuries of pollution in our…

When educational lessons teach continental drift (that all of the continents were once connected), it is Alfred Wegener who is associated with the theory. Few hear of Marie Tharp, the pioneering mapmaker who discovered the Mid-Atlantic…

NCEI is proud to be entering their 10th year of partnership with the NASA DEVELOP Program! This unique internship opportunity allows early and transitioning-career scientists to get hands-on field experience using NASA Earth science…

Pouya Hosseinzadeh, left, a USU doctoral student in computer science, with faculty mentor Soukaina Filali Boubrahimi, right, assistant professor in the Department of…

Highlights: Temperatures were above average over much of the globe, but eastern Asia, much of Greenland, and parts of Antarctica were cooler than average.  There is a 45% chance that 2024 will be the warmest year in NOAA’s 175-year…

Key Points: The 2023–24 winter season ranked warmest on record for the contiguous U.S. with eight states across the Upper Midwest, Great Lakes and Northeast each observing their warmest winter on record.  The Smokehouse Creek wildfire…

An artist’s impression of MethaneSATEnvironmental Defense Fund/NASA A satellite expected to transform our view of planet-warming methane emissions from oil and gas production has launched from the Vandenburg Space…

An artist’s impression of MethaneSATEnvironmental Defense Fund/NASA A satellite expected to transform our view of planet-warming methane emissions from oil and gas production has launched from the Vandenburg Space…

  There are a lot of superstitions that surround Leap Day...but how does February 29 affect science? Every four years we herald the arrival of an extra day in February. However, it’s a day that is both celebrated and loathed in the lives…

By Robert C. Jones Jr., University of Miami News Julius Dewald’s strategy to combat some of the world’s most intractable problems starts with a bird’s-eye view more than 400 miles above the planet.  From that lofty…

The graph shows how the pH of global ocean waters decreased between 1982 and 2022—this means that the ocean has become 18% more acidic over 40 years. The pH stripes…

Fast Facts By 2030, tens of thousands of commercial satellites are expected to join the thousands of satellites already in orbit. Scientists and others have raised concerns about the potential environmental and other…

What GAO Found There are almost 5,500 active satellites in orbit as of spring 2022, and one estimate predicts the launch of an additional 58,000 by 2030. Large constellations of satellites in low Earth orbit are the primary…

Fast Facts DOD has worked for years to upgrade GPS with a military-specific signal known as M-code. DOD plans to have the needed ground, space, and user equipment ready soon. But it's unclear whether the current…

Dr. George Washington Carver has been largely known as “The Peanut Man” due to his involvement in seminal research of 325 uses for peanuts. However, he was also a prolific agricultural scientist and inventor who thrived in the fields of…

The NCEI’s Ocean Climate Laboratory (OCL) has released the full World Ocean Atlas 2023 (WOA23) Global Climatologies of Temperature, Salinity, Dissolved Oxygen, and Inorganic Nutrients. This is a five year update to enhance the previous…

The mysterious new weapon might threaten satellites in Earth’s orbitKeyFame/Shutterstock The US government has privately warned lawmakers and European allies that Russia plans to launch a space weapon with possible…

How do we measure the temperature of the Earth? There are actually two different kinds of measurements needed because Earth is made up of land and water. Temperature on land is recorded by weather stations all over the world. Ocean…

Highlights: Temperatures were above average over much of the globe, but the eastern United States, most of Europe and a few other areas were cooler than average.  There is a 22% chance that 2024 will be the warmest year in NOAA’s…

Inside the MAPLE power experimentAlex Ayling et al. The first experiment to transmit power to Earth from space could lead to a space-based solar power station within 10 years, according to one of the researchers…

Last month saw the publication of the 2023 State of the Geomagnetic Field Report. The report details the current state of Earth’s main magnetic field, and provides a performance analysis of the most recent version of the World Magnetic…

Key Points: The arctic air mass from January 14–18 broke nearly 2,500 daily minimum temperatures county records from the Northwest to the Lower Mississippi Valley. On January 22–25, heavy rainfall brought more than a month’s worth of…

Spring is on its way and “springing into action” means more than just the seasonal cleaning spree. You can also use your time to see one of the best outdoor events of the year—the total solar eclipse! We know, we know, the lyrics from…

Today, the Department of Commerce (DOC) and NOAA announced an $85 million investment in the new Industry Proving Grounds (IPG) program to promote the development and use of actionable climate information. This initiative, which is funded…

Research Questions What does the existing literature reveal about the evaluation of space-related R&D programmes? What are the benefits and drawbacks of the different approaches?How do other publicly-funded EO R&D…

The world’s largest yearly conference for the weather, water, and climate science community takes place this month to further meteorological sciences. Our scientists and staff are participating in the virtual and in-person American…

Highlights: NOAA ranks 2023 as the warmest year in its global temperature record, which dates back to 1850. There is a one-in-three chance that 2024 will be warmer than 2023 and a 99% chance that 2024 will rank among the five warmest…

  In the past few years, there has been an increase in awareness and interest in microplastic research, as well as the impact these plastics have on the environment and human health. Recently, the NCEI Microplastics team published a…

Drought monitoring and early detection have improved greatly in recent decades through the development and refinement of numerous indices and indicators. However, there is a lack of user-informed guidance as to which drought monitoring…

Key Points: There were 28 separate billion-dollar weather and climate disaster events identified during 2023—the highest annual disaster count in the 44-year record.  The average annual temperature of the contiguous U.S. was 54.4°F,…

From December 11–15, 2023, the National Centers for Environmental Information’s (NCEI) scientists and educators will be hosting sessions and town halls as well as presenting talks and posters that explore “Wide. Open. Science.” at the…

NOAA and its partners have released the latest Regional Climate Impacts and Outlooks, which recap fall conditions and provide insight into what might be expected this winter. Fall Temperature Recap The meteorological autumn…

North Korea has said it will launch three more military spy satellites, build military drones and boost its nuclear arsenal in 2024, continuing a military modernisation programme that saw a record number of weapons tests this year.…

Key Points: Record- warm sea surface temperatures in the Atlantic basin brought 20 named tropical systems during 2023, ranking fourth for the most named storms in a year since 1950. Three of these storms made landfall—Hurricane Idalia…

Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain From the outside, the Kölnbrein water dam, operated by Verbund in Carinthia, which is Austria's highest…

A recently-released chapter in the book Climatic and Ecological Change in the Americas, completed with contributions from NCEI and partner scientists, explored the “fire resilience” of dry conifer forests, specifically Southwest U.S.…

The stratosphere seems to be full of aluminium particles and other metals that come from spacecraft burning up in the atmosphere, and those particles could mess up polar clouds

November and Seasonal Highlights: November marked the sixth record-warm month in a row. The September–November 2023 global surface temperature ranked as the warmest such period on record, a substantial leap (+0.70°F or +0.39°C) above the…

Geoscientists are using remote sensing to gather data on risks including increased exposure to air and soil pollution, excessive heat, wildfire, and flooding. Incarcerated people in the United States face disproportionately more…

Key Points: Record- warm sea surface temperatures in the Atlantic basin brought 20 named tropical systems during 2023, ranking fourth for the most named storms in a year since 1950. Three of these storms made landfall—Hurricane Idalia…

Key Points: Record- warm sea surface temperatures in the Atlantic basin brought 20 named tropical systems during 2023, ranking fourth for the most named storms in a year since 1950. Three of these storms made landfall—Hurricane Idalia…