Government officials have launched the U.S. Greenhouse Gas Center, a NASA-led, multiple-agency effort designed to empower collaboration in the earth science field.
Resources provided by the center will be available to federal organizations and private sector entities and will include data, information and computer models from an array of relevant missions, NASA announced on Monday.
The center, which was introduced during the 28th iteration of the United Nations Climate Conference, will support the Biden Administration’s goal to “make critical data available to more people – from scientists running data analyses, to government officials making decisions on climate policy, to members of the public who want to understand how climate change will affect them,” explained Bill Nelson, administrator of NASA.
“We’re bringing space to Earth to benefit communities across the country,” he said.
Information hosted by the center will come from International Space Station observations, satellite and airborne missions and ground stations and will be made available online. These data sets will focus on estimates of greenhouse gas emissions from human activities, naturally occurring greenhouse gas sources and sinks on land and in the ocean and large methane emission event identification and quantification.
The center’s data sets, associated algorithms and supporting code will be completely open sourced. It will offer user support, an analysis hub for individuals to carry out advanced data analysis with computational resources and an interactive, visual interface for storytelling.
NASA worked with the Environmental Protection Agency, the National Institute of Standards and Technology and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to develop the center.
