Geoscience Policy Monthly Review
november 2015
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congress
House Science Committee leads investigations into NOAA climate study
November 5, 2015
Chairman Lamar Smith (R-TX) of the House Science, Space and Technology Committee is leading an investigation into the validity of a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) study claiming that a previously believed pause in global warming was in fact incorrect, and that the rate of warming over the past 15 years has been the same as the rest of the 20th century.
Chairman Smith sent a letter to NOAA Administrator Kathryn Sullivan explaining that he believed the agency had not submitted enough data on the recent study; he also subpoenaed NOAA on October 13, 2015 asking for more documents and email communications related to the re-analyzation study. NOAA contends that they have already provided the panel with the correct amount of data supporting the study.
The climate science study, led by Tom Karl, Director of the NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, consisted of global temperatures collected by the agency showing that the pause in global temperature never occurred. The study utilized new technologies correcting raw data for various biases and included ocean temperatures recorded from buoys. In his letter, Chairman Smith states that NOAA never fully explained how the study interpreted the data.
Sources: eenews, house.gov
Congress approves legislation to legalize space mining
November 25, 2015
The U.S. Commercial Space Launch Competitiveness Act (H.R. 2262) passed the Senate and House of Representatives and was signed into law by the President on November 25. The act, introduced by Representative Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) on May 12, 2015, promotes the commercialization of space exploration and mining efforts to extract resources from asteroids.
The act awards ownership of any asteroid materials obtained from outer space to the entity that obtained them. The act also directs the Department of Transportation, which oversees commercial launch and reentry operations, to promote safe commercial space operations and to report on the development of voluntary consensus standards by the commercial space transportation industry.
Sources: congress.gov, eenews