NOAA research is valuable to the United States in many ways. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is responsible for a great deal of the climate research the government conducts, a growing area of importance as the Earth's climate shifts. This has made them an enemy under the new American presidential administration, which is in turn threatening the agency's budget.
Proposed cuts
According to The Washington Post, the administration is threatening to cut the budget of the NOAA by a whopping 17 percent. These cuts would affect the agency's ability to conduct research, as well as their ability to run satellite programs.
External research, coastal management, estuary reserves, and the protection of coastal areas would also be in danger of losing funding.
The satellite division of the NOAA would take the biggest hit. This division of the agency collects a vast amount of data and research related to climate change and were behind a recent study that confirmed the pace of climate change has not slowed down over the past several years, which angered congressional Reublicans who have refuted the scientific realities of climate change.
Explaining the cuts
The budget cuts should come as no surprise to the NOAA after a recent budget plan obtained by the media suggested that President Donald Trump was looking to greatly increase the spending of the military.
In order to due that and not accelerate the federal deficit, cuts were going to have to be aimed at other government agencies.
The NOAA was always likely to draw the budgetary wrath of the administration, which refutes scientific knowledge of climate change and appointed a leader of the EPA who has spent his career working with oil companies while suing the very agency he now helms.
This administration was always going to provide an uphill climb for believers in climate change. The new budget is nowhere close to being finalized, but the plan circulating suggests a new reality facing the scientific and environmental communities.
