The importance of understanding and predicting climate variation and change has escalated significantly in recent years. Recognizing this, the NRC Committee on Climate Data Records from NOAA Operational Satellites (NRC, 2004) provided an overarching recommendation that:
NOAA should embrace its new mandate to understand climate variability and change by asserting national leadership for satellite-based Climate Data Record generation, applying new approaches to generate and manage satellite Climate Data Records; developing new community relationships, ensuring long-term consistency and continuity for a satellite Climate Data Record generation program.
The SDS Project was initiated at NOAA's National Climatic Data Center (NCDC) in Asheville, North Carolina in 2000, and represents, in part, NOAA's response to the NRC recommendation. Other recent events also helped shape the Project, to include:
- In 2001, in response to a request from the White House; The National Academies' National Research Council (NRC) (2001) recommended several research priorities to reduce uncertainties in climate science. One key recommendation was to "ensure the existence of a long-term monitoring system that provides a more definitive observational foundation to evaluate decadal-to century-scale changes."
- In 2002, President George W. Bush announced the formation of the Climate Change Science Program (CCSP) to focus federal research on climate by integrating the activities of the established U.S. Global Change Research Program (USGCRP) and the new Climate Change Research Initiative (CCRI). Observations and Monitoring are a key components of the CCSP Strategic Plan (2003): the Plan addresses the following question:
How can we provide active stewardship for an observation system that will document the evolving state of the climate system, allow for improved understanding of its changes, and contribute to improved predictive capability for society?
- The Global Climate Observing System (GCOS) Second Report on the Adequacy of the Global Observing Systems for Climate in Support of the UNFCCC (2003) provided a list of "Essential Climate Variables" (ECVs) needed to support critical climate research. The ECVs are essentially met through provision of "Climate Data Records" (CDRs).
http://www.wmo.int/web/gcos/gcoshome.html
- The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Fourth Assessment Report (AR4; 2007; http://ipcc-wg1.ucar.edu/) identified key uncertainties, gaps in knowledge and research needs. Repeatedly, the lack of adequate global data sets was found to limit the regions and types of climate change detection and analysis studies that were possible.
- NOAA's mission for the next century includes a bold new mandate to "understand climate variability and change to enhance society's ability to plan and respond" as one of four central goals. One of the strategies for achieving this goal is to Monitor and Observe: Invest in high-quality, long-term climate observations and encourage other national and international investments to provide a comprehensive observing system in support of climate assessments and forecasts.
- NASA is nearing completion of the deployment of the Earth Observing System (EOS). In coming years, observing capabilities established by NASA will transition from research-oriented programs to operationally oriented ones, such as the National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System (NPOESS) and the European Organization for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites (EUMETSAT) METOP. The climate community will soon depend on NPOESS and METOP to provide much of the data required to monitor the climate system.
