The National Climate Assessment, an ongoing project to review the nation’s climate change preparedness, has been the subject of attacks by the current administration, which dismissed hundreds of scientists working on the project as part of its concerted effort to stop progress on climate change. But the American Geophysical Union and the American Meteorological Society have announced that they will publish the group’s findings in their journals, if the authors wish to do so.
As Solar One continues its mission to provide the communities it serves with accurate, actionable climate information, our work and the work of volunteer scientists like those who are working on the NCA6 and those who are determined to make sure that work is accessible are needed more than ever.
“It’s incumbent on us to ensure our communities, our neighbors, our children are all protected and prepared for the mounting risks of climate change,” Brandon Jones, the president of the union and a program director with the National Science Foundation, said in the statement. “This collaboration provides a critical pathway for a wide range of researchers to come together and provide the science needed to support the global enterprise pursuing solutions to climate change.”
The Assessment, which is in its fifth iteration since being implemented in 2000, is mandated by Congress under the US Global Change Research Program, and its future is not clear. While publishing the findings will not replace the Assessment itself, which undergoes extensive public and governmental reviews, it will give the authors an opportunity to complete the work they have been doing and make their findings available.
Some of the topics that the authors have been working on for the past year include updating climate models and studies on how urban environments are adapting to rising temperatures. The next National Climate Assessment, NCA6, is scheduled for publication in 2028.
As Costa Samaras, a civil engineer at Carnegie Mellon University who would have led the climate mitigation chapter, says, “The science is unstoppable”.
You can read more about this on the NY Times website here.
