What is NOAA?
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) is an agency within the Department of Commerce with roots dating back over 200 years. NOAA was established in 1970 as the nation’s first physical science agency, combining the US Coast and Geodetic Survey, Weather Bureau, and US Commission of Fish and Fisheries (founded throughout the 1800s). NOAA is currently the largest agency within the Department of Commerce, making up roughly a quarter of the personnel and half of the department’s annual budget. NOAA’s budget overall makes up just 0.1% of the entire federal budget, yet is an incredibly outsized economic value add for the American people. A recent study by the American Meteorological Society shows that every dollar invested into the National Weather Service, just one of NOAA’s many services, produces $73 in value for the American public.
NOAA’s mission “to understand and predict changes in climate, weather, ocean, and coasts, to share that knowledge and information with others, and to conserve and manage coastal and marine ecosystems and resources” is crucial in numerous ways for the safety and security of the United States and its people. NOAA’s research programs, vessels, satellites, science centers, laboratories, and extensive pool of distinguished scientists and experts play key roles in protecting human lives and economic prosperity both domestically and internationally. Current reports indicate as many as 880 people across all six offices of the agency, including meteorologists, hydrologists, early warning systems staff, technicians, and other scientists, have been let go, with more potential reductions in force to come. Disruptions to these functions risk harm to global influence, US military capabilities, and homeland security.
NOAA’s contributions to defense and operational readiness
NOAA plays a critical role in US power projection and national defense readiness through its advanced physical infrastructure, equipment, and expertise in data collection and analysis. NOAA’s physical science capabilities, particularly in marine and atmospheric environments, support military branches by providing essential data for operational readiness. For example, NOAA’s understanding of ocean salinity, acidification, water temperature, and currents is crucial for Naval operations, as it directly affects submarine navigation, sonar accuracy, and underwater communications. By working with the Navy to provide this data, NOAA enhances the military’s situational awareness and supports the Navy’s strategic planning efforts. NOAA environmental and weather monitoring is especially important for military activity in the harsh environment of the Arctic, an increasing arena of competition. In 2021, seventy-nine retired senior military, national security, and intelligence leaders endorsed expanding NOAA communications and weather monitoring in the Arctic as part of the report Challenge Accepted. Private sector satellites cannot replace the comprehensive and in-depth data analysis provided by the agency, especially when it comes to the underwater domain.
In addition to contributions to naval operations, NOAA’s National Weather Service provides indispensable weather forecasting for all branches of the US military, particularly the Air Force. The NOAA-operated Defense Meteorological Satellite Program and complementary polar-orbiting satellites provide the observations that inform the three to seven-day operational weather forecasts and around-the-world weather prediction capabilities of the Department of Defense. These forecasts ensure that the Air Force can anticipate and mitigate weather-related risks, improving operational efficiency and safety for operators. Given the increasingly dynamic and unpredictable nature of weather systems in the face of a changing climate, NOAA’s mandate to provide accurate and timely forecasts is vital to military readiness and risk reduction efforts.
Ryan Maue, former chief scientist at NOAA and White House Office of Science and Technology Policy appointee under the first Trump administration, explains, “because the military relies on NOAA’s infrastructure, the risks of and damage from extreme weather and climate events are a national security concern as much as an economic one.” NOAA is an indispensable resource for the American people and with “a bigger budget, NOAA could offer increased value for taxpayers and boost the entire U.S. economy.”
NOAA’s indispensable science diplomacy efforts
NOAA’s services play a pivotal role in the United States’ international diplomacy efforts, particularly through science diplomacy and the provision of essential data, analysis, and training to global allies and partners. In regions such as the Indo-Pacific, the Caribbean, and Central America, NOAA provides the gold standard and supports nations that lack the capacity or resources to predict and mitigate environmental hazards such as hurricanes or to conduct advanced scientific research. NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI) Pacific Region Climate Services hub directly delivers tools and information to communities and businesses across the vast Pacific Ocean to “reduce climate risk and improve resiliency.” By offering these tools, NOAA not only strengthens international relationships with island nations facing existential climate threats and courting from China, but also helps build resilience in highly vulnerable nations.
NOAA’s leadership in ocean and atmospheric science helps drive US influence in negotiations over transboundary and international resources. Efforts to map the ocean floor have critical implications for science, resource extraction, and national security. Amid increasingly important multilateral conversations around seabed mining, for example, NOAA’s marine science guidance ensures policymakers have the most accurate and complete understanding of seabed minerals and the potential impacts of mining activity. Without a strong US scientific presence, other actors could provide information that may or may not be accurate or beneficial to US interests.
Science like this can also serve US interests by keeping lines of communication open amid political tensions. Nations that might normally have challenging – even adversarial – relationships at times must cooperate to share data or manage common resources and environments. NOAA engages in several working groups of the Arctic Council, working to understand the impacts of a changing Arctic on the economy, national security, and emergency response. Prior to the invasion of Ukraine, the Arctic Council served as one place where Russia and the US benefited from science and safety collaboration.
NOAA’s protection of US lives and livelihoods
NOAA services are crucial for domestic resilience and security in the face of increasing extreme weather events, heat waves, energy demand, and food security vulnerabilities. The primary mission of the National Weather Service is the “protection of life and property.” NOAA data and information make up the first line of defense, helping to predict natural hazards, give people time to evacuate dangerous areas when necessary, and ensure local emergency services are able to respond effectively and efficiently. Over the past 5 years, 115 weather and climate disasters in the United States have killed more than 2,500 people and caused nearly $750 billion in damage, according to the National Centers for Environmental Information (itself run by NOAA), highlighting NOAA’s resilience value for American lives and livelihoods. In the case of wildfires, for example, NOAA is on the cutting edge of detection and warning systems, using rapidly advancing AI technologies to autonomously and precisely detect and predict wildfires. NOAA’s National Hurricane Center has continued to invest in hurricane prediction science and technology, leading to improved forecast models that can better predict the speed, intensity, and path of a hurricane. NOAA’s Hurricane Hunters fly directly into the eye of a hurricane, collecting key measurements to further improve forecasts.
Furthermore, NOAA data and services are instrumental in analyzing extreme weather ex post facto in addition to informing policy discussions around the world. NOAA’s Billion-Dollar Weather and Climate Disasters dashboard provides key economic impact and risk data to communities hit by severe disasters. However, this dashboard has been intermittently offline on NOAA’s website and is at risk of being removed.
NOAA also underpins the ability of American industry to catch fish around the United States. and all over the world, supporting 2.3 million fishing jobs, almost 1/3 trillion dollars in seafood industry sales, and $148.9 billion in value-added impacts. NOAA provides critical science that informs sustainable and adaptable fisheries management, which is increasingly important as climate change and other factors threaten the ability of fishers to reliably catch fish. NOAA often leads the negotiation of international agreements that allow American fishers access to the international and foreign country waters that they rely on. Many tuna fishers bring their catch to American Samoa for processing and canning, which makes up over 80% of the territory’s GDP. NOAA also manages the American aquaculture industry, which contributes $4 billion and 22,000 jobs to the economy.
NOAA is a key player in international efforts to combat illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing. This is a growing geopolitical challenge as climate change is shifting fish stocks away from their historical ranges, leading to potential armed fisheries-related conflict. Overfishing and IUU fishing – including by the Chinese distant water fishing fleet – compound these climate and conflict stressors to drive instability. NOAA provides training and other capacity development programs to assist under-resourced nations in monitoring and protecting their territorial waters, aiming to mitigate this increasing risk.
The Seafood Important Monitoring Program and other NOAA programs also work towards ensuring that Americans eat seafood caught legally and ethically, free of forced labor or environmentally harmful practices. The majority of Americans agree this is an important goal to support global food security with a recent poll showing 84% of adults believing it is crucial to “promote sustainable seafood and protect the health of fish in oceans.” NOAA has also been a leader in developing sustainable aquaculture practices, bolstering the domestic aquaculture industry, creating jobs, and helping to drive sustainable aquaculture globally in pursuit of food security and a healthy ocean.
Conclusion
The American people rely on NOAA expertise every day for a whole host of crucial services, including weather forecasting, tornado and hurricane warning systems so that emergency services can prepare and respond to storms, aviation forecasts ensuring safe take-off and landing during travel, seasonal forecasts helping farmers grow food, nautical charting used by recreators and shipping companies, the services that protect American fisheries and businesses, and the information that allows US defense forces to fulfill their mission of deterring war and ensuring US security. The recent firing of over 800 employees across all NOAA divisions has already threatened the agency’s ability to provide these critical services. Established by Richard Nixon in 1970, NOAA has historically received broad bipartisan support, with both sides of the aisle understanding that the weather and our oceans are a nonpartisan issue. The bottom line is that dismantling or drastically reducing the functions of NOAA, an already underfunded agency, would cause further damage to both the United States’ security and the security of our allies and partners around the world.
The Center for Climate and Security (CCS) has recently updated its Resource Hub to include a number of key NOAA documents, including NOAA’s “State of the Science Fact Sheet” series, which covers a wide range of climate-, weather-, and marine-related topics and an archived version of NOAA’s Billion-Dollar Weather and Climate Disasters dashboard. Overall, the Resource Hub has archived important government climate security documents from the previous administration, Congress, and interagency programs. CCS also maintains an archive of climate security documents dating back to 1990, which can be found here.