NASA Satellite Observations in Support of National Objecties

Satellite observations and a broad program of competitively selected,cross-mission science investigations constitute the major contribution made by NASA to studying the Earth's environment. There are presently 16 operating research satellite missions, 5 more missions will launch before the end of 2014, and 8 additional NASA Earth-observing orbital research investigations are budgeted to launch between 2015 and 2020. These satellites will provide scientists and managers with unprecedented capability to study the Earth as an integrated system. The observations made by NASA, as well as the related activities in research, applied sciences, technology, and data management, serve as significant contributions to US national efforts related to environmental related topics such as climate, oceans, the Arctic, and Earth Observations. In particular, NASA is the largest contributor to the US Global Change Research Program (USGCRP), and NASA's program has important applications to all four of the major thrusts of USGCRP (advance science, inform decisions, conduct sustained assessment, communicate and educate). In this talk, a description of the contributions of NASA's satellite program to these national objectives will be presented, including examples of past and recent contributions, as well as expectations of the evolution of those contributions into the future as new knowledge become available.