On July 24, the Environment, Technology, and Standards Subcommittee
examined the ability of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
(NOAA) to handle and utilize satellite data. The hearing focused on
the difficulties experienced by NOAA's National Environmental Satellite,
Data and Information Service in providing data to DOD and the National
Weather Service, and whether NOAA will be prepared for the tremendous
influx in data when the National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental
Satellite System becomes operational later this decade. It is the subcommittee's
duty, said Chairman Vern Ehlers (R-MI), "to ensure that the taxpayers
are getting their money's worth. But getting our money's worth is not
simply contingent on a satellite being successfully launched.... The
key factor is using the data."
NOAA itself has reported that it has been unable to achieve timely
delivery of 65 percent of satellite data and data products sought by
DOD and the National Weather Service. Conrad Lautenbacher, Under Secretary
of Commerce for Oceans and Atmosphere, stated in his testimony that
NOAA has experienced a ten-fold increase in data archived and a fifty-fold
increase in users over the past decade, while the number of data products
produced in support of DOD and the National Weather Service increased
from 40 to 500. He admitted that "a backlog of new satellite products...has
accumulated" and the reliability of the Data and Information Service's
satellite data processing operations "has also degraded."
However, he noted that the FY 2003 budget request includes funding for
several initiatives to help correct these problems.
The hearing also addressed the National Polar-orbiting
Operational Environmental Satellite System (NPOESS), which
represents the merging of NOAA and DOD weather and climate
monitoring efforts into a single program. A contract will be
awarded this year for development and production of NPOESS, with
the first launch expected in 2008 or 2009. Witnesses
acknowledged that NOAA and its Satellite, Data and Information
Service are not yet prepared to receive and archive the enormous
increase in data to come from NPOESS. However, GAO's Director of
Information Management Issues, Linda Koontz, testified that "the
four processing centers and the integrated program office are
well aware of these data management challenges and are planning
to address them.... Because the NPOESS launch is several years
in the future, agencies have time to build up their respective
infrastructures and models so that they can handle increased data
volumes."
Lautenbacher's statement indicated that some of the funding to
modernize data handling, through a program called CLASS
[Comprehensive Large Array-data Stewardship System] has been
requested for NOAA but not specifically under the NPOESS program.
"NOAA has made significant progress in its ability to archive and
provide access," his testimony stated, "and will continue
to
leverage these advancing technologies through effective
stewardship of current resources. Management of the increased
volume of data can be accomplished only through a rapid expansion
in storage capacity, increased communications bandwidth, and
automation of the means of data ingest, quality control, and
access. The CLASS program will act as the connection in NOAA's
effort to meet these challenges and pave the way to accommodate
the additional massive data volumes expected over the next
several years."
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