The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) recently announced that it would stop tracking the cost of the country’s most extreme weather disasters. This comes during significant staffing reductions and a broader rollback by the Trump administration of climate change-related projects from previous administrations.
So, what are the implications? How will this move leave researchers and policymakers without information to help understand the patterns of major disasters and their economic consequences? Can this data be obtained anywhere else?
Randy Cerveny, professor of geographical sciences at Arizona State University, joined The Show to discuss.
Full conversation
SAM DINGMAN: So the latest headline here is that, as I said, NOAA will stop tracking the cost of these extreme weather disasters Why was this data so important?
RANDY CERVENY: Well, it allows us to set baselines so that we can see how things are changing, so that we can prepare for the future. If we don't have baselines, if we don't have accurate data now, then, we can be caught totally unprepared as we go into the future.
So keeping a good database of disasters, of weather, of all kinds of, of climate and weather information is critical in order to be able, to be able to plan and mitigate problems that might take place in the future.
DINGMAN: Now I want to be clear here, when we say prepare for the future, one of the reasons that NOAA was tracking the costs of these things for things like staffing and making sure there were resources in place, right, this was not an explicitly climate change-related data collection process.
CERVENY: No, no, it's, it's part of the specific jobs of the National Weather Service. For example, when tornadoes hit or hurricanes hit, people from the National Weather Service have to go out and chart what damage was done so that we can get a better understanding of exactly what happens, what happened, and what can happen.
It has a big role, of course, to play for insurance companies that if, if they don't know exactly what damage was done and caused by what, then, they're not going to be able to cover costs, and that's an important thing as well.
DINGMAN: Now there are obviously some climate change implications here. The cessation of these studies comes on the heels of a recent report in the journal Nature, which had some jarring statistics on wildfires and human mortality. To quote from the findings, climate change contributed to approximately 15,000 wildfire deaths over 15 years and a cumulative economic burden of $160 billion. Am I right that these are also the kinds of findings that, that NOAA research supports?
CERVENY: Oh, absolutely. And one of the important things about that study is that it wasn't the fires themselves. It was the smoke from the fires. What we are realizing now is that a disaster isn't limited to just the thing that we think of.
When we think of fire, we think of wildfires, we think of fire, but this was the smoke, the smoke that percolates out from that can cause tremendous health damage, and the numbers, as you pointed out, were alarming that there is such a big secondary impact to things like wildfires.
DINGMAN: Now research like this, not necessarily that report in the journal Nature, but the research that NOAA was doing that enables studies like the report in Nature, that research, it's not like the private sector can easily duplicate that, right?
CERVENY: Well, not easily duplicated and it's proprietary to them. They don't have to issue it. So for example, these disasters are still going to be charted, but they're going to be charted by the insurance companies for their own particular use, and that data may not be available to the general public.
They can adjust their overheads and their costs based off of their findings, but they don't necessarily have to share it with us.
DINGMAN: Right. I'm reminded here of the story from a few years ago that I think it resurfaced again. Where I think it was ExxonMobil had done all this research on climate change, they were alarmed by what they found, and then they just conveniently did not release that report.
CERVENY: Right. It's their own particular data, so they have no obligation to share that. A group like NOAA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, is a public entity and therefore has to be able to share the data that it collects. Now we don't collect that data anymore.
DINGMAN: So this also comes on the heels of staffing reductions at NOAA. By some accounts, the administration has lost, or the agency, excuse me, has lost 20% of its workforce. Can you talk about how that trickles down some of the practical implications of that?
CERVENY: Yeah, it's, it's, it's not something that we have to think of, is this a disaster that's going to happen in the future? It's happening now.
This last weekend we had an outbreak of tornadoes over Kentucky. Kentucky, one of the offices in Kentucky, the National Weather Service office in Kentucky, no longer is staffed 24 hours a day. Weather happens 24 hours a day. Most Weather Service offices around the country are open 24 hours a day, but when that tornado outbreak happened they were off duty.
However, and to their credit, the people at the National Weather Service are some of the finest people I know of. One of the people at the National Weather Service office in Kentucky stayed on and worked a second shift and probably saved lives.
That outbreak of nine tornadoes in Kentucky killed 26 people. I'd hesitate to try to think what would have happened had not that one person decided to stay and work a second shift at his office.
DINGMAN: Just about 30 seconds here, Randy. I know we're also heading into hurricane season. At the risk of asking perhaps an obvious question, what are the implications here for hurricane season?
CERVENY: It really does not look good. Unfortunately, the hurricane forecast by The National Hurricane Center just came out moments ago, and what we're looking at is an above average hurricane season.
We're going to have potentially seven hurricanes, of which three are going to be what we call Category 3 or higher major hurricanes. If those hit parts of the United States with the staffing problems that we have at the National Weather Service, we are looking at a very large potential disaster to occur.
DINGMAN: Well, if you will, not the best forecast.
CERVENY: Unfortunately, you are quite correct in that.
