Discovering a 207-year-old whaling ship, advancing air-quality forecasts, improving storm surge and wind forecasts, and deploying the first-ever drone-based tagging of endangered whales. These are a few of the more than 60 stories about NOAA’s many notable scientific accomplishments from the past year that are featured in the 2022 NOAA Science Report, which emphasizes a wide range of impacts that NOAA science advancements have on the lives of Americans.
NOAA scientist Andrew Rollins was unsatisfied with the current, research-grade instrument for measuring nitrogen oxides. So he built a better one.
The Department of Commerce’s U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) today announced a collaboration to promote and advance further innovation in climate and “green” technology areas, a key focus of the Biden administration.
NOAA’s Mauna Loa Atmospheric Baseline Observatory, the benchmark sampling site for monitoring global climate change, is slated to undergo a major renovation and facility upgrade once road access is restored over lava flows produced by the recent eruption of Mauna Loa volcano, NOAA announced today.
Scientists have long known that the sun drive photochemical reactions responsible for generating ozone and particulate pollution that is harmful to human health. But what happens when the sun goes down? A new study co-authored by a Chemical Sciences Laboratory resesearcher provides insight into what happens with air pollution in the dark of the night..
The 2.4 million people who live along Utah’s Wasatch Front experience some of the most severe winter particulate matter air pollution in the nation. Now, analysis of measurements taken during NOAA research flights in 2017 indicates that emissions from a single source, a magnesium refinery, may be responsible for a significant fraction of the fine particles that form the dense winter brown clouds that hang over Salt Lake City.
On December 6, 2022, a major new version of HYSPLIT was fully implemented at the National Weather Service’s (NWS) National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP). HYSPLIT is the pre-eminent model, developed and updated by NOAA’s Air Resources Laboratory, that has been used for tracking hazardous and toxic emissions from industrial, transportation, and nuclear accidents, smoke from wildfires and prescribed fires, ash from volcanic eruptions and dust from dust storms. Among its new capabilities is an expanded and enhanced capability for volcanic ash modeling.
NOAA science expertise and data has supported the U.S. government decision to reduce potent greenhouse gas emissions. On September 21st, the United States Senate successfully approved the Kigali Amendment of the Montreal Protocol with strong bipartisan support. The Kigali Amendment, negotiated under the Obama administration in 2016, is an international agreement to phase-out and replace hydrofluorocarbons, a class of chemicals that act as potent greenhouse gasses.
An annual analysis of air samples collected at remote sites around the globe that is tracking a continued decline in the atmospheric concentration of ozone-depleting substances shows the threat to the ozone layer receding below a significant milestone in 2022, NOAA scientists have announced.
A research team led by scientists from the University of California Berkeley and NOAA found that HRRR-Smoke accurately predicted the intensification of smoke pollution from the Camp Fire.