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Earth Science

NASA Ordered To Release Some Climate Documents

By Keith Cowing
NASA Watch
November 11, 2013
Filed under ,

Judge Orders NASA to Release Climate Change-Related Documents, Allgov
“Among the materials NASA withheld were two electronic directories referred to as the “Steve” and “alternate cleaning” directories, media inquiries about the data corrections, and two email accounts of Dr. Gavin Schmidt, a NASA scientist who teaches at Columbia University and contributes to a blog called RealClimate.org. Although CEI wanted all that and more, Judge Rothstein ordered NASA to release only the “Steve” directory and one of Dr. Schmidt’s email accounts, finding that the other materials either held no responsive documents or fell within a valid FOIA exemption. Declining to go further, Rothstein rejected CEI’s contention that that NASA had acted in bad faith. “CEI”s request for discovery is not justified here because CEI has not provided any evidence that the agency acted in bad faith and the outstanding issues of fact do not suggest bad faith on the part of NASA,” Judge Rothstein ruled.”

NASA Watch founder, Explorers Club Fellow, ex-NASA, Away Teams, Journalist, Space & Astrobiology, Lapsed climber.

38 responses to “NASA Ordered To Release Some Climate Documents”

  1. PostitiveOutlook says:
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    So instead of working on science they have to release a bunch of spurious data to people ill prepared to review it.

    • Paul451 says:
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      to people ill prepared to review it.

      I think you misjudge their motivations. The CEI has no interest in science, so they are indeed prepared to review what they receive. They are looking for the inevitable frustrated comments in private emails saying silly things like “I’m thinking if I found evidence against climate change I wouldn’t publish it, just to spite these idiots”, and then wave those comments around as proof of the grand conspiracy of global climate scientists.

      • kcowing says:
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        The FOIA law is what it is.

        • Geoffrey Landis says:
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          It is. And, again, NASA released 2,500 PAGES of documents in response to these four FOIA requests. Two thousand five hundred pages.
          But that wasn’t enough. Basically, they wanted to troll through all the directories, and all the e-mail accounts.
          They’re not actually interested in the science. They just want to harrass the scientists.
          It takes TIME to respond to a FOIA request. Every single page released has to be looked at: you have to verify that this is material that you are clear to release, and not material which you go to jail if you release. If you take one minute per page– probably a reasonable average–those 2500 pages meant that somebody spent a little over a week doing no work whatsoever other than clearing through those pages.
          They got what they wanted: make the scientists waste time and money. And they went on to the next step: make scientists waste MORE time and money.

          • kcowing says:
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            I concur that the requesters are more interested in causing headaches than doing legitimate research or reporting. But the law is the way it is.

          • Steve Whitfield says:
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            I wonder how people are instructed to charge their time when responding to “requests” like this. If this kind of interruption was always charged to a cost code that specifically related to chasing paper in response to an outside directive, and then the cumulative total for that charge code was published each year, it might give them an avenue to avoid some of this government-generated extra workload.

            It would be nice if NASA could say, “sorry, you’ve used up our budget for that,” or perhaps “so what is it you don’t want me to do because I’m responding to this?; sign here, please.”

            Clearly, some of these requests are valid and important, but I have to wonder: what percentage of them end up making no difference to anything at all.

      • Denniswingo says:
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        “I’m thinking if I found evidence against climate change I wouldn’t publish it, just to spite these idiots”, and then wave those comments around as proof of the grand conspiracy of global climate scientists.

        _________________________________________

        Ideas like that is why science is mistrusted in the climate science arena.

        Science is science, and the data must be provided, along with methods, computer codes, and any related documentation. Replication is the fundamental rock upon which science rests. When that rock is shifted, removed, or anything else, you no longer have science, but advocacy. This is what Eisenhower warned about just as much as he warned about the dangers of the military industrial complex.

        • Paul451 says:
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          I’m not talking about anyone actually hiding data. I’m talking about nerd-rage in private emails between people who feel they are being constantly attacked for merely telling the truth.

          This has happened in previous email-“gate” faux-scandals. Scientists who were bombarded with FIOA requests and lawsuits then saying stupid things in private emails which they never act on, just to vent their frustration. These comments get seized on to “prove” some grand conspiracy.

          The problem is that in normal lawsuits, the judge can rule that the plaintiff is abusing the process merely to harass the defendant(s) and declare them a “vexatious litigant”, which prevents them from filing further suits without the permission of the courts. But FIO legislation generally has nothing to prevent it being abused to harass people.

          • Denniswingo says:
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            You are missing the point. If you are a civil servant , NOTHING you write in emails is private and like Keith says, it is a legitimate target of a FOIA request. Don’t like it? Don’t work for the government.

            In fact what you said is that if you found something you would hide it. That is an intolerable breach of scientific ethics I don’t give a damn who you are.

            I happen to know of a bit of scientific data that contradicts the AGW theory myself. It is in data that was recovered under a parallel effort on some other satellite data that we were involved in. It was passed on to the appropriate people for them to act on. I am extremely miffed that this has not come out but I am relying on the integrity of the people involved to eventually do the right thing.

            I will leave you with President Eisenhower’s words on the subject.

            ___________________________________________

            Akin to, and largely responsible for the sweeping changes in our industrial-military posture, has been the technological revolution during recent decades.

            In this revolution, research has become central, it also becomes more formalized, complex, and costly. A steadily increasing share is conducted for, by, or at the direction of, the Federal government.

            Today, the solitary inventor, tinkering in his shop, has been overshadowed by task forces of scientists in laboratories and testing fields. In the same fashion, the free university, historically the fountainhead of free ideas and scientific discovery, has experienced a revolution in the conduct of research. Partly because of the huge costs involved, a government contract becomes virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity. For every old blackboard there are now hundreds of new electronic computers.

            The prospect of domination of the nation’s scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present – and is gravely to be regarded.

            Yet, in holding scientific research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite.

          • Luke_Askance says:
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            Dennis Wingo: “I happen to know of a bit of scientific data that contradicts the AGW theory myself. [. . .] It was passed on to the appropriate people for them to act on.”

            Contradicts, as opposed to just modifies? With all due respect, Dennis, if you have such data and consider it valid, your best course is to publish it and let the scientific community review it. I’m sure you would have no trouble getting someone to fund the effort.

            Contrary to popular belief in some quarters, no one wants the changes global warming is likely to bring. As I never tire of saying, anyone who could, with data that withstand scientific scrutiny, show the effects of AGW are not so bad would be a hero.

          • Denniswingo says:
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            …Contradicts, as opposed to just modifies? With all due respect, Dennis, if you have such data and consider it valid, your best course is to publish it and let the scientific community review it……

            Not my gig. We supply the data, it is other people’s responsibility to publish it. If it is not published, I know the right people with the right chops to do it.

            While I build hardware for it and am incredibly interested in the physics of infrared absorption and emission of radiation, there are only so many things that one can do, and to me the entire argument about CO2 is stupid.

            No matter if CO2 is a problem or not, we need a sustainable energy system. Oil and hydrocarbons are not sustainable over the long term. Neither are solar panels or wind turbines. We need tens of terawatts per year of energy generation in order to have a prosperous planetary civilization, which should be our goal. Thus, nuclear is the only solution, fission first, then fusion.

            We have enough oil to give us enough time to make this transition happen, AND the national security implications of energy independence are so astounding that to not work on that is the height of incompetence. Just look at what fracking has done to realign the macro political world in the Middle East and Russia. Both Putin and the Saudi’s see fracking as the biggest geopolitical threat to their nations. Not terrorism or anything else, but fracking. That should tell you something about how important energy independence is.

            Coupled to energy is resources. That is why we need the economic development of the solar system and its resources.

            That is why I work for space…..

    • RockyMtnSpace says:
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      To paraphrase Keith, this is data generated by people working for NASA under tax-payer funded research. The tax-payers have a right to see the data and any e-mails associated with the data if those e-mails were generated on a NASA e-mail account. Why should climate scientists be exempt from that rule? Or are you worried CEI might find something that contradicts what the scientists have been stating publically?

      • kcowing says:
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        Of course. If the material falls under FOIA release guidelines then NASA should have provided it in the first place. All the lawyers and paperwork and stalling tactics just cost the taxpayers more money.

        • Geoffrey Landis says:
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          “If the material falls under FOIA release guidelines then NASA should have provided it in the first place.”
          And NASA in fact DID provide it in the first place, 2500 pages of it.
          The question addressed by the court was not whether NASA was to comply with the FOIA request, it was on the details of what information was to be released (and you do need to keep in mind that some information is not releasable BY LAW).

      • Steve Whitfield says:
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        The problem I see is that it may not have been clear at the outset whether some particular item was public domain or should have been legally withheld, for whatever reason. If an exchange of emails (using one or more NASA accounts) was used to make a decision or get clarification on an item that should be withheld, then releasing “any emails” … “generated on a NASA e-mail account,” or all of the emails in Dr. Schmidt’s account for that matter, may violate the required withholding.

    • kcowing says:
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      FOIA Act (rightfully) makes no determination as to whether someone needs to be “prepared” to review it. Rather, if covers their right to have access to that information in the first place.

  2. dogstar29 says:
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    The climate change denying Competitive Enterprise Institute which is behind this is funded by the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, ExxonMobil, the Koch Brothers, General Motors, the American Petroleum Institute, the American Plastics Council, the Chlorine Chemistry Council and Arch Coal. Bring this up the next time you walk into a Chevy dealership.

    • kcowing says:
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      I totally agree that they have an agenda dripping in climate change denying but the FOIA law does not get into that. Rather it requires agencies to provide certain types of information when asked to do so.

      • dogstar29 says:
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        I agree the FOIA is and should be available to all interested groups. I was just pointing out that it isn’t just a few people on the political fringe like the Koch Brothers, but rather some of America’s most powerful industrial lobbies that are using their financial power to limit public understanding of NASA research that might well help us to prevent a global catastrophe. If GM supports uncontrolled global warming and wants to suppress NASA research, customers should at least be aware of it.

        • Denniswingo says:
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          …America’s most powerful industrial lobbies that are using their financial power to limit public understanding of NASA research that might well help us to prevent a global catastrophe……

          ____________________________________

          That global catastrophe is quite easy to avoid. The massive adoption of nuclear power along with fuel cell vehicles. Back that up with resources from space, and the problem is solved and we end up with a prosperous global civilization.

          These things must also be provided by corporations, backed up with government investment.

          I have never understood throwing out all of these corporate names as a priest invoking demons to fight might have 700 years ago.

          • Steve Whitfield says:
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            How do you get government to act contrary to what the corporations want? Most of those corporations are likely controlling the campaign funding (thus we have pork). Your proposed solution may be quite easy philosophically, but implementation would seem to be a long, hard battle with absolutely no guarantee of success. It is, unfortunately, a situation where right and wrong have very little effect on events.

          • Denniswingo says:
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            Hint. There are corporations that will profit from that approach. The problem is that our political leaders these days, from the president on down, are without vision, without understanding of what is needed to insure a prosperous future, yet we keep voting for them.

          • Jafafa Hots says:
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            How many corporations have closed their R&D departments?

            What can’t be brought to market in a very short timespan, what can’t create profits within a short time frame does not get funded.

            Short-sighted corporate market goals have far more to do with the lack of investment in the future than any visions of any Presidents.

          • Denniswingo says:
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            ….What can’t be brought to market in a very short timespan, what can’t create profits within a short time frame does not get funded…..

            That’s just silly. Try the mining industry, or the oil industry, or the forestry industry, or even the semiconductor and automobile and steel industries…

          • Luke_Askance says:
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            There’s a big difference between planning and investing to keep a very profitable industry (like oil extraction) going, and planning and significant investment in converting to renewable energy. My reading about “creative destruction” in business tells me that industry leaders don’t foster major changes, but rather fight them.

          • Denniswingo says:
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            Luke, Jaffa made a general statement about corporate investment that was incorrect. You are also incorrect about renewable energy. All of the major automakers are developing fuel cell cars that this time that will take decades to come to fruition. Toyota, Mercedes, Hyundai all are coming out with fuel cell cars next year.

            Also, renewable energy as it is defined today (wind turbines and solar panels) is neither renewable or sustainable. Nuclear power is both, fusion is as well even if it takes several more decades to make it work. That is the proper role of government to make those kinds of investments, same with space.

          • Luke_Askance says:
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            I define renewable energy to include fission breeder reactors, and I have advocated investing in nuclear power for some decades. The new fission reactor designs show promise and should be developed. (I would also include geothermal power, with all its problems.)

            I think fuel-cell cars and the hydrogen economy will be great, when they happen. Of course, the power to generate that hydrogen has to come from somewhere. Getting it from fossil-fuel plants kind of defeats the purpose.

            In the meantime we need to deploy the clean-energy technologies we have, not wait for those we wish we had. There is plenty of evidence that fossil-fuel companies actively obstruct any efforts to curtail CO2 emissions.

          • Denniswingo says:
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            …In the meantime we need to deploy the clean-energy technologies we have…..

            That makes no sense. There are NO clean energy technologies outside of nuclear power. Sorry but the energy gain of solar panels and wind turbines is so low that we are wasting both time and resources even working on them.

            The energy companies don’t have to obstruct anything as the faux renewables are terribly uneconomic and fail completely without massive government subsidies.

          • Luke_Askance says:
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            I’ve seen it argued (absurdly IMO) that nuclear power is not clean because fossil fuels are used in manufacturing the fuel rods, making the cement and steel used in construction, transporting those items, preparing the site, etc.

            Of course, the same arguments apply to wind and solar. So perhaps we can obviate them by referring to “cleaner” energy. Surely you’d agree that a wind farm is cleaner than a coal-fired plant.

          • Denniswingo says:
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            In the electrical engineering world there is the concept of Q. Q, or the quality factor, is a measure of the gain of a circuit or the resonance of a filter. Higher Q’s are related to stronger gains and stronger resonances in circuits.

            The same concept applies to power generation. Not one single so called renewable power system, be it solar, wind, or biomass, has a Q factor more than four or five. Meaning that for every quanta of input energy, you only get about 5 times that back out under the best case scenarios.

            Oil has a Q factor of about 100 and it is portable. Nuclear power has a Q factor of between 100 and 10,000 as the energy content, even with inefficient carnot cycle steam systems, is far higher than oil or any other energy generation system.

            A wind farm might be “cleaner” within a narrow context, but as people in Britain are finding out they are environmental disasters with their use of land, their noise and unreliability in difficult weather in the winter there.

          • Luke_Askance says:
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            As for government subsidies, fossil-fuel companies get them too. I recently read the figure of $500 billion worldwide. We can argue the merits all day long and half the night, but it’s clear the House Republicans have sought to end subsidies for wind and solar while preserving those for oil and gas.

          • Denniswingo says:
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            You might want to dig deeper into that number. From my research those are the same tax breaks that any industry gets, not just oil and gas, for mundane things like amortization schedules and write offs for some capital equipment.

            This goes along with other stupid concepts that I have started to see where some writers are complaining that people who have won the “genetic lottery” for health are not paying their fair share for ACA. Not only is this stupid on its face, it harkens back to the progressive eugenics movement of the early 20th century.

            History is a great teacher, if we would listen.

          • Steve Whitfield says:
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            It seems to me that almost every important issue comes back to the need for more and better public education — and not necessarily what passes for education in the schools these days, either.

            In those rare instances when increased education spending is proposed it is ultimately voted down. I would think that should be scaring people.

    • Eric Cartman √∞ says:
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      There are NO climate change deniers. “Denier” is just the left’s way of demonizing skepticism of activist science promoting the never-ending apocalypse of the month.

      Surely everyone has heard the “science” behind toxic pesticides, overpopulation, resource depletion, nuclear winter, collapse of agriculture. It’s been taught in universities for over 4 decades.

      • Geoffrey Landis says:
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        Gosh, thanks Cartman. It’s always important to know what a cartoon fouth-grader thinks. I’m still waiting to hear what Kyle thinks.

      • Luke_Askance says:
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        I hear that song far too often. If you really know the science better than mainstream scientists, you can stop using the name of a cartoon character to post comments. But I doubt that you do.

  3. Dewey Vanderhoff says:
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    I employ FOIA requests frequently…local, state, and even federal requests. In nearly every case it is a friendly two-way dialogue that produces the results. Only rarely have I ever been obstructed or been given back heavily redacted results. There are of course exceptions, depending on the nature of the material requested. But usually a FOIA process is pretty straightforward , and if not courteous at least pleasantly indifferent.

    So in this case, when these right wing , l’aissez faire climate change denier- insurgents at the Competitive Enterprise Institute are complaining when they can’t get NASA to roll over and seek relief from the Court, I really wonder what is happening here. After all, the original request was over 6 years ago. This ruling is for data and conclusions NASA did in 2007. In geodynamic climate science research time, that’s almost an epoch.

    Why is CEI being so bellicose about this ? Why was NASA less than compliant–the James Hansen Effect ?

    I think the answer is under the same umbrella as the many other issues that have clouded the open discourse on Climate Change…it’s become a political iron football.

    Just keep in mind here that Exxon-Mobil ( a founding fundroller of CEI way back when ) was already w-a-a-a-a-y out in front of the coming Climate Change debate in the late 1980’s, well before Al Gore’s Inconvenient Truth and James Hansen’s manifestos. Exxon-Mobil spent tens of millions sowing the seeds of doubt and plenty of disinformation about climate change , in their own self-interest to protect future hydrocarbon fuel sales. That was twenty years ago. What CEI is blustering about here is six years old. Meanwhile, the Climate Change discourse is now a global phenom and rhetorical battle with many fronts. It’s now a given that Climate Change is real and quite powerful mojo, and much of the man-caused factors are both real and decisive. The world Hydrocarbon Hegemony probably knew they could not win the battle, but they did succeed in casting great doubt and gaining way too much control of the debate using their petrodollars. Science has a hard time defending itself against full on corporate assaults and the money behind them when brought to bear. Thankfully , public opinion has mostly turned the tide and come around to the science side of the Climate Change arguments. Industry lost, but are not giving up. After all, they have Fox news and the right wing blogosphere doing their bidding, giving them a very disproportionate say in the fray . The Right Wing has effectively adopted a smouldering scorched earth policy . 98 percent of the science and about 75 percent of the public are now confident that climate change is real and humans are culpable in it.

    CEI is still fighting the last war here. The rest of us have moved on.