this post was submitted on 05 Aug 2025
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White House Orders NASA to Destroy Important Satellite that Collects Climate Data (futurism.com)
submitted 3 days ago by Salamence@lemmy.zip to c/technology@lemmy.zip
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cross-posted from: https://hexbear.net/post/5763205

One is attached to the International Space Station, and the other is collecting data as a stand-alone satellite. The latter would meet its permanent demise after burning up in the atmosphere if the mission were to be terminated.

A 2023 review by NASA concluded that the data they'd been providing had been "of exceptionally high quality."

The observatories provide detailed carbon dioxide measurements across various locations, allowing scientists to get a detailed glimpse of how human activity is affecting greenhouse gas emissions.

(Ex NASA employee) David Crisp said it "makes no economic sense to terminate NASA missions that are returning incredibly valuable data," pointing out it costs only $15 million per year to maintain both observatories, a tiny fraction of the agency's $25.4 billion budget.

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[–] possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip 8 points 2 days ago (1 children)

If nothing else they could just leave it be

[–] Vorticity@lemmy.world 9 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Being that they're in low earth orbit, they do require some human intervention for station keeping. They also need to monitor the orbits and move the satellite at times to avoid collisions with debris. Lastly, they need to monitor for anomalies so that, if something does go wrong, they can safely dispose of the satellite before the satellite itself becomes another piece of debris.

That, plus data collection and dissipation are the reason the satellites cost $15M/year to operate. The administration wants OCO2 deorbited. I'm not sure what they want done with OCO3 since it is attached to the ISS.

[–] possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip 5 points 2 days ago

Just let MS Copilot take care of it

/s