On October 6 and 7, the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate approved the Appropriations Conference Committee bill that provides funding to the Veterans Administration, Department of Housing and Urban Development, and Independent Agencies (including NASA) for FY99. The NASA budget was approved at $13.67 B, of which the Office of Earth Science was $1.413 B. Of this budget, $672.5 M is for the Earth Observing System (EOS), $268.2 M for EOSDIS, and $321.1 M for science, including both the research and analysis program and the EOS Interdisciplinary Science (IDS) investigations. The conference report includes $53 M of the Earth Science budget for earmarks, of which $41.8 M was provided by Congress. The earmarks include supporting the launch delay in the EOS AM-1 spacecraft resulting from the ground operations software problems; new centers at five universities for natural resource training, computers and remote sensing applications; funds for a regional applications center, and a consortium for the application of space data to education; and support for biodiversity programs at a museum.
An Investigators Working Group (IWG) meeting was held October 19-21 at the New England Conference Center, University of New Hampshire, Durham, New Hampshire. As in the past couple of years, the primary focus of this meeting was on scientific accomplishments obtained thus far by various EOS investigations. Participation was high, and included (i) a poster session on a wide variety of interdisciplinary investigations ranging from snow accumulation in the Greenland ice sheet to optical properties of Saharan dust and new particle formation in the upper troposphere, (ii) early science results and lessons learned in processing and distributing data from the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM), (iii) anomalous absorption of clouds and regional aspects of global change, (iv) results from recently launched spacecraft and analysis projects, including the Sea-viewing Wide Field-of-view Sensor (SeaWiFS) and moderate-resolution scatterometer measurements over land and ice surfaces, and (v) climate change and public policy.
The EOS AM-1 satellite, originally scheduled for launch in June 1998, was delayed primarily because of inadequate flight operations segment (FOS) software required for command and control of the spacecraft. Lockheed Martin Space Mission Systems and Services, Seabrook, Md., developed the problematic software under subcontract to Raytheon Systems Co., the prime contractor for the EOS Data and Information System (EOSDIS). Due to these problems the real time command and control portion of the ground system will be replaced with the Raytheon developed Eclipse satellite control software package. The off-line portion of the control system will be provided by ISI and is based upon the original FOS design. A launch date for EOS AM-1 will be established following sufficient testing and performance of the new Eclipse ground control software later this year.
In May the Earth Science Enterprise began a strategic planning exercise to develop a notional concept for the second round of EOS missions to be initiated for the post-2002 time period. The intent of this exercise was, in part, to re-validate the linkage between overall scientific goals of EOSexpanding knowledge of the Earth systemand the existing EOS measurement strategy, and, secondly to identify emerging new research priorities that either were not possible with technology during the first round of EOS or are scientific priorities that have arisen in recent years. NASA began this process with a "Request for Information" to the scientific community that was later followed by 6 panel reviews of the 100 responses that were received, ultimately leading to disciplinary panels highlighting 23 mission concepts that were recommended for further technical and cost assessment. The final step in this process was a Post-2002 Mission Planning Workshop held in Easton, Md. on August 24-26 in which the nominal mission scenarios and underlying programmatic guidelines were presented to a representative group of RFI respondents and an Interdisciplinary Review Panel of independent scientific experts. This panel, chaired by Prof. Charles Kennel, Director of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, was asked to evaluate various implementation scenarios that fell into three distinct categories of missions: (i) EOS follow-on missions for systematic measurements of critical parameters, (ii) Earth Probe missions for exploratory research or focussed process studies, and (iii) pre-operational instrument developments to provide new or more capable sensors for operational observing systems. The Interdisciplinary Panel has issued a report to NASA that can be found at ftp://eospso.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/Kennel_Report.pdf.
In anticipation of the launch next year of the EOS AM-1, Landsat 7, QuikSCAT, and Meteor-3M/SAGE III spacecraft, the Project Science Office has completed the EOS Science Plan, under development by the broad EOS scientific community for the past 4 years. Readers will find a very thorough presentation of the state of the science being investigated by participants in the EOS program. They also will find discussions on how science investigations are conducted both before and after launch of the EOS satellites. This review of the state of the science, along with its extensive documentation of scientific references, should be of value to both working scientists and the graduate students who will take their place in the scientific endeavors of the next century. The plan consists of an overview chapter followed by seven topical science chapters that discuss, in considerable detail, all aspects of EOS science. The plan is published in two parts, an Executive Summary, consisting of summaries of all 8 chapters in the Science Plan, and a separate volume with the full text of each chapter. The plan is available in hard copy as well as on the web at http://eospso.gsfc.nasa.gov/sci_plan/chapters.html. A CD-ROM edition will also be published for use in classrooms, as it provides a very valuable teaching resource for students.