Private organizations step up to do science that was cut back by the Trump administration

The American Geophysical Union and American Meteorological Society announced an effort to support the congressionally mandated National Climate Assessment.

After the Trump administration dismissed hundreds of authors working on the next National Climate Assessment, two science societies announced an effort to publish a special collection of climate change research in its stead. 

The Trump administration notified researchers earlier this week that their work was no longer needed on the National Climate Assessment, a congressionally mandated report that summarizes the effects of global climate change in the United States. 

The report’s future is no longer clear and some authors have expressed concern that it will be whittled down, unscientific or inadequate in expressing the risks of climate change. 

“I’m certainly concerned it might be fulfilled in a way that’s less rigorous and evidence-based,” said Robert Kopp, a professor of Earth and planetary sciences at Rutgers University, who was one of the recently dismissed National Climate Assessment authors. 

In the wake of the administration’s action, the American Geophysical Union (AGU) and American Meteorological Society (AMS) announced Friday that they would develop a special collection of research focused on climate, according to a news release from both organizations.