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12 Conclusions
Pages 98-106

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From page 98...
... , global energy fluxes acquire global satellite data with orders of magnitude greater (Chapter 4) , ice sheet flow (Chapter 7)
From page 99...
... Although global marine primary productivity INTEGRATED GLOBAL VIEW OF THE CARBON CYCLE estimates had been attempted before the satellites era, they AND CLIMATE SYSTEM were flawed because of intercalibration issues. More importantly, because it takes years to obtain global coverage of The global view of Earth from satellites has imparted ground-based marine primary productivity measurements, the understanding that everything is connected -- land, ocean, satellites allowed for the first time observation of global and atmosphere.
From page 100...
... terrestrial and oceanic biosphere in carbon uptake through The long-term observations obtained during the past 50 photosynthesis and the impact of increased carbon dioxide years of Earth science from space combined with advances levels on global climate. However, primary productivity is in data assimilation, computer models, and ground-based controlled by geophysical processes; thus, understanding the process studies brought climate scientists to the point at interconnections, such as the effect of a changing climate which they could begin to project how climate change will and hydrologic cycle on the global biosphere and vice versa, affect weather and natural resources at the regional level, required observations at a global scale of land-cover changes the scale at which the information is of greatest societal (from Landsat and AVHRR [Advanced Very High Resolu- relevance (NRC 2001a)
From page 101...
... Its spectral MAXIMIZING THE RETURN ON INVESTMENT IN bands were designed to serve a diversity of user commuEARTH OBSERVATIONS FROM SPACE nities in the Earth sciences, allowing observations of the As scientists have gained experience in studying Earth following parameters: land, cloud, and aerosol properties; through satellite observations, they have defined new tech- ocean color and marine biogeochemistry; atmospheric water nology needs, helped drive technology development to vapor; surface and cloud temperature; cloud properties; provide more quantitative and accurate measurements, and cirrus cloud water vapor; atmospheric temperature; ozone; advanced more sophisticated methods to interpret satellite and cloud top altitude. It has led to scientific breakthroughs data (Chapter 2)
From page 102...
... . However, satellite data confirmed observations and model efforts and revealed the global impact of ENSO (Friedler 1984)
From page 103...
... CONCLUSIONS 103 a b Mapped – 1997 Mapped – 1998 c d 12-1 a,b,c,d
From page 104...
... inter­disciplinary thinking in the Earth sciences. Building Similarly, the frequency of synoptic views available from sophisticated models and data analysis tools often involves daily satellite overflights made an unprecedented temporal long lead times and requires training of a skilled workforce.
From page 105...
... Only by Earth satellite data, many scientific questions and societal when academic, government, and commercial scientists challenges remain unresolved, including improving 10-day are given liberal access to data and a sufficient number are weather forecasts, more accurately forecasting hurricane trained in the effective use of these data will the analysis intensity, increasing resolution of earthquake fault systems tools mature to the benefit of all parties. Similarly, obtain and volcanoes to detect precursors of events, mitigating ing the maximum benefit from weather satellites required a climate change impacts, and protecting natural resources decade-long process of improving methods of radiance data (NRC 2007a)
From page 106...
... However, the nation's commitment to tions from space is renewed, we have seen just the beginning Earth satellite missions must be renewed to realize the of an era of Earth observations from space, and a report in 50 potential of this fertile area of science. years will be able to highlight many more valuable scientific achievements and discoveries.


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