Satellite to Study Global-Warming Gases Lost in Space
By Alex Morales, Bloomberg News
Feb. 24 (Bloomberg) — A satellite launched from California failed to reach orbit today, crashing into the sea near Antarctica and dooming a $273 million mission to study global-warming gases.
“The mission is lost,” National Aeronautics and Space Administration spokesman Steve Cole said in a telephone interview from the launch site at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.
The NASA satellite was to orbit 438 miles (705 kilometers) above Earth and observe how carbon dioxide enters and leaves the atmosphere, helping scientists predict future increases in the main greenhouse gas blamed for global warming. Instead, the satellite fell in the ocean near Antarctica though the mission manager said at no point did the craft pass over land.
“It’s a huge disappointment for the entire team who have worked very hard for years and years and years,” NASA Launch Director Chuck Dovale said in a briefing from California. “Even when you do your very best, you can still fail.”
Today’s malfunction follows a Feb. 11 collision of U.S. and Russian satellites almost 500 miles above the planet, the first crash of its type, which created a space debris field of more than 300 pieces that could damage other satellites.
The Orbiting Carbon Observatory satellite didn’t reach orbit after a 1:55 a.m. launch because the “payload fairing” failed to separate, NASA said. The fairing covers the top of the satellite during launch and needs to come off so the satellite can detach from the rocket and enter orbit.
“It’s disappointing because it was giving us novel information to help us move our understanding forward on global warming,” Alan O’Neill, science director of the Reading, U.K.- based Centre for Earth Observation, said in an interview.
Orbital Sciences
Both the satellite and launch rocket were built by Dulles, Virginia-based Orbital Sciences Corp. John Brunschwyler, Orbital Sciences’s mission manager, said “over the past 10 years, we’ve flown a nearly perfect record — 56 out of 57 vehicles and we’ve not had any problems with this particular fairing design.”
NASA’s investment was $273 million for the design, development and launch operations. Insurance details on the mission may be given later today, NASA said.
The craft contained a monitoring device designed to collect 8 million measurements every 16 days. Scientists hoped to use the data to find out how much CO2 is absorbed by the forests, grasslands and oceans, which are collectively known as “sinks.”
Man-made CO2, which traps heat in the atmosphere, is largely produced by power plants, vehicle engines and factories.
The data gleaned from the satellite was intended to help guide government global-warming policy, NASA said.
Understanding ‘Carbon Sinks’
“An improved understanding of carbon sinks is essential to predicting future carbon-dioxide increases and making accurate predictions of carbon dioxide’s impact on Earth’s climate,” NASA said on the mission Web site. “If these natural carbon-dioxide sinks become less efficient as the climate changes, the rate of buildup of carbon dioxide would increase.”
On Jan. 23, Japan launched what it said was the world’s first satellite, Gosat, to measure greenhouse gases from 56,000 points around the globe over five years.
Today’s satellite was expected to have a minimum three-year life. Similar spacecraft have lasted five to 10 years, David Steitz, a NASA spokesman, said yesterday.
While launch and separation of the rocket’s first stage went as planned, a clamshell-shaped “fairing” covering the satellite failed to open, meaning it was too heavy to reach orbit, Brunschwyler said on NASA’s online television station.
“As a direct result of carrying that extra weight, we could not reach orbit,” Brunschwyler said. Indications are the satellite “landed just short of Antarctica, in the ocean.”
Earlier this month, the collision of Russian and U.S. satellites destroyed an Iridium Satellite LLC communications craft and a defunct Russian Cosmos 2251, NASA said.
At least 18,000 satellites, debris and other space objects orbiting the Earth are tracked by the U.S. Joint Space Operations center. The Soviet Union put the first satellite, Sputnik 1, into space in 1957.
h/t to Gary and Steve
How would the incompetent and supposed people who were the cause for this mishap be made responsible?
“Just think what the tax payer could have done with 273 MILLION to help in this recession the democrat’s brought on”
I didn’t think people thought in such small numbers nowadays ! 🙂
Unfair to blame the Democrats, most of the world is blaming bankers and greedy house buyers, ie the public!
From Richard Savage:
A rough back-of-the-envelope calculation that easy to derive from the Stefan-Boltzmann law (see any recent atmospheric science book) is:
dT = 0.25*PG*Te/PS
where PG is the greenhouse radiative forcing, Te is the black body equilibrium temperature of the earth w/o anthropogenic greenhouse forcing, and PS is the incident solar radiation. If you plug in the numbers, you end up with something like 0.3C, which is within a factor of 2 of the observed change.
National Post: Obama asks for unity in the face of crisis
http://www.nationalpost.com/news/story.html?id=1323503
Excerpt:
In his first address to a joint session of the U.S. Congress, President Obama urged the nation to unite as it confronts a myriad of challenges that range from skyrocketing unemployment to plummeting house prices to an increasingly imperilled financial system.
Highlighting long-term goals once the U.S. emerges from recession, Mr. Obama vowed to “truly transform” the economy and fight global warming with a dramatic push to develop alternative sources of energy…
… Mr. Obama vowed to spend US$15-billion a year to develop alternative energy sources like wind and solar power and asked Congress to send him legislation placing a market-based cap on carbon pollution.
*************************************************
I caught bits of Obama’s address to Congress tonight, and it was painful.
Based on what I heard, his energy plan not only won’t work, it will likely prevent other more suitable plans from being implemented.
As I’ve said for years and as the British found out this winter, wind power won’t be there when you need it most.
Corn ethanol is probably also a poor substitute for real energy.
Energy sources that require ongoing operating subsidies are generally not economic.
Research and start-up assistance can work, but ongoing subsidies cannot.
As regards CO2 abatement programs, that nonsense should pretty well finish off the ailing US economy.
By the way, Earth is cooling, not warming.
God bless America! I will think about you tonight, and hope for better days.
Regards, Allan
P.S. If anyone is interested in US monetary supply, check out the Adjusted Monetary Base at
http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/BASE
The US Adjusted Monetary Base ~doubled from mid September 2008 to end January 2009. It took since 1776 to reach $874 billion, and then 4.5 months to reach $1750 billion. What does this mean for the average American?
Well, I’m sure we can’t blame Jody Foster for the OCO sat failure, as I’d bet that she was in Japan making sure that their rocket got off OK. Good job, Sparks. 8^)
Steven: $3.000 for the Obama stimulus plan… What exactly is the connection with the satellite? In any case, the money isn’t gonna come from citizens – are you about to give $3000 to the government newt month? I don’t think so…
On the other hand, did you already calculate how much it has cost per capita to send troops in Irak and Afghanistan? Did you already count how much more debt per capita there is now in the US thanks to the previous conservative government?
This in incredible. Incredible stupidity. US government agency (NASA!) buys insurance for satellite launch from private company, which company in turn is insured (and consequently bailed out, like AIG) by US government. Its like husband and wife buy from each other gambling insurance before their trip to Vegas (Simply put: if they win something, their insurance is useless waste of time and money spent on paperwork. If they loose small, they just exchange some money between two pockets. If one of them loose big (which will most probably will happen, because their “insurance”), they both screwed).
BTW, same idiotic misunderstanding what insurance is and when it stops working (CDS for money creating institutions, anyone?) is at the hart of current financial crisis.
So why do plants produce less stomata when CO2 levels are higher? Could it be that plants are adapted to lower CO2 levels? Could it be that higher CO2 levels without the extra water, nitrogen, phosphates etc are actually detrimental to the plants, hence the need to reduce CO2 input?
Allan M R MacRae
“As I’ve said for years and as the British found out this winter, wind power won’t be there when you need it most. ”
Except we didn’t find out at all, there were no power cuts due to lack of electricity generation capacity.
What are you talking about? There seems to be some fallacy going about the UK has gone renewable and is now suffering. Well, if you wish to believe that because it backs up your view on wind power then feel free to live in fantasy land :p
Regards
Andy
The rocket they launched it on (Taurus XL), has a pretty awful reliability rate, 2/8 flights since its 1994 inception have failed. NASA’s first (& I’ll bet last) flight with it too.
“Here’s what you people who harp on the “man contributes 3% of CO2″ claim need to understand:”
Yeah, all levels of CO2 natural or man made, a total of 0.04% of the air.
So Humans are 3% of that or “0.0016 ppm” of the air…. over 90% of so called greenhouse gas is water vapor, old news .
“Natural carbon emissions are absorbed by the natural carbon sink. Before man began emitting CO2”
Before man? We have been here from the beginning of time in one way or another. We didn’t just get created… we as a life form, came up through the ranks in the back ground of the dinosaurs and before that. If you believe in evolution then nothing can de-evolve and it means that life that survives today is timeless.
Something came from something, it just didn’t get created a few thousand/million years ago.
Everything living thing on earth today, is the best of it’s said “gene pool” to date.
Despite what they tell you, people today live longer then ever and our kids will live longer then us.
That is the pattern, unless AGW shortens life by??…..Making you get diseased from all the crops you grow? : P
CO2 IS LIFE, LIFE LOVES CO2.
Mary Hinge,
Anytime you feel that I or any other authors have their facts wrong, you are free to post your complaint here. That is one thing which makes this site different from some well known AGW sites.
I’m not sure that you understand the difference between scientific debate and ad hominem attack.
??? Where are you getting this from? The point I was making was that before manmade emissions, the atmospheric concentration of CO2 was stable (at around 280 ppm. Since man’s industrial activity, CO2 concentrations have increased at an unprecedented rate to a level not seen in the past 650,000 years.
Response to AndyW (01:20:33) who said:
There seems to be some fallacy going about the UK has gone renewable and is now suffering…
Andy, I don’t have time to find you all the backup material- but one article is included below from the Times. I’m pleased that you were warm during the recent cold snap.
Your statement is inconsistent with everything I’ve seen on UK energy. In summary, I understand that Britain is rushing to add nuclear and conventional power capacity. During the January cold snap, there was no wind (a common occurrence with such weather ) and insignificant wind power. If you have different information let’s see it, with sources.
GERMAN COMPANIES TO BUILD 4 NEW NUCLEAR PLANTS IN BRITAIN
The Times, 15 January 2009
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/utilities/article5519752.ece
Robin Pagnamenta, Energy and Environment Editor
Germany’s two largest power companies joined forces yesterday and announced an ambitious plan to build at least four nuclear reactors in the UK at an estimated cost of £20 billion.
The plants, the first of which is set to enter service within ten years, will provide at least six gigawatts of new generating capacity, the equivalent of 10 per cent of the generating capacity of all Britain’s existing power plants.
E.ON and RWE, which jointly operate three nuclear stations in Germany, are expected to propose building at Wylfa, on Anglesey, where RWE has recently been granted approval for a connection to the National Grid, and at Oldbury, beside the River Severn in Gloucestershire, where E.ON has obtained similar permission.
Paul Golby, chief executive of E.ON UK, said that the 50-50 joint venture would also explore the possibility of building reactors on other nuclear sites. These could include former British Energy sites such as Bradwell, in Essex, and Dungeness, in Kent, which EDF, British Energy’s new owner, may dispose of in the months ahead.
The Government, which has been eager to foster competition in the market for nuclear new build after EDF’s £12.5 billion takeover of British Energy, welcomed the announcement. Mike O’Brien, Minister for Energy, said that it was good news for Britain and offered proof that new nuclear plants were an attractive investment.
The joint approach would help both companies to reduce the risk and to exploit shared expertise and available funding, Dr Golby said. It could lead to the construction of nuclear plants with the same, or possibly greater, electrical power than EDF’s proposal to build four new reactors on two sites formerly owned by British Energy. These are expected to be at Hinkley Point, in Somerset, and Sizewell, in Suffolk.
In a blow for Areva, the French nuclear reactor designer, E.ON and RWE backed away from a commitment to any specific technology, despite an earlier memorandum of understanding signed by E.ON to back Areva’s EPR reactor design, which has been picked by EDF for the four reactors that it plans to build in Britain.
The decision represents a victory for Toshiba-Westinghouse, the Japanese-owned reactor designer, whose AP1000 is in competition with Areva’s EPR. RWE is understood to be minded to back the Japanese reactor.
Copyright 2009, The Times
Re my above post:
The biggest problem I see with wind power is the “substitution capacity”, the percentage of conventional power generation that can be permanently retired when new wind power is put into service. This number is typically less than 10%.
The best report I’ve found on this subject is:
E.On Netz Wind Power Report 2005, Germany
http://www.eon-netz.com/Ressources/downloads/EON_Netz_Windreport2005_eng.pdf
Simply, the wind often does not blow when we need the peak power – so we need a ~same-size conventional power station over the hill, spinning and ready to take over when the wind dies… …the fact that wind power varies as the cube power of the wind speed is a further problem – power variations in the grid due to varying wind speed can cause serious grid upsets, even shutdowns.
Regards, Allan
anna v,
Ah, the convenience of a simplistic argument. Our planet is not a greenhouse. A CO2 concentration of 1000 ppm would lead to much warmer temperatures, which would result in higher sea levels, forcing people to move to higher elevations. If would also result in increased drought and famine, extinction of a sizable percent of species, mass bleaching of corals, reduced production of cereals, etc.
I’m not going to argue that the biosphere can’t grow and slowly increase it’s capacity to absorb CO2. My argument is that man is also increasing carbon emissions, and is doing so at a rate such that the biosphere cannot keep up, as evidenced by increasing atmospheric concentrations and increasing ocean acidification. If this were simply a natural process, there wouldn’t be a problem. The problem lies in the fact that there is now an unnatural source that is pumping CO2 into the atmosphere faster than the natural sink can catch up.
That’s exactly what this satellite was supposed to help clarify. Just because every sink is not precisely quantified does not mean that we cannot know that CO2 concentrations have risen drastically since industrial activity. Law Dome measurements show CO2 concentrations to be relatively stable for hundreds of years before recent measurements show an unprecendented spike in the last 150 years.
Right, some civil engineer has found something that actual climate scientists missed. Why is it that you “skeptics” doubt actual science, and yet accept unpublished conjecture? Lansner is trying to go back and reinvent the wheel, ignoring the work of such previous climate science pioneers as Callendar and Keeling.
Lance:
Yeah, old irrelevant news. Water vapor is a feedback. It has an extremely short atmospheric lifetime, compared to carbon dioxide. Also, the percentage of GHGs to the rest of the atmosphere is irrelevant, as they still warm the earth. It’s called the greenhouse effect.
You’ll notice I didn’t just say “before man”. I said “before man began emitting CO2…”, in reference to the industrial revolution.
Mary Hinge
Are you confusing C4 plants such as corn with C3 plants such as soybeans (C3 plants are far more common than C4)? A recent study out of the University of Illinois showed soybeans at higher levels of CO2 (at least 550) had 90 genes used in the respiratory mechanism that switched on only in the presence of higher CO2. This means in the relatively recent past, these plants were selective for higher CO2.
Lance,
“Before man? We have been here from the beginning of time in one way or another. We didn’t just get created… we as a life form, came up through the ranks in the back ground of the dinosaurs and before that. If you believe in evolution then nothing can de-evolve and it means that life that survives today is timeless. ”
Thanks for the reminder of evolution and our kinship with every living creature. My bet is that sincere-dedicated-pseudoscientific-AGWfollowers began with a deep concern about how humans have managed their/our little plot of Earth, e.g., wetlands in-filled, watersheds ignored, rampant over-development of relatively fragile ecosystems, etc. They used to be called conservationists, perhaps rational environmentalists. They now have found a hook on which to hang their fears — rampant, voracious, dangerous CO2 — and are afraid to let go, even though their current political leaders are only in the campaign for wealth, power, and control.
IMO, only the clear, emotionally and intellectually available science of CO2 will rescue the retinue whose minds are in thrall to manipulators.
AndyW (01:20:33) :
“What are you talking about?”
Texas has already had blackouts when the wind stops that threaten to cascade through the system. I’ve heard Texas gets anywhere from 7 to 17% of its power from wind turbines. I don’t know the exact figure.
From Joe (23:09:11):
“A rough back-of-the-envelope calculation that easy to derive from the Stefan-Boltzmann law (see any recent atmospheric science book) is:
dT = 0.25*PG*Te/PS etc”
However, the numbers were offered in response to Reasic’s comment (which seemed unreasonable to me) that man-made carbon dioxide is the “driver” and H2O is “feedback”. Even using Joe’s calculation for the sensitivity of dT to radiative forcing (which is widely disputed), a change of 0.3 C (due to humanity) seems trivial in comparison to the natural greenhouse effect, 33 C or 100 times as much. That’s the fundamental point I tried to make.
Sherwood Idso derived (empirically) several estimates of sensitivity, starting back in 1981; his value is 0.11. There have been recent estimates offered by James Hansen and by Roy Spencer. It is, perhaps, the most fundamental unknown in climate science. One might also question whether the 33 C is all due to radiative heat retention. After all, atmospheric and ocean currents transfer a lot of heat from equator to poles; they contribute to what we call “the greenhouse effect.”
Of course, whatever the real sensitivity, dT gets wildly amplified in the climate models, which incorporate (I’m told) lots of positive feedback. Perhaps Reasic was referring to such model feedback in his remark. Whether such feedback is important in the real world is unknown.
If you took a bit more time checking details before writing/posting then you would have less chance of some major errors appearing. I am not attacking you per se but how can I not mention the author when they continually make howling errors? Your assertion that it was NASA making a basic error with their trajectory as the nosecone was too heavy was plainly ridiculous. Your other statement on this thread
is equally ridiculous and false and a poor attempt to try to blame the global recession/depression on AGW!
If you don’t want critiscism don’t write anything! If you want to write on an emotive subject then be prepared to take critiscism, just don’t try to hide behind the ‘Ad Hominem’ umbrella. [snip – Mary that remark was uncalled for – Anthony]
Richard Savage:
It helps if you first get your facts and figures right. The forcing due to ALL manmade GHGs is 2.30 W/m^2. Secondly, this number is the combined radiative forcing due to INCREASES in these GHGs, which pretty much renders your calculation useless.