NASA GISS gets slammed in Inspector General report for questionable '$1.63 million of GISS’ expenditures since 2012'

From the “Climate of Gavin” department.

The Office of the Inspector General (OIG) recently completed a report on out favorite set of climate alarmists, NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS). Regular readers know that in addition their mission to study planets and planetary atmospheres, they also study Earth, and regularly sound the alarm that global warming/climate change will roast us all.

They don’t even measure their own data, using NOAA’s GHCN and other data, along with their “special sauce” of adjustments that give them a almost always guaranteed “warmer than normal” Global temperature report.

It seems GISS caght the eye of the OIG, and they made a report on GISS shortcoming and failings. Here are some excerpts and highlights:

WHAT WE FOUND

GISS is a major contributor in helping NASA meet its Earth science research goals, in particular the Agency’s effort to improve the ability to predict climate change by better understanding the roles and interactions of the ocean, atmosphere, land, and ice in the climate system. In addition to climate modeling and maintenance of publically available climate-related datasets, the Institute’s major efforts include research in atmospheric chemistry, astrobiology, aerosols, and water isotopes.

Apart from its substantial scientific contributions and contrary to NASA policy, we found that 43 of 66 (65 percent) new GISS scientific publications publicly released from October 2015 through September 2017 were not approved by GISS or Goddard officials prior to release. NASA policy requires numerous reviews and approvals before scientific information can be publically released. These procedures – which include a technical review, export control review, a series of supervisory approvals and, if needed, a legal review – are designed to ensure the accuracy of scientific information released to the public and to prevent inadvertent release of sensitive information. Moreover, we found inadequate NASA guidance related to the independence and qualifications of the initial approver in the technical review process and other practices not in conformance with best practices.

We also found multiple instances of unallowable use of NASA-appropriated funds by GISS employees, grant recipients, and contractors for salary expenses, sub-contracting, and computer equipment. Based on our review of these unallowable expenses, improper charges under GISS’ support contract, and the improper use of purchase cards, we question $1.63 million of GISS’ expenditures since 2012. In our judgment, this inappropriate use of NASA funds was largely the result of insufficient oversight by the principal investigators, NASA’s technical officers, and approving officials coupled with the absence of a senior-level administrator at GISS to manage the Institute’s grants and cooperative agreements.

Finally, GISS routinely collaborates with public and private institutions on an ad hoc basis to achieve NASA’s strategic research goals. However, we found that the Institute is missing opportunities to partner with other Federal agencies and entities that conduct similar work because NASA lacks the long-term interagency agreements needed to set goals and objectives and provide needed funding.

Then there’s this:

GISS’ prominent role in Earth science research – as a contributor to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s (IPCC) Nobel Prize winning report on climate change in 2007 – coupled with on-duty public outreach and education, as well as off-duty advocacy by individual GISS staff about climate change, has raised the group’s public profile. At the same time climatologists debate the impact of man-made greenhouse gas emissions in predictive models, the issue has carried over into Government policy discussions and congressional hearings about the impact of human activity on global climate change.

It seems to me that the OIG was “starstruck” and really did no investigation of substance in this area. In this:

…coupled with on-duty public outreach and education, as well as off-duty advocacy by individual GISS staff about climate change,

…they seem to think that the snotty antics of Gavin Schmidt as a holier-than-thou advocate is somehow justified.

Read the whole report here: https://oig.nasa.gov/docs/IG-18-015.pdf

In my opinion, the OIG missed the biggest, most egregious flaw of NASA GISS: Their role as redundant gatekeepers of climate data that they adjust to be warmer. NOAA already does a global temperature estimate, GISS uses NOAA data, and with their own procedures, comes up with a different number. Their climate modeling is also handled by other agencies and could also be called redundant. In my opinion, NASA GISS is a pointless and redundant waste of taxpayers money. It should be closed.