Oh, the humanity! The New York Times has unearthed a scandal of apocalyptic proportions: the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) might shutter its office in Hilo, Hawaii, which oversees the Mauna Loa Observatory. Yes, that Mauna Loa—the one with the fancy Keeling Curve that’s been tracking carbon dioxide like a stalker since 1958. According to the Times’ breathless prose, this could spell doom for “global scientific research.” Cue the violins.
The story, scraped from an internal federal document like it’s some kind of Wikileaks drop, warns that the Hilo office could close as early as August. Why? Because Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has proposed slashing 793 federal leases to save a measly $500 million. That’s less than 0.1% of the 2025 defense budget, the article tut-tuts, as if every penny of government bloat is a sacred cow. Never mind that these offices might be ghost towns, abandoned by remote-working bureaucrats who’d rather Zoom from their lanais than clock in. Nope, it’s a crisis, because reasons.
The Times wrings its hands over the observatory’s fate, but here’s the kicker: there’s zero evidence Mauna Loa’s CO2 monitors will stop humming. No one’s saying the instruments get unplugged—just that the Hilo office, one of 30 NOAA buildings on DOGE’s hit list, might not be needed. Maybe the data can be managed from, say, a server in Colorado? Or a laptop in someone’s basement? But no, we’re told this is a “pole star of global scientific research,” and without that Hilo lease, the planet’s “eyes” will be gouged out. Ralph Keeling, son of the curve’s namesake, calls it “vital baseline data.” Sure, Ralph, but vital to what? Endless climate conferences and glossy charts?
The article’s real spice comes from its cast of disgruntled ex-NOAA folks. Janet Coit, former assistant administrator of NOAA Fisheries, frets that if leases end, staff might not know “whether they have an office or access to essential equipment.” More likely these offices have been empty for years as employees “worked” remotely, with some likely working a second job.
Meanwhile, John Bateman, a NOAA meteorologist, laments the end of monthly climate briefings due to staff cuts—1,300 gone, 1,000 more to go. Sounds like a leaner operation, but to hear the Times tell it, it’s the end of civilization. Who will churn out those precipitation reports we all pore over at breakfast?
And then there’s the White House Press Secretary, Karoline Leavitt, who delivers the story’s best zinger. Asked to comment, she fires back:
“As a matter of policy, we do not respond to reporters with pronouns in their bios.”
Burn. The Times, of course, plays it straight, but you can almost hear the reporter’s keyboard clattering in indignation. Pronouns or not, the lack of a juicy quote leaves the piece leaning hard on innuendo—extrapolating from a spreadsheet to a full-blown climate science Armageddon.
Naturally, the article can’t resist the obligatory climate change sermon. That rising Keeling Curve? It’s “warmed the atmosphere,” causing “more frequent and intense extreme weather events like heat waves, floods, and wildfires.” No data, no attribution studies—just vibes. Never mind that linking CO2 to specific storms is a game of statistical Twister even the IPCC plays coy about. But why let facts spoil a good narrative?
So here we are: a tale of a Hawaiian office facing the axe, spun into a dirge for “climate science”—that noble pursuit some might call taxpayer-funded navel-gazing. The Times wants you to believe every lease termination is a dagger to the heart of progress, every cut a betrayal of the planet. Yet the observatory’s still running, the curve’s still curving, and the only thing truly threatened seems to be the egos of a few ex-employees. Maybe DOGE’s onto something—trim the fat, keep the data. Or maybe it’s all just a plot to make us miss the next PowerPoint on South Sudan’s heat waves. Either way, the sky’s not falling. It’s just a little less cluttered with rent checks.
Sound of glorious chain saw – “bbBBRRRAAAAAAA!” cutting off the federal fat and bloat.
Drain the swamp! I say.
Afuera!
Government facilities the world over are often ghost towns.
I once had a contract to document all the workplace safety measures in a military engineers corp depot, comprising 5 buildings, machine shops, warehouse, etc.
Went through all the security checkoffs, official work order, etc etc at the entry gate, and proceeded to get started (I had been given a property plan beforehand).
I had the whole place to myself for the 10 hours I was there. Nobody about.
Apart from a garbage removal guy (security cleared of course) I encountered, who told me he’d had this gig for over a year, and almost never encountered another life form there, apart from the odd snake chasing the autumn mouse invasion.
He never finds any garbage to cart away either.
I found it odd that I didn’t have to turn on any lights on anywhere, so I asked the garbage guy were they motion-triggered or on timers or something.
He said no, they’re all on 24 x 7.
Your tax dollars at work once again, suckers.
Its common knowldege that most government office buildings have low occupancy, especially since covid when govt employees are now longer required to go the the office to goof off. They now get paid to goof off from home
I hope DOGE makes it an official finding.
We need government offices because there has to be a place where all the checkmarks on forms and training attendance rosters get stored and posters explaining correct thinking are posted.
And basements with disused lavatories, with signs saying “Beware of the Leopard”.
I wish that I could give you 42 upvotes for this post.
You could just give me 6×9. 🙂
“The Science” requires an office with a window, occupied or not. Otherwise it can’t be done.
And on July 10, 2023, it was announced that “The New York Times will shut down its sports desk and shift coverage to The Athletic.”
https://www.cnn.com/2023/07/10/media/new-york-times-sports-desk-closure-the-atlantic/index.html
We survived as did the New York Times, the New York Yankees and most of the people living in the greater New York area. The sky did not fall.
Not until Gangs of Venezuela were bussed in by Biden/Harris and started razing the population
I read of unoccupied federal buildings. However, there are no federal buildings near me, so I can’t check, and haven’t seen one. There is a US Post Office in the town 10 miles away. I stopped in about 2 months ago. It was open and there were several people inside.
A link to facts and photos would be nice. 🤔
Fortunately the mail can’t be…
Received
Processed
Sorted
Shipped
Or
Delivered
From the confines of a comfy sofa.
There is an app for that!
I barely use stamps, but I either ran out of them, or threw some out accidentally along with the junk mail. I was by my local busy Post Office, so I thought I’d call in and buy a sheet of stamps. They were out of stamps. A Post office out of stamps, hello !!!! The Post Office lady was indignant and, when I started laughing, she pointed me to a piece of paper taped to the window that said in Font size 10 “We’re out of stamps”. Oh OK, didn’t stop me laughing.
I get mine at my local CVS Pharmacy. At every register. Now at the amazingly cheap price of 74¢ each $14.80 for a sheet of 20 or something like that
I went into a Starbucks a while ago and ordered a “regular coffee.” They didn’t have any brewed. At a coffee shop? They offered me a “shot (espresso) and water” which I refused.
Did some research before commenting. NYT should have.
Mauna Loa is maintained by a staff of 8, that rotate a few days on and off. Three hour AWD drive from Hilo. The observatory has living quarters with full amenities including for several visiting scientists. The staff all reside in Hilo when not at the observatory.
So the Hilo office is basically useless and mostly vacant, as the staff do NOT live at the office when off duty.
DOGE it.
Absolutely correct, Rud! I lived and worked for a time at the Army’s Puhakaloa Training Area (PTA), which is near the turn-off to the Mauna Loa site. “Three hour AWD drive to Mauna Loa from Hilo” is putting it mildly. Not a nice road.
The road’s been vastly improved in recent years, my wife and I drove over it several times in a FWD sedan, no problems.
I have to ask why global co2 must only be measured at one location, but global temperature is abstracted from measurements taken anywhere.
CO2, a life gas, is measured at many locations, including Barrows, South Pole, etc.
Barrows has the greatest seasonal variations, by far, much greater than Mauna Loa
The South Pole has very small variations
I am so glad, because increased CO2 grows more flora and fauna, and increases crop yields to feed hungry people, courtesy of God’s fossil gift to Mankind, and the CO2 of their emissions are so beneficial for all of us.
Net Zero by whatever date is an evil, expensive suicide pact that impoverishes all of us, but enriches the elites.
Trump is trying to kill the evil pact ASAP.
He should get the Nobel Prize for that.
The old name, Point Barrow, is singular. I can’t pronounce the new name. Fortunately, I didn’t have to pronounce the new name when I was last there in 1967.
Mauna Loa is NOT the only location—Scripps has a full list with archived histories. Mauna Loa is just the oldest.
Keeling chose it because high above the marine boundary layer, and remote enough to represent the ‘well mixed’ atmospheric gas. Of course maybe he also just liked visiting Hawaii on ‘paid vacation’.
Whatever Rud, tell me I’m wrong, but I consider that the Gold Standard. I hope it doesn’t get DOGEd.
Somehow, I don’t think DOGEd will be voted the best new word of the year.
Doge is not a new word, but I do wonder if the choice now was linked to the historical usage.
Doge of Venice – Wikipedia
However, the Trade Winds can carry the surface air up-slope, being depleted of CO2 as it passes over the vegetation.
Clyde,
Do the trade winds make it up to the observatory? Here in New Hampshire, our Mount Washington, 6,288 feet ASL, manages to be well above surface air much of the time. This shows up as their air temperature generally has very little diurnal variation. Our ground level air often starts the day with cold and calm conditions due to radiational cooling and air pooling below the inversion. After sunrise the pool heats up quickly until the inversion breaks. Heating continues more slowly as mixing warms a much thicker layer of air, but it often doesn’t reach the Mount Washington observatory’s height.
One handy thing here is to check out https://www.weather.gov/wrh/timeseries?site=KMWN as that has the first temperature measurements in the state that shows warm air advection. When that happens overnight the morning temperature at the observatory can be surprisingly warmer than in the Baker River’s broad valley.
Here’s some recent MLO weather data, there is a bit of a diurnal effect. I wonder if high sun angle, area above treeline, and lightish winds cone to bear.
https://gml.noaa.gov/obop/mlo/met.html
Mount Washington data is at https://www.weather.gov/wrh/timeseries?site=KMWN Treeline is some 4,000′, fog and high winds are common
https://capegrim.csiro.au/
Cape Grim, on Tasmania’s west coast, is one of the three premier Baseline Air Pollution Stations in the World Meteorological Organization-Global Atmosphere Watch (WMO-GAW) network. Baseline stations are defined by the WMO to meet a specific set of criteria for measuring greenhouse and ozone depleting gases and aerosols in clean air environments.
These baseline stations are crucial points of reference for the larger global network of atmospheric gas observing stations.
The Cape Grim Baseline Air Pollution Station monitors Southern Hemispheric air. In the Northern Hemisphere, the Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii has been continuously monitoring and collecting data related to atmospheric change since the 1950s.
Carbon Cycle Greenhouse Gases – NOAA Global Monitoring Laboratory
Thanks for the link!
Note that near the end it says, “The annual variations of the CO2 growth rate are not due to variations in fossil fuel emissions [which are very small]. Figure 3 shows the measured annual atmospheric increase of CO2 compared to the reported annual fossil fuel emissions. The ups and downs in the atmospheric increase are due to variations in the exchange of CO2 between the atmosphere, oceans, and land ecosystems. They are primarily due to small annual fluctuations of temperature and precipitation affecting photosynthesis and respiration on land. It is very important to know that the added CO2 does not disappear, but, as long as atmospheric CO2 keeps rising, a portion of it transfers each year from the atmosphere to the oceans and to plants on land.”
I think that we can further assume that with a large annual/seasonal flux, the anthropogenic emissions will be partitioned into the various sinks in direct proportion to the fraction that is anthropogenic, which is about 4%.
Did a holiday in Hawaii years ago, Honolulu – crowded, dirty and expensive v.disappointing, nothing like the movies!. Went over to “The Big Island’ nice scenery but rained like a drain for days. Hired a car, drove over to Mauna Loa hoping for a peek, but it was locked-up!
Much better beaches in OZ!
Cheers,
Bill
I was in a Honolulu beach hotel last year. It was magnificent! In the morning the hotel would put out our cabana on Waikiki Beach, at lunchtime we were served lunch on the beach … all in between we could order drinks and wallow in the water. European beaches too.
We have magnificent beaches but i haven’t been to an Oz beach so well catered, more like an anti-insurgent operation. 🙂
From Google Maps, the Mauna Loa Observatory is to the WSW of Hilo, but the only road from the Observatory winds toward the southeast, and intersects the ring road around the island to the south of Hilo.
Probably the staff at Mauna Loa like to enjoy the beaches on their days off! If their offices in Hilo are DOGE’d, they might have to rent a hotel room or Airbnb to go to the beach.
On a more serious note, the remote location of Mauna Loa, on a high mountain on a relatively small island surrounded by the largest ocean on the planet, means that it is probably under-estimating the “average” global CO2 concentration in the atmosphere, except perhaps during a volcanic eruption on the “Big Island” of Hawaii.
The CO2 concentration in the air is probably much higher in major cities near large emitters of CO2, such as heavy industry, coal- or gas-fired power plants, refineries, or even homes or apartment buildings that are heated in cold weather. But in those areas, the CO2 concentration would vary widely based on shifts in wind direction, whether or not the sampling location is directly downwind of a CO2 emission source.
I have property in Volcano, as I like the native Hawaiian birds. It is a short term rental as well. I have been up the Mauna Loa observatory access road,but only to the 8000ft level not the 11,000ft where the observatory is last November Why? Because Mauna Loa had an eruption the covered the road in 15+ft of lava. I find it fascinating that on other parts of the Big Island the roads were repaved quickly but not for the supposedly important observatory
Seeing how the administrative branch has reached it’s current state by the inexorable operation of Parkinson’s laws:
I have to applaud the project to reset it by at least a century.
All the more so because there has never been a shortage of bureaucrats that the lion’s share of us native types dream of gifting with a genuine arrow shirt, 😉 😉
I reckon that No3 is related to the fact in all taxpayer funded organisations managers are empire builders.
“I’m Director of the Sagger Makers Monitoring and Safety Department and I manage 150 people and we have vacancies “
The last thing any bureaucrat wants to do is solve the problem that created and sustains his job.
Actually, the EPA was more clever. They actually usefully solved the clean air and water problems. Uh Oh. So then they invented the linear no threshold harm model to justify continue spending more and more to gain less and less. And, they found that spending more required more staff. So did measuring less. DOGE.
Expenditures rise regardless of income
Not enough income? Just add it to the debt
DOGE TO THE RESCUE OF ALL OF US
I saw an interview with billionaire David Sacks yesterday on Laura Trump’s new Fox News show, and David said he was a little puzzled by the signs the deranged Democrats were holding up during Trump’s speech last week to a joint session of Congress, the signs saying “Musk Steals”.
And Mr. Sacks said he thought that was silly since Musk was not stealing anything but was putting wasted money back into the U.S. Treasury, but then it dawned on Mr. Sacks as to why the Democrats were holding up this sign: The Democrats considered that Musk, in reducing this government waste, was stealing from Them!, the Democrats.
I think Mr. Sacks has it exactly right. Democrats think your money is their money, to do with as they please, and they don’t like it when someone comes along and takes their money away from them and they go crazier than they usually are.
And then there’s the Peter’s Principle: In a hierarchy, people rise to their level of incompetency–and stay there.
I think the real problem is that some get to rise above that!
Check out the current Australian Minister for Energy etc
It’s also possible that someone who’s incompetent may actually be competent at a higher level. But one must be promoted to that level, and that rarely happens to those who are incompetent–unless they’re in government.
In a bureaucracy, creative, outspoken people are silenced, or silence themselves, as the head of the department, in many cases, does not appreciate underlings trying to tell him how to do his job better. Young bureaucrats learn the rules quickly, or they don’t stay around very long.
I worked in a government bureaucracy, the Veterans Administration, and a private industry bureaucracy, the Union Pacific Railroad, and the above held true for both of them.
It’s not statistical Twister. It’s statistical onanism…
I hope we can continue to use the Keeling curve to demonstrate the futility of the Net Zero campaigns. One of my favourite cocktail party tropes. god I’m getting boring.
Yeah, but don’t take it personally. It’s a result of the whole climate crisis narrative getting a bit boring.
Why is NOAA running a NASA and JPL facility?
Mauna Loa is NOAA.
NASA is Goddard at Columbia U in NYC.
JPL in CA is, weirdly, the Antarctic Amundsen Embayment and the dreaded Thwaites glacier.
So, what you are saying is DOGE has to dig into this rat’s nest much deeper? Has been my, and the general public’s, understanding for decades that Mona Loa Observatory has been a NASA entity, and that JPL/NASA built and operated orbital tracking/communications from there. Every time I have gone to their webpage there has been a big, fat NASA emblem in the upper lefthand corner of the page. They have been lying all this time? And NOAA has been stealing billions of dollars from the taxpayers all this time? It ain’t NOAA’s job to monitor orbital missions’ communications, or volcanoes, or extra-orbital/sub-orbital vehicle trajectories. So where the fuck has all this money gone? Yea. I am pissed the fuck off.
I’m pretty sure that Scripps Oceanographic plays a role in MLO also.
The article lies: There are no “more frequent and intense extreme weather events like heat waves, floods, and wildfires.” The paid liars ignore the 2021 UN IPCC Sixth Assessment Report (AR6) Scientific Basis Section, Working Group One (WGI), Chapter 12, Page 90.
Our Leftist governments constantly lie to us about things great and small. President Trump is in the process of revealing all of the prior lies and rip-offs.
Trump and Elon are doing the right thing, you can tell by who is doing the wailing. Keep up the good work.
That’s something that Musk actually said and I paraphrase – the ones who wail the most get to be top of the DOGE list. That’s why USAID were among the first to be crippled.
I think he learnt it from X, formerly $25 sandwich lunch Twitter.
I heard Musk say that the people committing the fraud will wail the most–that’s how you can identify them.
Hard to believe that a swamp could exist on a mountain top 13,677 feet above sea level, but apparently CAGW (and the governmental response) is capable of anything!
4wheelers get piss poor mileage at that height, but they charge it to the expense account
All this can be remotely monitored from anywhere. WTF
You mean Mauna Kea observatory, big telescopes. Mauna Loa observatory (Keeling curve) is not at a mountain top, at 11,134 ft.
How embarrassing for Democrats (and thoroughly deserved) –
Obama announced a DOGE back in 2011, with Biden as the ‘czar’.
https://www.foxnews.com/media/flashback-president-obama-urged-making-tough-decisions-cut-government-spending
Obama was enforcing compulsory waste, fraud, and abuse.
Obama knew Biden was an idiot, so he gave him something to do to keep him busy.
Biden slowly learned more about grifting and grafting, so he quickly enriched himself and his family and friends as well. Great Jig!
Did Obama want to kill the “cut government waste” project?
Well, if you want to screw things up, put Joe Biden on it.
I recall a small poster on a staff officers wall, “don’t get rid of all the deadwood, use some of it to light a fire under the rest”
“… a measly $500 million.”
Well heck, just ask Bill Gates to step in and pick up the bill(s).
If $500 million is so measly, can I have it?
You can, but you may not.
“As a matter of policy, we do not respond to reporters with pronouns in their bios.”
My best guffaw of the day! I can’t believe the arrogance.
The arrogance of thinking that anyone might care a toot about your choice of pronouns?
I am a bit surprised that nobody mentions that Hilo is the wettest city in America.
A few years ago, I planned (and paid for!) a holiday in Hawaii and chose Big Island as most Geologically interesting.
I included four nights in Hilo and admittedly chose the “Guesthouse” we stayed in badly, nothing even approaching where we stayed elsewhere on the Island.
But I have to say that whilst I’d love to visit Hawaii again (a long journey from England), certainly including Big Island, I wouldn’t go back to Hilo even if it was for free. So good luck selling an ‘office’ there.
Right after I got out of Vietnam, I went and lived on Oahu for about six months. I rented a house on the North Shore about halfway between Wiamea Bay and Sunset Beach. Slept in the big cave at Wiamea Bay the first day of arrival, before the rental house was found.
This was in 1970. I prefer to remember it like that. I’m sure it has changed drastically since that time. There were no hotels on the North Shore back then.
Loved it, but is was ure expensive, even then. A hometown friend of mine went with me and met his future wife there during a concert held inside the inactive volcano, Diamond Head.
He met her, and failed to get her telephone number, which left him distraught. The next day, I had to take my motorcycle up the road to a repair shop, and on the way home, I passed a 1964 Chevy with two girls in it, and I looked at them, and there she was, sitting in the passenger seat! So I took my helmet off and they recognized me, and I told them to follow me and took them to our house, where she and my friend were reunited, and the rest is history. What are the odds? 🙂
Burro-crats hate losing their job because they know they’ll never have that easy in the private sector.
NOAA is still telling the world that the atmosphere is 38% cow farts. Pooey!
How to build your own Bureaucracy:
1. Generate regulations which require monitoring for compliance.
2. Fund health care/retirement plans.
3. Hire DEI staff to monitor for compliance.
4. Allow staff to form unions for permanent employment.
5. Allow staff to work remotely w/o oversight.
6. Increase budget by 10%/year regardless.
Retire.