Scientists Rebuild the US National Climate Assessment, One Peer-Reviewed Paper at a Time

The US National Climate Assessment is a legal requirement, and the Trump administration still shut it down. Last year, the administration eliminated funding for the US Global Change Research Program and removed hundreds of contributing authors. It also took past reports offline, which forced others to host copies so the information would still be accessible.

Now scientists are rebuilding it, one peer-reviewed paper at a time.

The Shutdown

The work of the administration’s actions were dramatic. The funding cuts hit the US Global Change Research Program, which coordinates the assessment’s happened, but removing contributing authors and taking past reports offline prevented the next assessment from proceeding as it should.

The legal duty to produce these reports was ignored, and the administration proceeded on its own. Climate experts and decision-makers who rely on the assessment were left with no central US source of climate science.

The American Geophysical Union and American Meteorological Society

Later in the year, the American Geophysical Union and the American Meteorological Society announced an effort to give researchers a central place to compile the kind of work that would have fed the next US report. The project is known as the “US Climate Collection.”.

The collection runs its own course, distinct from the US Global Change Research Program or the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Instead of organizing the production of a large, coordinated report, the groups are inviting teams of researchers to publish papers in scientific journals, where they go through peer review. Those papers will then be added to a centralized resource for later report-writers.

The First Paper

That collection now includes its first paper, a piece of work from 175 authors, many of whom had been working on the US report. It is being published in two journals: one operated by the American Geophysical Union and one by the American Meteorological Society.

The paper serves as a guide for deciding where to focus future contributions, though it is not a complete assessment, it is a step in the right direction.

What Assessment Reports Do

Reports from the US and the IPCC exist for more than one reason. Their writers spend a great deal of time studying thousands of papers made public by others, so people who want to stay current on a subject don’t have to read them all themselves. The reports also give a summary of what the existing evidence actually says about a given topic, and what it fails to say.

That quick way to catch up on what we know is not the only benefit of these reports. They also establish reference points that researchers cite heavily as they work to extend our knowledge, and they are built to be useful for planning and policymaking at all levels.

These reports should serve as standard references for anyone who needs to understand climate and weather, whether you are a farmer trying to distinguish climate trends from weather variability or a city planner building infrastructure to prevent flooding.

How the US Climate Collection Works

The project gathers its data from publications rather than direct observation. Scientific journals are where researchers release their papers, and the collection adds those papers to its own centralized resource.

A Paper by 175 Authors

The first paper’s author count stands out as a significant collaboration. 175 authors is a substantial number, and the fact that many of those authors had been working on the US report suggests the collection is drawing the same caliber of talent that would have been part of the official assessment.

The paper has been submitted to two journals, a conscious decision, with the American Geophysical Union and the American Meteorological Society both being scientific societies that operate their own publishing arm.

What Comes Next

The opening contribution is just the beginning. The anthology still requires additional submissions to become truly valuable, and the roadmap it offers is meant to direct the work that follows.

The goal is to turn this compilation into a trusted reference for climate science that both policymakers and researchers can draw upon.

The Roadmap

The roadmap serves as the stated objective of the first paper. It exists to direct subsequent contributions, which makes the collection more than a simple repository — it functions as a living guide for what the scientific community should concentrate on going forward.

That approach offers a practical means of sustaining the work despite the administration’s reductions.

The Verdict

This practical project is the work of scientists and scientific societies acting in response to a political choice. It is a group effort to keep the science accessible, even as the government has cut funding and removed access to the reports that should have been produced.

The arrangement falls short of perfection. It cannot match the central coordination found in the US Global Change Research Program or the IPCC, and it relies upon journals to handle the task of publication.

This is a plan built upon the materials that remain at hand. The journal piece is out, and the gathering has started.

Source material: “Effort begins to fill the void left by terminated US climate report,” Ars Technica.

climate science · global warming · peer-reviewed papers · scientific collection · US National Climate Assessment