DOGE says feds could save $164,391 by cutting off this historic research site
Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency is considering terminating the lease of a tiny office that supports a huge climate science experiment - one that's been ongoing for 67 years.
Just eight people work in suite 102 at the Kilauea Financial Plaza in Hilo, on the big island of Hawaii.
Once a week or so, one of them takes a short helicopter ride to the northern slope of the Mauna Loa volcano – necessary because in 2022 an eruption buried more than a mile of the road in 30 feet of lava.
There, the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration staffers tend to the intricate, delicate scientific instruments at the Mauna Loa Observatory that measure multiple important atmospheric conditions.
The best known – in fact world-famous – of these measurements is the site's almost 60 years tracking carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. These provided the first significant evidence that the earth's CO2 levels were steadily rising.
But that program could end if the support staff's office is shuttered.
Earlier this month the Hilo office appeared on a list of planned office closures as part of DOGE efforts to slash federal spending.
The DOGE website lists a lease for a NOAA office in Hilo, Hawaii that would save the government $164,391 if it were terminated. Paste BN could not confirm this is the site of the NOAA office but it is the only NOAA office listed in Hilo.
The Observatory site, which is owned by NOAA, would remain. But without the support staff, it's not clear how it would function.
"The observatory needs staff and the staff are based in Hilo," said Ralph Keeling, who directs the Scripps Institution of Oceanography CO2 Program, which which co-runs the project with NOAA.
The situation isn't currently clear. General Services Administration spokesperson Stephanie Joseph told Paste BN they are working with NOAA and other federal agencies to ensure agencies’ needs are being met while also securing better terms for the government and saving money.
In some instances, a lease could be continued if the agency decides it's needed, the GSA said.
What will happen with the Hilo office isn't yet known.
For now, the "operations at the Mauna Loa Observatory are continuing without interruption," National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Association staffer Theo Stein told Paste BN in an email.
What is the NOAA site that might be shuttered?
The Mauna Loa Observatory is located at 11,135 above sea level on the north flank of the Mauna Loa volcano.
The observatory sits on land owned by NOAA and is high enough that it sits in the troposphere. According to NOAA, "The undisturbed air, remote location, and minimal influences of vegetation and human activity at MLO are ideal for monitoring constituents in the atmosphere that can cause climate change."
Having both NOAA and Scripps measurements on the site is "really valuable," said Keeling, whose father helped begin the CO2 monitoring program. "You only get one chance to measure things and if you don't get it right, you miss it. If one program has a problem, for whatever reason, it's good to have a second program."
While Scripps has its own equipment at the observatory, that equipment is maintained by NOAA. "We depend on their staff for the actual maintenance of the apparatus," Keeling said.
There is also a secondary testing site on Mauna Kea, a second volcano about 35 miles north of Mauna Loa, but it, too, depends on NOAA staff to maintain the equipment.
Asked how the loss of staff headquarters in Hilo might affect the decades-long data gathering considered one of the scientific crown jewels of climate science, Keeling said "I don't think anyone knows what it means."
The project has been under threat before. There were sustained periods without measurements in 1964 when budget cuts within the federal agencies supporting the record suspended operations for several months, according to Scripps. The project also faced financial woes in 2014.
In 1984 and again in 2022, eruptions at Mauna Loa caused the observatory to lose power for up to several months. In 2022 NOAA staff were able to set up a temporary measurement site at a University of Hawai’i astronomical observatory located on nearby Mauna Kea.
Why is the Mauna Loa Observatory so important?
The Mauna Loa Observatory began taking continuous readings of the levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere in 1958. Since the 1970s, Scripps and NOAA have made complementary CO2 measurements at the observatory.
The effort dates back to the early 1950s, when Charles David Keeling was a post doctoral student at CalTech looking at carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere.
By 1958 he was at Scripps and he set up a testing station at Mauna Loa. His measurements made him the first person in history to record Earth's yearly "breathing," when plants absorb CO2 from the air for growth in the summer and return it in the winter.
That alone might have made him famous in scientific circles. But then he realized something even more startling – the level of CO2 in the Earth's atmosphere was increasing each year.
Keeling had discovered what became known as the Keeling Curve – the slow rise of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere that was causing global warming.
Carbon dioxide (CO2) is the greenhouse gas responsible for most of the warming attributable to such gases, according to NOAA's Earth System Research Lab, which also measures carbon dioxide levels at Mauna Loa and other locations.
Increasing amounts of CO2 and other gases caused by the burning of the oil, gas and coal that power our world are enhancing a natural "greenhouse effect," causing the planet to warm to levels that climate scientists say can't be linked to natural forces.
Carbon dioxide levels were around 280 parts per million (ppm) before the Industrial Revolution, when humans first began releasing large amounts into the atmosphere by burning fossil fuels.
When Keeling first began testing, CO2 levels were 313 parts per million at Mauna Loa.
Today, they stand at 427 ppm.
Keeling died in 2005, and his son, Ralph is now the keeper of the "curve."
A physicist himself, he says the ongoing measurements at Mauna Loa are on the "cutting edge of discovering what we're doing to the planet."