Earth data: Powering global business
Environmental information increasingly underpins major business investments and decisions
By Dr. Kathryn Sullivan, NOAA Administrator
We are entering a new era where environmental information increasingly underpins the decisions made by businesses, consumers, and even financiers. Weather forecasts, climate predictions and water data not only help customers reduce costs and companies increase profits — they also move markets, transform supply lines and underwrite insurance policies.
Across the country, we see organizations making impressive uses of NOAA’s weather, water and climate data:
● Major retailers are using hourly and weekly forecasts to keep cargo and transportation operations running smoothly and quickly.
● Air carriers are transmitting real-time wind and atmospheric data to pilots that help them avoid turbulence and keep passengers safe.
● Energy companies are using seasonal predictions to more precisely deliver electricity and gas, and upgrade vulnerable infrastructure that could disrupt power.
Furthermore, we’re seeing new mechanisms emerge from the finance sector — like green bonds, climate bonds, and catastrophe bonds — which help communities and businesses make important investments, such as erecting energy efficient buildings or engineering landscapes that are less susceptible to flooding, fires or storms.
Remarkable advances in Earth observing technology have made these innovations possible. But it is our nation’s vulnerability to extreme weather and climate change that make innovation critical.
According to recent studies by NOAA and our international partners:
● Global temperatures: By 2050, the average American will experience 2–3+ times the average annual number of 95°F days we’ve seen over the past 30 years. The last two decades of the 20th century have been the hottest in the last 400 years, and possibly the warmest for several millennia.
● Sea level rise: Global sea level has risen by about 8 inches since reliable record keeping began in 1880. It is projected to rise another 1 to 4 feet by 2100. By 2050, $66 — $106 billion worth of existing coastal property will likely be below sea level nationwide.
● Nuisance flooding has increased on all three U.S. coasts, between 300% and 925% since the 1960s. By 2050, residents in major US cities (Boston, New York, Norfolk, San Francisco) will experience over a 500% increase.
NOAA is in a unique position to help both the industrial and financial sectors foster innovations that can help us face the future. Our data is helping underwriters and investors better understand and account for risk in the wider financial system, in order to inform valuations and investment decisions and to incentivize organizations to reduce their exposure to climate impacts and extreme weather. Today’s financial instruments would not be possible without the underlying data collected by scientific instruments which enable organizations to invest more sustainably and generate significant financial returns.
In this new era, where extreme weather events are more commonplace, we see industries, insurers, communities and governments treat Earth data as a global public good. And that’s precisely what it is — a free and unbiased commodity that the public, private and philanthropic sectors all need to develop products and policies that keep people safe, businesses strong, and communities resilient.
Dr. Kathryn Sullivan is the under secretary of commerce for oceans and atmosphere and NOAA administrator. Sullivan spoke last month at an event co-hosted by CDP and McGraw Hill Financial, which owns Standard and Poor’s (S&P).
