Congressman Lamar Smith Advocates for Improved Weather Forecasting

The enhanced prediction of severe weather events is of great importance in protecting the public from injury and loss of property. My home state of Texas has seen record breaking flooding that caused widespread damage and loss of many lives in my district.

This past May, the House of Representatives passed a bill that I co-sponsored, H.R. 1561, The Weather Research and Forecasting Innovation Act of 2015. This bill greatly improves our severe weather forecasting capabilities. In this year’s Commerce, Justice, and Science Appropriations bill, the House also approved my amendment to fully fund these crucial weather-related research activities at NOAA.

This is something that Texans, and people in any community recently affected by severe weather, can appreciate. It is time for us to bring our weather forecasting systems into the 21st century.

An understanding of NOAA’s data policies is crucial as the agency evolves to take advantage of more data sources and methods of collection. NOAA has expressed interest in purchasing space-based weather data from the private sector. This led to a pilot project within NOAA to competitively select at least one provider of space-based data to test it against NOAA’s proprietary data. This pilot program was included in H.R. 1561, the Weather Research and Forecasting Innovation Act of 2015, which unanimously passed the House of Representatives in May.

NOAA relies upon different technologies, observing systems, and partnerships for data that is constantly available for use in formulating forecasts and predicting weather events to protect lives and property. For more information on today’s hearing, including witness testimony and the hearing webcast, visit the Committee’s website.