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| It probably comes as no surprise that NASA has hordes of data collections measuring every imaginable biological and geological process on Earth. But unlike most businesses and organizations today, which create and store valuable data but only use less than 1% of that data, NASA scientists have created a state-of-the-art digital map that predicts weather patterns and environmental conditions around the Earth, nearly 100 years into the future.
According to Mashable and EandE Publishing, scientists from the NASA Earth Exchange (NEX) focused primarily on mapping out “hot spots” where high temperatures may appear as a result of global warming, and they also made data-based predictions on rainfall and global temperatures. EandE Publishing states that NEX has “hundreds of terabytes of data” regarding natural geological processes and weather patterns in nearly every habitable city across the globe, and based on this data, scientists have created a map that predicts the yearly rainfall and global temperature levels between the years 2050 to 2100. The maps aren’t just interesting for geologists or useful for politicians who argue that global warming is actually real; according to HNGN, NEXcompiled the maps as part of a White House initiative to combat the harmful effects of global warming domestically and internationally. Specifically, scientists and politicians are hoping that the maps will serve as warnings for poverty-stricken countries. Many developing nations are located in regions where natural disasters like hurricanes and tsunamis run rampant — and these events have been increasing due to rising global temperatures — but these countries don’t have the resources to fix their broken infrastructure. With some advance warning, scientists and politicians are hoping that developing countries will be able to prepare and/or evacuate their homes before disasters strike. These maps are already available to the public, HNGN states, and a similar set of maps released in 2013 regarding U.S. client risks are available as well. |