Articles

A WWAO collaboration has published a new paper on how to use next-generation satellite snow data to improve seasonal water supply forecasts using machine learning.

A potent storm pushed snowpack levels above normal across Colorado.

A long-term sea level dataset shows ocean surface heights continuing to rise at faster and faster rates over decades of observations.

As the world looks for sustainable solutions, a system tapping into NASA satellite data for water management has passed a critical test.

Global temperatures last year were around 2.1 degrees Fahrenheit (1.2 degrees Celsius) above the average for NASA’s baseline period (1951-1980).

NISAR, the soon-to-launch radar satellite from NASA and the Indian Space Research Organisation, will track changes in wetlands as well as other Earth vital signs.

The burst of turquoise and tan hues in Alaskan waters is in stark contrast to the snowy shoreline.

Google's immersive experience, "A Passage of Water", uses satellite data to illustrate how climate change is affecting Earth’s water cycle.

NASA will share its Earth science data and knowhow at the 28th U.N. Climate Change Conference of the Parties (COP28).

Beautiful color palette reveals the features of an iconic glacial landscape in southeastern Alaska.

A new Space Act Agreement between NASA and Esri expands worldwide access to NASA's geospatial content for research and exploration — including new datasets from nearly 100 spaceborne sensors.

About 40% of the world's population live within 100 km of the coast, and floods affect more people than any other type of natural disaster. NASA's floods toolkit offers easy access to NASA Earth data that can help scientists and decision makers understand floods, respond to them, and map their impact.

Cameras on the Surface Water and Ocean Topography spacecraft captured the antennas for its main science instrument unfurling in orbit.

Led by NASA and the French space agency CNES, the Surface Water and Ocean Topography mission will provide high-definition data on nearly all the water on our planet’s surface.

Meet the scientific heart of the Surface Water and Ocean Topography mission, which will see Earth’s water in higher definition than ever before.

The upcoming Surface Water and Ocean Topography mission will provide a trove of data on Earth’s water resources, even in remote locations. Alaska serves as a case study.

Join us for NASA’s Earth Science Applications Week 2022! A three-day virtual celebration of the many ways NASA Earth science is being used to make our world a better place.

NASA has released a 2021 solicitation for water-resource proposals through NASA's Research Opportunities in Space and Earth Sciences (ROSES). The first-round deadline is May 21, 2021.

From big to small...we’re all connected. In honor of Earth Day this week, NASA is hosting an Earth Day Virtual Event and releasing a range of activities, live talks, games, videos and great downloadable posters and books.

Using remote-sensing data and machine learning, a team from NASA and beyond finds that switching to lower-intensity crops can reduce water consumption in California’s Central Valley by 93%, but this requires adopting uncommon crop types.

Learn how to discover, access, and use Surface Water and Ocean Topography (SWOT) mission data and how these data could lead to new, innovative science and applications in the world of water.

Remote-sensing data is becoming crucial to solve some of the most important environmental problems, especially those related to agricultural applications and food security.

Join us at our Science to Decisions town hall at the AGU Fall Meeting next week! Our fabulous speaker panel comes from NASA, NOAA, the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, Colorado Climate Center, and the National Academy of Sciences, Water Science and Technology Board.

This source accounts for about 10% of all the water that enters this highly productive farmland, including rivers and rain.

In an effort to incentivize open science, the White House, 12 federal agencies, and a coalition of more than 85 universities and other organizations have declared 2023 to be the Year of Open Science.

A new project involving Columbia University, New York City and NASA scientists will build a climate action plan to reduce the impact of climate change on New York's water supply, and ensure the agricultural sector continues to protect the city's water quality.

Earth's average surface temperature in 2022 tied with 2015 as the fifth warmest on record, according to an analysis by NASA.

What can hidden motions underground tell us about groundwater, climate change, earthquakes and eruptions? NASA scientists are using data gathered 400 miles above Earth to find out.

Citizen scientists and NASA satellites join forces to track water supplies.

The NASA/USAID SERVIR program is helping Asia adapt to changing rainfall patterns.

A new study from NASA WWAO and other agency partners sets out a roadmap for how environmental research and stewardship can come together.

For 20 years NASA's Earth Observatory has told stories of our planet. Its Earth Explorer atlas features 12,000 images showing what's happening locally or on the other side of the world.

Water in Lake Mead - the U.S.' largest reservoir - is at its lowest level since 1937 when the reservoir was filled for the first time. At just 27% capacity, NASA images offer a stark illustration of climate change and a long-term drought that may be the worst in the U.S. West in 12 centuries.

WWAO is hosting a session at the 2022 American Geophysical Union Fall Meeting this December, jointly with NASA's Water Resources Program. Our session looks at how to improve water management using satellite Earth observations. We invite you to join us!

Communities in the Cheat River watershed in West Virginia face frequent flooding, which threatens to reverse years of restoration work aimed at cleaning up pollution from mining. NASA has partnered with a local non-profit to help build resilience to future floods.

How much water is in mountain snowpack? That’s a question science has been attempting to solve for decades. Finally, NASA-developed technology provides an accurate answer, using a cutting-edge airborne sensor system and sophisticated software that also predicts when snow will melt.

NASA has co-launched a new modeling framework for assessing water use and estimating crop yields at regional levels. GEO-CropSim integrates Earth observations into crop models to help decision makers manage crop production while analyzing water use.

In seasons when water is scarce, tools powered by NASA data can help farmers decide where to allocate water and nutrients for irrigation and fertilizer.

California’s reservoirs are rapidly drying up and the water level in Shasta Lake — the largest reservoir in the state — has dipped to about 35% of its capacity. The L.A. Times spoke to WWAO about how the drought looks from space.

NASA’s Applied Remote Sensing Training Program (ARSET) is offering a Monitoring Coastal and Estuarine Water Quality webinar as part of its effort to train, empower and advance.

In the face of severe west-U.S. drought, NASA has launched a new page highlighting its eyes on the drought, which are helping track and monitor the ongoing drought, predict how much water will be available, and improve how we use the water we have.

The 2021 SnowEx field campaign, which is helping determine how much water winter snowpack holds, has come to a close. Teams took snow measurements at six sites across the western U.S., on the ground and with drones and airplanes flying overhead.

NASA will design a new set of Earth-focused missions to help mitigate climate change and disasters, fight forest fires, and improve real-time agricultural processes.

NASA’s Plankton, Aerosol, Cloud, ocean Ecosystem (PACE) mission is inviting the terrestrial-land community to provide insight into how PACE data products can be used.

Researchers have found a new way to measure the depth of some of the most isolated, shallow lakes, using NASA's ICESat-2 satellite. Knowing the shapes of lake beds in dry regions enables us to better estimate the amount of water stored in these basins.

Harmful algal blooms are often hard to predict. NASA's Earth-observing satellites are uniquely poised to help spot them, and track the many ways that different parts of the Earth's system are connected.

The Cyanobacteria Assessment Network (CyAN) - a joint EPA, NASA, NOAA and USGS project - uses satellites to monitor harmful algal blooms in over 2,000 of the largest U.S. lakes. Since its launch, CyAN has saved millions of dollars in monitoring and health costs. 

Earth data are becoming more widely valued. For the first time, satellite data have been included in the World Health Organization’s guide on monitoring harmful algal blooms worldwide. The update draws directly from the Cyanobacteria Assessment Network, a multi-agency water project involving NASA.

We have liftoff! NASA WWAO's new Soil Moisture Data System is operational and has been handed off to its partner, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, as the project comes to a close.

NASA’s Harvest program and soil analytics company CropX have announced a new partnership. The alliance will provide farmers and industry experts with insights that help improve farming sustainability by conserving resources and improving crop yields.

NISAR, an SUV-sized Earth satellite that will feature the largest reflector antenna ever launched by NASA, is taking shape in the clean room at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Its mission is to track disasters as well as the effects of climate change.

As a leading agency observing and understanding environmental changes on Earth, NASA has joined the Biden administration's National Climate Task Force.

WWAO's new soil moisture data portal - Crop-CASMA - is live. Crop-CASMA, which provides high-resolution, field-scale soil wetness from NASA satellites in an easy-to-use format, is a collaboration between NASA, the U.S. Department of Agriculture and George Mason University.

Using NASA's Ice, Cloud and land Elevation Satellite 2 (ICESat-2), scientists have shown humans are having a much bigger impact on surface storage variability than previously thought, with over half of the planet's variability happening in managed reservoirs.

WWAO is launching new water projects in the U.S. Columbia River Basin. As part of this effort, we’re looking for information on activities using NASA data or technology that could address key water issues in the region.

In mid-January, the U.S. Pacific Northwest was soaked by several episodes of heavy rainfall, leading to widespread flooding and landslides. NASA data show these rivers in the sky.

Work from UC Irvine and NASA shows climate change will move Earth's tropical rain belt, with cascading effects on water availability and potential threats to global food security.

2020 was a rough year for planet Earth, and NASA found it was the hottest on record. Our warming planet fanned the flames of extreme wildfires, drought and hurricanes.

NASA is tracking the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on our air, land, water and climate. The data have been collected in a free, openly-available online dashboard.

A new agreement between the U.S. Department of Agriculture and NASA will strengthen agricultural and Earth science research. WWAO’s collaboration with the USDA on its High-Resolution Soil Moisture Project fits into this larger partnership.

Access to the latest information about sea-level rise is crucial to many coastal cities. New NASA research is helping San Francisco plan measures to adapt to rising seas.

We have liftoff! NASA WWAO's new Drought Severity Tool is operational and has been handed off to its tribal partner, the Navajo Nation, as the project comes to a close.

Launched three weeks ago, the Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich satellite has returned its first data and is surpassing expectations. The NASA-U.S.-European satellite will measure sea-level rise with unprecedented accuracy.

WWAO's Navajo Nation Drought Tool User Guide is now live. This marks a milestone in the transition of our Navajo Drought Project from research to decision makers, and is key to building capacity within the Navajo community to use the tool. 

Floods are the most deadly and costly natural hazard. A NASA team is streamlining access to real-time satellite data so disaster managers can make informed decisions, faster.

NASA scientists Dalia Kirschbaum and Maggi Glascoe are using satellite data to pioneer improved landslide and flood alerting around the world.

Our new NASA Water Portal is now live. The portal serves as a hub for building connections between our catalogs of Water Data Needs and Water Capabilities and our partners, including water managers, decision makers, and scientists.

NASA has accumulated 40 petabytes of Earth science data, twice as much as all of the information stored by the Library of Congress. In the next five years, that will grow to 250 PB. 11 new projects are launching to help manage, store and search these data.

Water managers need accurate, consistent and timely data. A new online platform called OpenET puts NASA data in the hands of farmers, water managers and conservation groups.

Planet Earth should be named Planet Water, with 70% of its surface covered in ocean. Yet the freshwater that sustains our lives is a precious resource. NASA is at the forefront of monitoring it from every angle.

On the Navajo Nation, access to drinking water is limited. Over 40 percent of homes lack running water. The community is hit by frequent, pervasive drought. WWAO is developing a new drought tool that, with the help of satellite data, will enable Navajo water managers to hone in on drought severity and better manage the water they have.