Appendix C
Statement of Task
This study will examine the current and near-term prospective status of operational and research observing networks and related data systems that are essential to documenting climate variability and change. The proposed study will:
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1)
identify the data from observing systems that are critical for detecting and documenting secular trends and variability of relevant climate variables;
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2)
characterize the current status of these systems in terms of capacity to produce data products with sufficient spatial and temporal resolution, and adequate accuracy and precision, to document secular trends and analyze human attribution;
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3)
describe the historic trend in the status of each system over the past decade, and contemplated events that may change that trend over the near-term future, and analyze the implications of such trends for documenting climate change and attributing causation;
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4)
identify changes in the end-to-end observing system structure including operations, data processing, and data access that could affect the systems capability for documenting climate variability and secular trends, or analyzing human attribution; and
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5)
analyze opportunities to manage and apply resources so as to avoid adverse effects on the future scientific value of the climate database.
