Moving Toward a Resilient Earth Observations Data Ecosystem

Earlier this month, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine convened experts from academia, federal agencies, private companies, nonprofits, and philanthropies to chart future directions for earth observations (EO) and data stewardship. EO, the gathering of information about the Earth's physical, chemical, and biological systems, have evolved dramatically since Cold War satellites first launched for military intelligence. Today, EO data underpins critical decisions across society—radar imagery reveals infrastructure damage for emergency responders after natural disasters, multispectral satellite data tracks crop conditions to inform agricultural planning, and geospatial climate records help insurers assess property risk.

This expanding set of demands is colliding with an infrastructure that evolved piecemeal over decades. Capabilities are scattered across more than 15 federal departments and agencies, with commercial and philanthropic providers now adding more. Standards and governance frameworks struggle to keep pace with rapid technological change and growing data volumes. This gap becomes more consequential as EO data moves into regulatory applications where verification and accuracy requirements are far more stringent than for research. 

While pockets of the ecosystem are well coordinated, there is no central body with the authority, sustainable funding, or mandate to set a vision for what a resilient, integrated system should look like. The workshop convened roughly 500 participants, including staff from the Data Foundation's Climate Data Collaborative, to grapple with that gap. What emerged was a shared recognition that a system fragmented by history needs intentional effort to become federated by design.

Here are some takeaways from our team.

Building Understanding about the Value of the Whole EO System

The value of the EO system is often understood in pieces rather than as a whole. Individual missions and programs get recognition, but users don't always see the full picture of how everything fits together or what's at stake if parts of the system are degraded. Some of the most critical components of the system rarely make headlines, like the long-term in situ measurement networks that provide continuity and calibration, or the specialized workforce that transforms EO data into actionable insights

Helping stakeholders see how their work depends on this infrastructure is essential. Connecting EO data to the policy, regulatory, and operational decisions it enables is how we ensure the ecosystem is responsive to growing demands. When stakeholders understand the interdependencies between datasets and the institutions involved in producing them, the case for sustained investment becomes clearer. And when the pieces work together, the whole delivers more than the sum of its parts. For example, a single satellite measuring atmospheric methane can be empowered for broader regulatory and policy applications through ground-based calibration networks, inventory data, standards, and analytical tools. Building this understanding is paramount in creating the constituency needed to advocate for the whole system rather than individual programs or missions.

The Need for Clear Roles and Responsibilities in an Integrated Public and Private EO System

The federal government has long been the backbone of the EO system, but the landscape is shifting. The commercial EO sector has grown dramatically, offering new capabilities and faster innovation cycles than the federal and academic ecosystems have traditionally fostered. As new players enter, roles and responsibilities remain loosely defined. The question is whether this emerging public-private system can maintain the trust and coherence that users depend on.

Building that trust starts with clarity about roles and responsibilities. Some of the most critical building blocks of the EO system need clear ownership: long-term data records that provide trends and baselines, documentation standards that specify methods and procedures, reference standards for calibration, and data standards that govern file formats and metadata to enable interoperability. Defining what the federal government is foundationally responsible for, and where non-federal actors can fill gaps, build on that foundation, and bring in new capabilities, is essential for a federated system to function as an integrated whole.

These building blocks are vulnerable. The programs, infrastructure, and workforce that comprise them take years to build and require sustained investment to maintain. They are often anchored to federal funding and staffed by teams with decades of specialized experience. They are not built to survive a scenario in which funding is switched on and off. Instead of hibernating, many of these components would decline in function immediately, compromising continuity of measurement and accuracy of monitoring, or cease to exist altogether. Understanding and mitigating these single points of failure is essential to building a more resilient system. Budget uncertainty, shifting policy priorities, and workforce attrition don't just weaken individual programs, they erode the trust and continuity that the broader ecosystem depends on.

Looking Forward

The workshop made clear that retaining a resilient, integrated system will require sustained effort from a broader set of actors. Data users seeking to adapt EO products for myriad applications need their voices incorporated in shaping priorities. In some cases, the boundaries between these interests may overlap and change as different needs arise, emphasizing the need for trust and cohesion to drive innovation. 

The Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Coalition is one example of what coordination in a federated system can look like. Launched earlier this year, it brings together federal agencies, private companies, NGOs, and academic institutions to strengthen the greenhouse gas measurement, monitoring, reporting, and verification community. The coalition is working through what an integrated GHG information system looks like and how to define public and private roles within it. It's not a centralized authority. It's a node in a broader network of networks, focused on one critical piece of the EO ecosystem.

The challenges ahead are not only technical – they are also institutional, economic, and political. Building trust across sectors, sustaining critical infrastructure through budget cycles, developing the right incentives for coordination, and rethinking how groups work together are the hard problems that will determine whether we build a resilient system or watch a fragile one erode.

This blog was co-authored by Hayley Bricker, Sonia Wang, and Tyler Stotland, who support the Data Foundation's Climate Data Collaborative. The Collaborative is working to strengthen connections between climate data infrastructure and the decision-makers who depend on it. Learn more at climatedatacollaborative.org.