UH Telescope to Help Collect Essential Climate Chamber Data

The University of Hawaiʻi is partnering with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to collect critical atmospheric measurements on Maunakea that are vital to understanding how Earth’s climate is changing. NOAA scientists recently installed an intake tube less than an inch in diameter and 25 feet long on the UH 88 inch observatory to sample the summit air after data collection on Maunaloa* was abruptly disabled when lava from the Maunaloa eruption cut off staff access and power lines to NOAA’s Mauna Loa* Observatory (MLO). Atmospheric measurements have been taken on Maunaloa since 1958 providing more than six decades of data to track global climate change through CO₂ measurements.

Under an emergency agreement, NOAA and UH established a temporary measurement site at the UH 88 inch to ensure the continuity of CO₂ data collection and other atmospheric measurements taken at MLO. The Department of Land and Natural Resource’s Office of Conservation and Coastal Lands, also provided expedited site plan approval for this important project.

“The data gathered over many decades in Hawaiʻi are essential to our understanding of climate change,” said Steve Thur, NOAA assistant administrator for Oceanic and Atmospheric Research. “We are always grateful for the stro

ng partnership with the University of Hawaiʻi, but especially now when we need a way to ensure continuity in the measurement of CO₂. Being able to pull atmospheric samples from Maunakea while MLO is down ensures that any disruption to this important long-term research will be minimal.”

The NOAA team will collect air samples in flasks to measure almost 60 gasses, including methane—the second most important greenhouse gas measurement after CO₂—at intervals similar to what was being done at MLO before the eruption.