NEW ORLEANS – In addition to purchasing global datasets, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) plans to pay a premium for observations of oil spills or other events. For oil spills, the spot-market approach “is inevitable, but not yet practical,” Steve Volz, assistant administrator for NOAA’s Satellite and Information Service, told SpaceNews at the American Meteorological Society annual meeting here. To date, NOAA has purchased radio occultation soundings primarily through contracts that give the government free and open access. As a result, NOAA can integrate the commercial observations with government data…
