Brendan Kelly lives about as far from Washington as you can get---Fairbanks, Alaska---but his job as a climate scientist depends on funding from the federal government. Kelly and scientists like him are watching events in the nation’s capital with a keen eye. President-elect Donald Trump has called global warming “a hoax,” and has appointed noted climate change denier Myron Ebell to reorient the EPA.
“I’m hostile to climate change as well,” Kelly jokes. “Just not to research on the topic.” Kelly directs the Study for Environmental Arctic Change, a project investigating altered patterns in sea ice, weather, sea level rise, and methane release from melting permafrost in the far north. The study is in year two of a five-year National Science Foundation grant, which provides between $800,000 to $900,000 annually. Beyond that, Kelly’s funding is uncertain. He is like many other researchers---not just in climate science, but such politicized fields as gun violence, stem cells, antibiotic resistance, and reproductive technologies---who worry about having their federal funds redlined by the Trump White House and Republican-controlled House and Senate.
Politics are always trying to meddle in science. For example, last spring, the Republican-led House Science Committee penned a reauthorization of the America COMPETES Act that cuts funding to climate science, and social sciences, while favoring things like engineering, nuclear energy, computer science, and fossil fuel development. The bill is still awaiting a full vote. So, the fear of losing funds is not idle speculation for some researchers.
But optimists believe institutional checks and balances, combined with public pressure, might keep the money flowing. “Even with leaders who haven’t made extreme comments, funding is a challenge because the work we need to do is quite substantial.” said Rush Holt, CEO of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, during a November 15 conference call. Holt says he’s optimistic that environmental, earth, and climate science funding will prevail despite the current fears. “The public cares about these things,” says Holt, who is a former Democratic Congressman from New Jersey and once chaired the House Science Committee. “Even as an anti-establishment president elect, he is not going to thumb his nose at the public. The public understands the value of science and technology. At least it does sometimes.”
Not everyone agrees. Bart Gordon, a former Republican Congressman from Tennessee (also a former House Science Committee chairman), and now a Washington lobbyist (http://www.klgates.com/barton-j-gordon/) notes that Trump will have broad executive powers that won’t require congressional votes---skirting the public debate and legislative battles that might otherwise occur. President Obama used orders like these to create higher efficiency standards for cars and government buildings. His commitment to the Paris climate agreement is also an executive order.
Even if Trump doesn’t proactively attack climate and other contested research areas, Gordon says Trump might just order federal agencies to ignore Obama’s orders, or refuse to give them money. “You can’t pull out of the Paris (climate) accords without four year notice, but you can cancel a lot of the executive orders,” Gordon said during the same teleconference.
And a lot depends on who Trump picks for his White House science advisor, and whether Trump listens to the advice he’s given during a crisis. Say there’s an Arctic oil spill, or a new viral outbreak along the Gulf Coast. Will Trump consult with scientists, or go with his gut and advisors? “We have argued that’s the first thing he should do is to bring science into the discussion when he makes decisions,” says Holt.
But nobody is certain. And outside the Beltway, thousands of young scientists who are just starting their careers are wondering about what all this means for their future. “I’m questioning whether I have a good future in academia,” says Alexis Hoffman, a meteorology doctoral candidate at Pennsylvania State University. She uses models to predict how atmospheric dust above sub-Saharan Africa affects food production. Her risk analysis could help people in the region survive, or avoid, future famines.
Despite Trump’s ominous rhetoric and dubious appointments, Hoffman and fellow meteorology graduate student, Rob Ceres, are both hopeful that environmentally-minded business and nonprofit leaders will help her and other researchers keep their momentum going. “Industry is still going to care about climate risk whether the White House does or not,” Ceres said. Rays of hope don’t always come from Washington.
