Well, NASA
studies our home planet more than any other planet,
and we use that unique vantage point of space
to understand what's happening with our oceans and on land
and on ice and in the atmosphere and how those systems work together.
And PREFIRE will be the newest addition to the constellation
of over two dozen satellites that study the Earth in this way.
PREFIRE s a pair of CubeSats
that are flying over the poles.
And they'll measure the outgoing energy
from the poles in a way that we've never done it before.
This is very important because a lot of the energy in the Earth
system does escape through the poles, and it's that balance between the energy
coming in from the sun and the energy that's leaving the Earth system
that really determines where our climate is headed.
Well, PREFIRE is a pair of
two cubesats and they're flying independently.
And that means we'll be able to understand that
outgoing energy from the polar regions on a variety of timescales.
That's going to help us get better at predicting
glacial melt, sea ice melt,
and a variety of other,
features of the Earth system that can help us prepare
for the changes that are coming, including helping communities
prepare.
PREFIRE’s measurements that will help us understand
the energy that is, the energy exchange in the polar regions
will help us better model future ice melt both the sea ice
and the glacial ice that is water that today is trapped on land.
When that when those glaciers melt, when that ice melts,
it gets added to the oceans.
It's a significant contributor to sea level rise.
And sea level rise is one of the greatest challenges for our coastal communities.
It can have impacts on the occurrence of sunny day
flooding and on the severity of storm surges.
So that's just one example of how a better understanding
of what's happening in the Arctic affects lives in communities around the world.