Controversial Program Could Diminish NASA’s Credibility And Its Federal Funding

As April commenced and congressional Republicans began to flesh out proposals for spending reduction to be offered as part of a prospective deal to raise the debt limit later this summer, one Florida congressman, Representative Byron Donalds (R-Fla.), suggested an area for potential cost cutting that one might not expect to come from a lawmaker whose state is home to Cape Canaveral. Yet in early April Congressman Donalds pointed to federal spending on the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) as potential opportunity to reduce taxpayer costs.

Based on recent comments from Congressman Donalds as well as other members of the Florida delegation, NASA’s financial backing of an air quality monitoring program in Florida aimed at studying prescribed burns related to agricultural operations, particularly sugarcane harvests, is a reason why NASA might find part of its budget on the congressional chopping block. The air monitoring research in question, which NASA is funding over Florida through the end of May, has proven controversial for a host of reasons.

First, the devices NASA has employed for this monitoring program, known as PurpleAir monitors, have proven to produce unreliable readings. Second, many point out NASA’s program is redundant and unnecessary, since state governments handle air quality permitting and monitoring. In fact, the Florida Department of Environmental Protection’s website notes air quality in the state is the best it’s ever been.

“Thanks to a statewide effort, emissions in Florida continue to decrease and are now the lowest they have been on record,” the Florida DEP’s website states. “The state of Florida has one of the best outdoor air quality monitoring networks in the country, enabling the Florida Department of Environmental Protection to provide accurate and timely data to the state’s residents and visitors.”

But Maya Miller, a reporter with ProPublica who has written about the environmental impact of sugarcane burns, contends that the DEP’s capabilities are insufficient. Miller points out that “the Florida Department of Environmental Protection has a single monitor across the 400,000 acres of sugar crop that spans three counties.”

Miller points out that between 2013 and 2021, the Florida DEP’s monitor was flagged “for not meeting strict accuracy standards and, therefore, not being adequate enough to measure compliance with the Clean Air Act.” Miller adds that the DEP subsequently upgraded their monitor press coverage of the issue.

The American Lung Association, in its 2023 “State of the Air” report, recently gave Palm Beach County, where NASA is funding the controversial air monitoring program and where most prescribed sugarcane burns occur, an A grade for particle pollution. According to the American Lung Association, Palm Beach County had the best air quality in the state.

Why then, some are asking, is NASA spending taxpayer dollars on what critics describe as a redundant, unnecessary, and flawed air monitoring program? Representative Cory Mills (R) recently referred to the deployment of PurpleAir monitors over Florida that NASA is funding as “a perfect example of the out-of-control government spending the Republican-led House of Representatives has vowed to stop.”

The PurpleAir monitors used for this NASA-backed research project being conducted in Florida have a spotty record of reliability. “According to multiple reports, its data can be unreliable and skewed by nearby air-conditions and humidity, like in Florida,” explained a column published in RealClearScience (RSC) on March 23. “A 2020 article in The Verge warned ‘[The sensors] can miss very small particles or confuse water droplets as particles when there’s high humidity.’ A 2021 SFGate article raised similar concerns from a local health official.”

“The use of PurpleAir Monitors almost guarantees the alarming outcomes the activists are seeking,” noted the March RCS article, which was authored by Jeff Stier, a senior fellow at the Consumer Choice Center. “In fact, EPA scientists say the PurpleAir devices are ‘biased’ because ‘they consistently overpredict fine particle concentrations in most locations’ when compared to ‘the regulatory-grade monitors that are operated in the same location.’”

Critics and skeptics of the NASA-backed air monitoring program over Florida, which will run through the end of May, posit that it’s part of an effort seeking to ultimately prohibit or enact policies that restrict prescribed sugarcane burns. NASA agreed to fund this controversial air monitoring program following a series of articles on the environmental impact of sugarcane burns produced through a partnership between the Palm Beach Post and ProPublica. ProPublica bills itself as “an independent, nonprofit newsroom” but is described by Stier as “a Ralph Nader-styled advocacy group, which…cloaks its bias behind a veneer of ‘investigative journalism.’”

ProPublica’s Miller takes issue with that characterization of her organization. “ProPublica is not an advocacy group,” contends Miller. “ProPublica is a nonprofit investigative news organization, and its mission is to expose abuses of power and betrayals of public trust.”

While some criticize the cost of a redundant air monitoring program, critics are also are concerned that the findings from this NASA-backed air monitoring program are being gathered in order to create the basis for proposed changes in federal regulation that harm one of Florida’s major industries. This incident has led some, such as Congressmen Donalds and Mills, to conclude the space agency might have more resources than it needs and could therefore be a source of taxpayer savings in the upcoming debt limit negotiations.

“That’s going to be one of the things we’re cutting out of this budget coming up,” Congressman Donalds said about the air monitoring NASA is now funding over Florida. “We’re not doing that,” Donalds added.

Aspects of the ongoing debate over the air monitoring program NASA is funding over Florida will sound familiar to those who followed the Obama administration’s attempt to launch a redundant and, based on air quality data at the time, unneeded air quality permitting system in Texas. Back in May 2010, the Obama EPA announced that it would reverse the Lone Star State’s flex air permitting system that had been in place since 1994, moving the state back to a previous system under which emissions caps are assigned to each individual greenhouse gas emitting source in a given facility.

This EPA action was criticized at the time as a federal takeover of Texas’s air quality permitting system. Critics of that move by the Obama EPA argued it would not benefit the environment, but it would add significant costs that would ultimately be passed along to consumers in the form of higher energy prices and diminished job opportunities. Kathleen Hartnett-White, a former chair of the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality and a previous director of the Texas Public Policy Foundation’s Armstrong Center for Energy & the Environment, criticized the the EPA’s attempted takeover of the Texas air quality permitting system at the time as a costly solution in search of a problem.

“We have a record that shows that we have significantly reduced emissions,” White said of the EPA’s attempted 2010 takeover. “It’s regrettable that the EPA is trying to seize control for control’s sake.”

As this author noted in the September 29, 2010 edition of The Economist, “under the existing system that the agency was trying to strike down, air quality in Texas improved during a time of tremendous growth. From 2000 to 2010, under the flex-permitting system that the EPA is so disapproving of, Texas saw a 22% reduction in ozone and a 46% decrease in nitrogen-oxide emissions.”

NASA defends the air monitoring it’s now funding over Florida. With the data gathered, NASA will produce a health impact statement, says NASA spokeswoman Karen Fox, which will “estimate diseases due to smoke exposure on downwind communities.” The conclusion of NASA’s air monitoring program in May will not be the end of this matter. The next step will be the release of findings, in response to which a number of policy changes will be proposed.

Efforts to prohibit prescribed sugarcane burns through the courts have failed. In 2019, a Florida accident injury law firm advised by President Joe Biden’s brother, Frank Biden, filed a lawsuit seeking to ban prescribed sugarcane burns. It did not go well for Biden.

A judge dismissed Biden’s case with prejudice in 2022. As the defendants summarized, “the case against air quality in the farming region was without merit. We believed the science, data and regulations that support our work every day would show that the air quality in the Glades is ‘good’ – the highest quality under federal regulations.”

The co-opting of NASA in the effort to ultimately prohibit or restrict prescribed sugarcane burns is seen by some as a Hail Mary attempt by activists who have already been denied in the courts and who have given up on mustering legislative support for their goals. Regardless of what the coming health impact assessment concludes, some believe this venture has harmed NASA’s credibility. As recent comments from members of the House majority suggest, in addition to the hit on its credibility, time will tell whether this incident also diminishes NASA’s federal funding.