Republicans' Future Agenda Includes Cancelation of Complimentary Meteorological Updates
In a striking twist, the modern marvel of free weather reports in the U.S. is under threat from conservative forces. For decades, we've effortlessly browsed weather.gov or sites like Google and AccuWeather to predict the weekly weather, including rain prospects, all thanks to government-run satellites.
However, conservatives aren't content.
As The Atlantic first reported, Project 2025, a plan conceived by The Heritage Foundation – a renowned conservative think tank – proposes dismantling the National Weather Service (NWS) and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). According to Project 2025, these entities drive the "climate change alarm industry," which allegedly harms U.S. prosperity.
Project 2025, an 881-page document, serves as a roadmap for the first 180 days of Republican rule under a potential Trump presidency. Although Trump distanced himself from Project 2025 after facing criticism, many of its proposals mirror Trump's and his allies' stated goals.
The irony is that private weather tracking companies, such as AccuWeather, Dark Sky, and The Weather Channel, rely heavily on free data from government sources domestically and internationally. They process this data using proprietary systems, but a significant portion is provided free of charge. This arrangement has long rankled AccuWeather's management.
The privatization of weather reports is a long-standing conservative objective that predated both Trump and Project 2025. In 2005, Republican Senator Rick Santorum pushed a bill aimed at stopping the NWS and NOAA from providing free weather reports. AccuWeather, a company based in Santorum's home state, lobbied fiercely for this bill, but it was stalled in committee.
AccuWeather revisited the issue during Trump's first presidential term. Trump nominated AccuWeather CEO Barry Lee Myers to head the NOAA. The Senate, suspecting a conflict of interest, refused to confirm him.
Now, the Project 2025 plan firmly aligns with AccuWeather's agenda. "Every day, Americans rely on weather forecasts and warnings provided by local radio stations and colleges that aren't produced by the NWS, but by private companies like AccuWeather. The NWS should merely focus on its data-gathering services," it states.
The plan suggests that the NWS should fully commercialize its forecasting operations, a move that would significantly increase costs for every company using the data. When costs escalate, businesses don't bear the burden – they shift it to consumers. Consequently, free weather reports would vanish, and the cost of third-party apps would rise.
Interestingly, Project 2025 claims that most Americans prefer AccuWeather over the NWS for weather forecasts. Oddly, it neglects to mention other third-party sources for weather data. "Studies have found that the forecasts and warnings provided by private companies are more reliable than those provided by the NWS," it states.
However, it cites only an AccuWeather-authored press release as evidence for its claim. AccuWeather's current leadership has since distanced itself from Project 2025, stating, "AccuWeather does not agree with the view, and AccuWeather has not suggested, that the National Weather Service (NWS) should fully commercialize its operations."
Update 7/17/22 at 1:05pm: This story has been updated with a comment from AccuWeather.
In the context of a potential shift in weather report provision, AccuWeather, a tech company headquartered in the U.S., has expressed interest in the privatization of weather reports. The Heritage Foundation's Plan Project 2025, targeting the National Weather Service (NWS) and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) for potential dismantling in 2025, suggests that the NWS should fully commercialize its forecasting operations, relying on tech companies like AccuWeather for atmospheric feeds. If implemented, this could lead to an increase in costs for various tech and weather-dependent businesses, ultimately impacting the prices of third-party weather apps and potentially eliminating free weather reports by 2025, issue warnings for consumers about rising costs.
