美宇航局和谷歌擬聯手監測碳排放
NASA, the American agency which landed men on the moon, and Google, the go-to company of the early 21st Century, are trying to give the world the ability to monitor both the carbon dioxide pollution and the levels of forest destruction that contribute to global warming.
NASA plans to launch a satellite which could help monitor deforestation and carbon emissions. For its part, Google has rolled out a new program call Earth Engine which essentially is a massive storehouse for satellite and other data that forest countries will be able to access for free by the time of the next UN climate conference in Mexico next year.
"Just having the thing flying around there imaging would just about make everybody act differently," said professor Steve Pacala, director of the Princeton Environmental Institute. "The idea that you could pull a fast one would be different."
Deforestation is the biggest cause of climate change in much of the developing world, and industrial countries plan to pay billions of dollars to poor countries to stop deforestation. The Google system could help many keep track of what forests are saved.
"The science is out there, but the ability to run it on large numbers of machines by countries in previous years who couldn't afford it is now possible," said Brian McClen, vice president of engineering for the Google Geo Group, who demonstrated the new program in Copenhagen.
The relaunch of the NASA satellite is awaiting White House approval and is going through the budget process for next year.
"I'm optimistic," White House science adviser John Holdren told reporters at climate talks Wednesday.
Until another satellite actually gets into the air, the way the world knows about carbon dioxide involves a lot of guesswork, math and monitoring machines and a good amount of trust.
Experts' estimates of carbon dioxide emissions are based on fuel going into power plants and complex formulas that calculate power plant efficiency. But those estimates are also dependent on reliable information about fuel and efficiency, so they could be skewed by inaccurate input.
實現人類登月的美國宇航局和本世紀初出現的搜索引擎巨頭谷歌公司將聯手出擊，使整個世界有能力監測影響全球變暖的二氧化碳排放和森林毀壞程度。
美國宇航局計劃發射一顆可幫助監測森林砍伐和碳排放的衛星。谷歌則推出了一個名爲“地球引擎”的新項目，該引擎實質上是一個儲存衛星和其他數據的巨大資料庫，在明年聯合國氣候大會在墨西哥召開前，森林國家就可免費使用這一數據庫。
普林斯頓環境研究院院長史蒂夫•帕卡拉教授說：“只需讓衛星在那飛行拍攝照片就足以讓人們改變行爲方式。你不會再有那些矇混過關的想法。”
森林砍伐是多數發展中國家氣候變化的最大誘因，發達國家計劃爲貧窮國家提供數十億美元的資助以阻止森林砍伐。谷歌最新開發的這一系統可以幫助很多國家追蹤哪些森林被挽救。
“谷歌地理工作組”工程部副主任布萊恩•麥克蘭說：“這項科技已經具備了，前些年各國無法提供數量龐大的設備來進行監測，如今這一科技成爲可能。”麥克蘭在哥本哈根展示了這一新項目。
目前，美國宇航局的衛星再發射項目正在等待白宮批准，並將進入明年的預算審覈程序。
上週三，白宮科學顧問約翰•霍爾德倫在氣候會談上接受記者採訪時說：“我很樂觀。”
目前世界對二氧化碳的瞭解方式包括很多猜測、數學計算、監測儀器和相當程度的“信賴”，下一顆人造衛星升空後監測方式有望得到改善。
專家對二氧化碳排放量的估算主要依據進入電力廠的燃料以及計算電力廠能效的各種複雜公式。但這些估算同時也要依賴於有關燃料和能效的可靠信息，這樣如果出現輸入錯誤，結果就會出問題。
Vocabulary:
go-to company: the best company to turn to for a specific reason or purpose
deforestation: the cutting down and removal of all or most of the trees in a forested area 森林砍伐
roll out: to launch (sth.) in a series of stages over an area 展開
pull a fast one on..:deceive somebody（搗鬼；欺騙；例如：You can't count on nathalie. She'll pull a fast one on you. 你不能指望娜塔莉，她會搗鬼的。）
skew: distort 歪曲（His conception of human nature is skewed. 他對人性的看法帶有偏見。）
