The Brief

The Trump administration has asked NASA employees to draw up plans to end at least two major satellite missions, according to current and former NASA staffers. If the plans are carried out, one of the missions would be permanently terminated, because the satellite would burn up in the atmosphere.

The data the two missions collect is widely used, including by scientists, oil and gas companies and farmers who need detailed information about carbon dioxide and crop health. They are the only two federal satellite missions that were designed and built specifically to monitor planet-warming greenhouse gases.

It is unclear why the Trump administration seeks to end the missions. The equipment in space is state of the art and is expected to function for many more years, according to scientists who worked on the missions. An official review by NASA in 2023 found that "the data are of exceptionally high quality" and recommended continuing the mission for at least three years.

Both missions, known as the Orbiting Carbon Observatories, measure carbon dioxide and plant growth around the globe. They use identical measurement devices, but one device is attached to a stand-alone satellite while the other is attached to the International Space Station. The standalone satellite would burn up in the atmosphere if NASA pursued plans to terminate the mission.

NASA employees who work on the two missions are making what the agency calls Phase F plans for both carbon-monitoring missions, according to David Crisp, a longtime NASA engineer who designed the instruments and managed the missions until he retired in 2022. Phase F plans lay out options for terminating NASA missions.

Crisp says NASA employees making those termination plans have reached out to him for his technical expertise. "What I have heard is direct communications from people who were making those plans, who weren't allowed to tell me that that's what they were told to do. But they were allowed to ask me questions," Crisp says. "They were asking me very sharp questions. The only thing that would have motivated those questions was [that] somebody told them to come up with a termination plan."

Three other academic scientists who use data from the missions confirmed that they, too, have been contacted with questions related to mission termination. All three asked for anonymity because they are concerned that speaking about the mission termination plans publicly could endanger the jobs of the NASA employees who contacted them.

Two current NASA employees also confirmed that NASA mission leaders were told to make termination plans for projects that would lose funding under President Donald Trump's proposed budget for the next fiscal year, or FY 2026, which begins Oct. 1. The employees asked to remain anonymous, because they were told they would be fired if they revealed the request.

A rocket launches carrying the Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 (OCO-2) satellite on July 2, 2014, at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.

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Congress funded the missions and may fund them again

Presidential budget proposals are wish lists that often bear little resemblance to final congressional budgets. The Orbiting Carbon Observatory missions have already received funding from Congress through the end of the 2025 fiscal year, which ends Sept. 30. Draft budgets that Congress is currently considering for next year keep NASA funding basically flat. But it's not clear whether these specific missions will receive funding again, or if Congress will pass a budget before current funding expires on Sept. 30.

Last week, NASA announced it will consider proposals from private companies and universities that are willing to take on the cost of maintaining the device that is attached to the International Space Station, as well as another device that measures ozone in the atmosphere.

NASA did not respond to questions from NPR about whether other missions will also be privatized, or about why the agency is making plans to potentially terminate projects that may receive funding in Congress' next budget.

In July, congressional Democrats sent a letter to acting NASA Administrator Sean Duffy warning his agency not to terminate missions that Congress has funded, and arguing that the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB), and its director, Russ Vought, are overstepping by directing NASA and other agencies to stop spending money that Congress has already appropriated.

"Congress has the power of the purse, not Trump or Vought," said Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif., one of the authors of the letter and the ranking Democrat on the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology in an email to NPR. "Eliminating funds or scaling down the operations of Earth-observing satellites would be catastrophic and would severely impair our ability to forecast, manage, and respond to severe weather and climate disasters. The Trump administration is forcing the proposed cuts in its FY26 budget request on already appropriated FY25 funds. This is illegal."

A spokesperson for OMB told NPR via email that "OMB had nothing to do with NASA Earth Science leadership's request for termination plans." The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy did not respond to questions from NPR.

In the past, Vought has been vocal about cutting what he sees as inappropriate spending on projects related to climate change. Before he joined the Trump administration, Vought authored sections of the Heritage Foundation's Project 2025 roadmap for remaking the federal government. In that document, Vought wrote that "the Biden Administration's climate fanaticism will need a whole-of-government unwinding" and argued that federal regulators should make it easier for commercial satellites to be launched.

The data from these missions is even more valuable than intended

The missions are called Orbiting Carbon Observatories because they were originally designed to measure carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. But soon after they launched, scientists realized that they were also accidentally measuring plant growth on Earth.

Basically, when plants are growing, photosynthesis is happening in their cells. And that photosynthesis gives off a very specific wavelength of light. The OCO instruments in space measure that light all over the planet.

"NASA and others have turned this happy accident into an incredibly valuable set of maps of plant photosynthesis around the world," explains Scott Denning, a longtime climate scientist at Colorado State University who worked on the OCO missions and is now retired. "Lo and behold, we also get these lovely, high resolution maps of plant growth," he says. "And that's useful to farmers, useful to rangeland and grazing and drought monitoring and forest mapping and all kinds of things, in addition to the CO2 measurements."

A soybean field near Clinton, Ill. Information collected by NASA's Orbiting Carbon Observatory satellite instruments is unexpectedly useful for predicting crop yields, because it allows scientists to monitor plant growth from space.

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For example, the U.S. Department of Agriculture and many private agricultural consulting companies use the data to forecast and track crop yield, drought conditions and more.

The information can also help predict future political instability, since crop failures are a major driver of mass migration all over the world. For example, persistent drought in Honduras is one factor that has led many farmers there to migrate north, NPR reporting found. And damage to crops and livestock from extreme weather in Northern Africa has contributed to migration from that region. "This is a national security issue, for sure," Crisp says.

Carbon-monitoring satellites have revolutionized climate science

The carbon dioxide data that the instruments were originally designed to collect has revolutionized scientists' understanding of how quickly carbon dioxide is collecting in the atmosphere.

That's because measuring carbon dioxide with instruments in various locations on the Earth's surface, as scientists have been doing since the 1950s, doesn't provide information about the whole planet. Satellite data, on the other hand, covers the entire Earth.

And that data showed some surprising things. "Fifty years ago we thought the tropical forests were like a huge vacuum cleaner, sucking up carbon dioxide," Denning explains. "Now we know they're not."

Instead, boreal forests in the northern latitudes suck up a significant amount of carbon dioxide, the satellite data shows. And the patterns of which areas absorb the planet-warming gas, and how much they absorb, are continuously changing as the climate changes.

"The value of these observations is just increasing over time," explains Anna Michalak, a climate researcher at Carnegie Science and Stanford University who has worked extensively on greenhouse gas monitoring from space. "These are missions that are still providing critical information."

It is expensive to end satellite missions

The cost of maintaining the two OCO satellite missions up in space is a small fraction of the amount of money taxpayers already spent to design and launch the instruments. The two missions cost about $750 million to design, build and launch, according to David Crisp, the retired NASA engineer, and that number is even higher if you include the cost of an initial failed rocket launch that sent an identical carbon dioxide measuring instrument into the ocean in 2009.

By comparison, maintaining both OCO missions in orbit costs about $15 million per year, Crisp says. That money covers the cost of downloading the data, maintaining a network of calibration sensors on the ground and making sure the stand-alone satellite isn't hit by space debris, according to Crisp.

"Just from an economic standpoint, it makes no economic sense to terminate NASA missions that are returning incredibly valuable data," Crisp says.

NASA's recent call for universities and companies to potentially take over the cost of maintaining the OCO instrument attached to the International Space Station suggests the agency is also considering privatizing NASA science missions. Such partnerships raise a host of thorny questions, says Michalak, who has worked with private companies, nonprofit groups, universities and the federal government on greenhouse gas monitoring satellite projects.

"On the one hand the private sector is really starting to have a role," Michalak says. In recent years, multiple private groups in the U.S. have launched satellites that measure methane, a potent planet-warming gas that is poorly monitored compared to carbon dioxide.

"Looking at it from the outside, it can look like the private sector is really picking up some of what the federal agencies were doing in terms of Earth observations," she explains. "And it's true that they're contributing." But, she says, "Those efforts would not be possible without this underlying investment from public funding."

Copyright 2025 NPR

Two of the three hikers found dead last week at Mt. Baldy have been identified.

They are Juan Sarat Lopez, 37, and Bayron Pedro Ramos Garcia, 36, according to authorities on Saturday. Both men are Guatemalan nationals living in Los Angeles.

Investigators believe the two fell from the Devil’s Backbone Trail the same day they were found.

Their bodies were discovered when a search-and-rescue crew was dispatched to search for another missing hiker, who was reported to have fallen 500 feet near Devil’s Backbone Trail.

That person was identified later as Marcus Alexander Muench Casanova, 19, of Seal Beach.

Trails still closed

Hiking trails on and around Mount Baldy have been closed by authorities after the deceased hikers were found, until 11:59 p.m. Jan. 7.

“Our primary responsibility is the preservation of life,” Sheriff Shannon Dicus said in a social media message sent on New Year's Eve. “Closing these trails is a necessary step to mitigate ongoing risks. We urge the community to respect these boundaries.”

The following trails will be closed:

• Forest System Trail No. 7W12 - Mount Baldy Trail
• Forest System Trail No. 7W02 - Mount Baldy Bowl Trail
• Forest System Trail No. 7W05 - Devil’s Backbone Trail
• Forest System Trail No. 7W06 - Three T’s Trail
• Forest System Trail No. 7W07 - Icehouse Canyon Trail
• Forest System Trail No. 7W07A - Chapman Trail
• Forest System Trail No. 7W08 - Ontario Peak Trail

Hours after the U.S. military captured Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro, President Trump made it clear that the U.S. operation is about — at least in part — control of Venezuela's oil.

"We're going to have our very large U.S. oil companies, the biggest anywhere in the world, go in, spend billions of dollars, fix the badly broken infrastructure, the oil infrastructure, and start making money for the country," Trump said during a press conference Saturday.

The capture of Maduro and Trump's comments comes at a time when even a country like Venezuela — with one of the biggest oil resources in the world — isn't a sure bet for attracting major oil companies.

Many oil companies have been bruised by their past experiences operating in the country. The global oil market is currently facing an oversupply. Oil prices are below $60 a barrel, and long-term projections for oil demand are unclear as the world shifts to more electric vehicles.

Trump promises to "run the country" and make way for U.S. oil companies in Venezuela. However, there's a long history of U.S. interventions in Latin America and the Middle East not going well, oil experts tell NPR.

Here's what you need to know about Venezuela's oil.

Venezuela has huge oil reserves, but now produces a fraction of what it used to

Venezuela was once one of the biggest global oil producers and was one of the main founders of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), a group of some of the world's biggest oil producers, whose decisions help determine global oil prices. Venezuela has the largest proven reserves of oil in the world, according to OPEC.

But while the country was producing more than 3 million barrels a day a few decades ago, today Venezuela produces only about a million barrels a day, or roughly 1% of global oil output. The U.S. produces about 13 million barrels a day.

Much of Venezuela's oil went to refineries in the U.S. Now much of it goes to China.

Not all crude oil is the same — some oil is physically lighter and easier for refineries to process. Venezuela's oil is heavy and dense, and requires special refineries. Burning any type of oil contributes to climate change, but Venezuela's oil is "among the dirtiest oils in the world to produce when it comes to global warming," says Paasha Mahdavi, associate professor of political science at the University of California, Santa Barbara.

The El Palito refinery rises above Puerto Cabello, Venezuela, Sunday, Dec. 21, 2025.

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Venezuela owes some U.S. oil companies billions

U.S. oil companies like Chevron began drilling in Venezuela about one hundred years ago and played a key role in developing the country's oil sector.

But around 2004 to 2007, then-President Hugo Chávez "basically forcefully renegotiated contracts" with international oil companies, says Francisco Monaldi, director of the Latin America Energy Program at the Center for Energy Studies at Rice University.

ExxonMobil and ConocoPhillips left the country in 2007 and then took the Venezuelan government to international arbitration courts. The courts ordered Venezuela to pay ConocoPhillips over $10 billion and ExxonMobil over $1 billion. Venezuela has only paid a fraction of those sums to ExxonMobil and to ConocoPhillips.

Chevron, however, stayed in Venezuela — although " they didn't like it," says Gerald Kepes, president of Competitive Energy Strategies, an energy consultancy in Washington, D.C.

Chevron today produces about a quarter of Venezuela's oil.

In response to the news of Maduro's capture, Chevron spokesperson Bill Turenne said in an email, "Chevron remains focused on the safety and wellbeing of our employees, as well as the integrity of our assets. We continue to operate in full compliance with all relevant laws and regulations."

Trump has said that Venezuela has "stolen" U.S. investment in the country's energy sector.

Will U.S. oil companies return?

Venezuela is what the oil industry calls a "brownfield" — meaning it's well established, and oil companies have a fairly good idea of what they will find when they drill. For companies like ConocoPhillips, returning to Venezuela could be an opportunity to recoup some of the billions owed to them by the government, Monaldi says.

In an email, ConocoPhillips spokesperson Dennis Nuss wrote, "ConocoPhillips is monitoring developments in Venezuela and their potential implications for global energy supply and stability. It would be premature to speculate on any future business activities or investments."

ExxonMobil did not respond to a request for comment.

Still, this isn't the best time to add to the global oil supply, Monaldi says. There's currently a worldwide glut of oil. Also, because Venezuela's oil is particularly bad for the climate, that makes it less attractive for European oil companies with climate goals, Monaldi says.

Aerial view of a ship at the Demerara river in Georgetown, Guyana on August 29, 2025.

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Venezuela's neighbor is a rising oil star

Next door to Venezuela is Guyana — a country that recently discovered over 10 billion barrels of oil and is a key emerging player in the international oil industry.

Guyana's oil is lighter than Venezuela's, less polluting, and has lower taxes than Venezuela, Monaldi says. There's also no national oil company in Guyana, as there is in Venezuela.

"All that makes for Guyana to be one of the most attractive oil places in the world," Monaldi says.

While ExxonMobil is no longer in Venezuela, it is a major player in Guyana.

For years, Venezuela and Guyana have had a territorial dispute that has also been related to oil rights. Last March, Venezuelan vessels entered Guyanese territorial waters approaching offshore oil vessels belonging to ExxonMobil.

"Without a doubt, with a changing regime, Guyana should feel more secure," Monaldi says.

Lack of political stability could be a deal breaker 

Some increase in Venezuela's oil production could happen fairly quickly with more financial support and improved management, according to an analysis by Wood Mackenzie, an energy consultancy.

But Mahdavi says the Trump administration's plans to jumpstart the industry will be difficult. He notes that it took nearly two decades to revitalize Iraq's oil industry after the U.S. invasion, though corruption and mismanagement remain pervasive.

And ultimately, notes Kepes, if it's unclear who is in charge in Venezuela, oil companies will have concerns about the long-term viability of their contracts. "No one's going to start investing on the ground in a place where there's no legal contract and viable permission to operate or if there's concerns about political stability and violence," he says.

Copyright 2026 NPR

The Palisadian-Post, the community paper that’s been covering the Pacific Palisades for nearly 100 years, printed its final issue on Christmas Day.

After January’s fires, subscriptions basically fell to zero, as did advertisers, according to a memo announcing the paper's closure from owner Alan Smolinisky.

But its end brings with it nearly a century of memories.

The Post remembered

The seaside community of Pacific Palisades was founded by members of the Methodist church in 1922. Six years later, the first issue of what would become the Pali-Post was published to document town life.

“ A little 12-point, 12-page tabloid, they called the Palisadian” said Bill Bruns, a former editor of the Palisadian-Post from 1993 to 2013, and member of the Pacific Palisades Historical Society. Before he was editor, Bruns was a loyal reader of the paper.

In 1934, the paper was purchased by Clifford Clearwater, one of the first settlers of the Palisades. Bruns said Clearwater had been an ambulance driver in World War I, and was the Palisades's original postal carrier where he would deliver mail by horseback.

He wasn’t trained as a journalist, but his life experiences gave him the confidence to keep publishing the paper, serving as its photographer and editor until his death in 1956.

“He had a friend who had a little plane and he would take Cliff up and Cliff would shoot these great aerial pictures of the town growing, hanging out of this little plane,” Bruns said.

Over the years, Clearwater took about 3,000 aerial photos of the community as it developed and grew. All of those pictures survived the Palisades Fire and are stored at the Santa Monica Library for the public to see.

In 1950, a rival paper — the Pacific Palisades Post — came on the scene and by the end of the next decade, the two papers would merge to become the Pali-Post that most people think of today.

Bill Bruns (back right) poses for a picture with the rest of the "Palisadian-Post" staff in 2013.

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A 'heyday' for community news

The paper changed hands again in 1981 and a little over a decade later, Bruns began as editor.

With an average of about 30 pages to fill every week, he said what readers appreciated most was the focus on local news. Reporters went in person to cover stories and were often seen at local meetings, sports events and businesses.

“So they knew that they were getting firsthand coverage of what was happening in the town,” Bruns said.

Readers like Sue Kohl who lived in the Palisades for 32 years, respected the breadth of its coverage.

The Post covered school sports her children participated in. She said it featured plenty of advertisements from neighborhood businesses, including her own real estate agency. She especially liked the small town bulletin feel of the paper.

“They talked about local issues. They talked about local residents, whether they were famous or not famous,” Kohl said.

One of her favorite sections to read was the “Two Cents” column, stray thoughts and opinions from Palisadians. She also appreciated the in-depth obituaries.

Bruns said the obit section was always appreciated by the families since the paper didn’t charge for them.

“ Because we didn't charge, people would write nice obituaries because they weren't worried about the cost and they would give us a picture and we ran those,” Bruns said.

The old "Pacific-Palisades Post" newsroom from Bruns' time as editor. After 2013, it was converted into a real estate office by the new owner, which was subsequently lost to the fire.

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The paper was known for its responsiveness to the community. The staff took pitches from readers, Bruns said, and put the spotlight on Palisadians themselves.

There was a “golden couples” column for anybody married for 50 years or more; a “young Palisadians” column for enterprising youngsters and a “people on the move” column for the movers and shakers.

The paper also announced the first birth in the community each year.

“It was kind of a cool thing to be the first baby in the Palisades. They gave them prizes like baby gifts and things. Very local, community driven, small town emphasis,” Kohl said.

More than a paper

That small town emphasis remained a constant. Gabriella Bock was a reporter at the Pali-Post from 2016 to 2018. She said it her first real newsroom experience.

Gabriella Bock's old desk at the Pali-Post office on Alma Real.

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“ We were a small, tight-knit news team of myself, a sports reporter and one other staff reporter,” Bock said. “So I was able to be taken under their wing and learn a lot in a short period of time.”

Gabirella Bock's former media pass from 2017.

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But the paper was more than just a place to work. When Bock got married, her fellow reporters wrote a marriage announcement in the paper. When she was pregnant, they threw her a baby shower.

When she heard about the paper closing its doors, she said it was heartbreaking. To Bock it’s not about being nostalgic or sentimental about a former workplace. She sees the giant hole the disappearance of another local newsroom can leave people with.

“It's how people learn what's happening on their block, in their schools, in their city, and when that disappears, people oftentimes will lose a reason to stay engaged at all,” said Bock.

Gabriella Bock works the line at the Gracias Senor food truck for a Pali-Post story. The food truck often parked outside of the Ralph's grocery store on Alma Real.

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Bruns echoes Bock’s sentiment. He saw the paper as a unifier of the community in his two-decade tenure.

“It just made people feel more like they really liked their town, and the Palisades Post was a crucial element in that whole spirit of community,” Bruns said.

After Bill Bruns (left) retired in 2013 he received a commendation from former LA City Councilman Mike Bonin (right) for his years of service in local journalism.

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Kohl, whose home is more than halfway rebuilt, hopes that the spirit will return one day.

Last time she drove through her old neighborhood of The Alphabet Streets she saw several homes in the process of coming back up.

“I have faith that we will all come back, and I hope that the newspaper finds that as well,” said Kohl.

Sue Kohl and her dog Maisie stand in the construction site of her home being rebuilt in the Pacific Palisades.

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President Donald Trump launched a military strike against Venezuela overnight, resulting in the capture of Nicolás Maduro and his wife.

In a news conference this morning, Trump said the U.S. is going to "run" that country, until a proper transition is in place.

California lawmakers are reacting to the attacks.

"Nicolás Maduro was a thug and an illegitimate leader of Venezuela, terrorizing and oppressing its people for far too long and forcing many to leave the country. But starting a war to remove Maduro doesn’t just continue Donald Trump’s trampling of the Constitution, it further erodes America’s standing on the world stage and risks our adversaries mirroring this brazen illegal escalation," says Sen. Adam Schiff, a democrat.

Republican Congressman Darrell Issa, who represents areas including Murrieta and the Temecula Valley, says President Trump, "has taken strong action to protect America’s homeland from neighboring threats of narcoterrorism and the scourge of deadly narcotics. The Trump administration has my full support."

Democratic Sen. Alex Padilla says, "Let’s be absolutely clear: Trump’s military action in Venezuela is unlawful without approval from Congress."

California Governor Gavin Newsom did not directly response to the attacks. He zeroed in on a comment Trump made about the L.A. fires during the news conference.

"Unless Trump is finally delivering the federal aid survivors need to rebuild after the horrific fires — nearly a year after California first requested it — he should keep Los Angeles out of his mouth," Newsom's office says on social.