Research & Developments is a blog for brief updates that provide context for the flurry of news regarding law and policy changes that impact science and scientists today.
The Trump administration is pulling funding from NOAA’s Arctic Report Card, an annual, peer-reviewed report about the state of the region, which is warming more quickly than anywhere else on Earth.
According to Politico, which broke the story, the report’s authors learned of the news in a Monday afternoon meeting. The lack of federal support could mean that the report will not be made available to the public.
“The loss of the Arctic Report Card would be significant not only for the scientific community, but also for decision-makers and the public,” Zack Labe, a climate scientist who has been an author of the report since 2020, told Eos via email. “Written for a broad audience and developed by more than 100 scientists from around the world, the report is an important resource for consistently documenting changes in one of the fastest warming regions on our planet. Discontinuing it would create a significant gap in our ability to track and connect these changes from year to year, with implications for people and communities around the world.”
Last year marked the 20th year of the Arctic Report Card, which is typically announced at AGU’s annual meeting in December. The report often highlights harsh realities about how climate change is affecting the Arctic.
In 2025, for example, the region’s maximum sea ice extent was the lowest observed in the 47-year satellite record. In 2024, the report’s authors described a “new regime” in which the climate is changing much more drastically and quickly than it was in the 20th century. And in 2023, summer temperatures were the warmest ever and snow cover for the North American Arctic hit an all-time low.
Scientists and members of the public decried the news on social media.
The move is the latest in a series of funding cuts and layoffs faced by the scientific community under the Trump administration. In recent months, the federal government has also attempted to dismantle the National Center for Atmospheric Research, terminated the entire National Science Board, and proposed sweeping changes to the federal grantmaking process.
—Emily Gardner (@emfurd.bsky.social), Deputy Editor
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