A political vendetta against alleged "climate alarmism" in Washington is poised to blind humanity to dangers arriving from the sun, with shockwaves likely to be felt as far away as Nairobi. The White House has initiated moves to dismantle the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), a decision that scientists warn will cripple our ability to predict solar storms that threaten the global power grid and telecommunications infrastructure.

At the center of the controversy is a directive from Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought. In a December 16 statement on X, Vought characterized the Colorado-based facility as “one of the largest sources of climate alarmism in the country,” signaling an intent to strip its funding. However, the facility’s remit extends far beyond Earth's climate; it is the nerve center for heliophysics—the study of how the sun affects the solar system.

The Solar Threat to Connectivity

While the political rhetoric focuses on terrestrial climate change, the dismantling of NCAR jeopardizes critical NASA missions designed to monitor space weather. This is not an abstract concern for Kenya. Modern economies rely heavily on satellite technology for everything from GPS navigation to the timing signals that synchronize banking transactions.

NCAR scientists are currently leading two pivotal NASA missions:

• The Chromospheric Magnetism Explorer (CMEx): Led by scientist Holly Gilbert, this mission aims to decode the magnetic sources of solar wind.
• The Solar Transition Region Ultraviolet Explorer (STRUVE): Scheduled for a 2029 launch, this project tracks where energy builds up before massive solar eruptions.

Without the data these missions provide, the world becomes vulnerable to coronal mass ejections—massive bursts of solar wind that can fry satellite electronics. For a Kenyan relying on M-PESA for daily trade or a logistics firm tracking cargo from Mombasa, a satellite blackout caused by an unpredicted solar storm would be catastrophic.

Blinding the Watchdogs

The scientific community has reacted with alarm, noting that space weather prediction is a matter of national and global security. Asal Naseri, acting associate flight director for heliophysics at NASA, emphasized the protective nature of these missions.

“These mission concepts... will improve our ability to predict solar events that could harm satellites that we rely on every day and mitigate danger to astronauts,” Naseri noted in a statement regarding the NCAR-led projects.

The proposed shutdown represents the latest escalation in the Trump administration’s broader campaign to scrub climate data from federal websites and reduce research funding. However, by conflating atmospheric climate science with heliophysics, the administration risks dismantling the very eyes and ears that protect Earth’s technological shell.

If the dismantling proceeds, the cost will not just be measured in lost scientific data, but potentially in billions of dollars (hundreds of billions of Kenya Shillings) in damaged infrastructure during the next major solar event. As the sun approaches the peak of its activity cycle, the timing of blinding our primary watchdogs could not be more precarious.