ARCTIC — The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is withdrawing its support for the coordination of the 2026 Arctic Report Card. The agency informed some of the report’s scientists on Monday afternoon and gave no reason for the immediate suspension of all agency support.

The Global Ocean Monitoring and Observing Arctic Research Program will continue to support observations, models and products that contribute to national security, weather prediction, safety of navigation, and the economic vitality of coastal communities.

"We are scrambling to pull the pieces together. I am optimistic that we can find a path forward for 2027 and beyond. Given the late date, whether we can pull it together for 2026 is an open question, but we’re trying to make it happen," Thoman said.

"The US is an Arctic nation. It’s not just a distant place. It’s also our national place. So many of the changes there have impacts that reach down into our mid-latitudes, even further south," Twila Moon, a scientist at the National Snow and Ice Data Center, said.

"Even if we’re able to move the Arctic Report Card forward in a way that brings information to people, there’s still a real loss in this not being a US federal effort. That’s a real stepping back of US leadership in the science arena, in the environmental intelligence arena, and that kind of has a whole other flavor of harm as well, Moon added. Rick Spinrad, former NOAA administrator, called the decision to withdraw support for the Arctic Report Card really unconscionable." "It provides the baseline of what’s happening in the Arctic. Then in terms of value for future planning, you can imagine anybody who’s dependent on Alaskan infrastructure – for example, like the oil pipeline, or the fishing community, or local communities that are worried about changes in weather conditions that are going to affect frost heaves on their roads. Now we will not have that tool, and it will be up to them to try to ferret out where the data are, and then to find somebody who can do the analysis to tell them what the trends have been and what they can expect in the future. It’s not clear to me why the administration made this decision. I can only infer that it’s tied to their aversion to anything associated with having a better understanding of climate change," Spinrad said.

Why It Matters

The action fits a pattern of reduced federal climate reporting. The Trump administration dismissed all the authors working on the Congressionally mandated National Climate Assessment. The administration halted updates to climate.gov and dismantled a key climate research center in Colorado.

The administration attempted to scrap a $368 million deep-sea observation system and removed key climate change reports from government websites. The administration ended NOAA data deliveries to the National Snow and Ice Data Center, which reduced services that track sea ice, snow and glacier conditions. NOAA no longer produces an annual report on billion-dollar disasters or updates that database. The National Academy of Sciences removed a chapter on climate science from a manual for judges after President Donald Trump criticized it on Truth Social as fraudulent, biased and misleading. A National Academy of Sciences review of climate attribution science found the science robust for linking individual extreme weather events to climate change, a finding pivotal to cases against oil and gas companies in US courts.

Timeline

On March 12, 2024, NOAA received a Notice of Receipt and Request for Public Comment on Petition for Rulemaking Regarding Maintaining Records and Submitting Reports on Weather Modification Activities. On December 1, 2025, the 2025 Arctic Report Card found that surface temperatures across the Arctic from October 2024 through September 2025 were the warmest recorded since 1900. On the same date, the report found that in March 2025, Arctic winter sea ice reached the lowest annual maximum extent in the 47-year satellite record.

The report noted that ongoing glacier loss contributes to steadily rising global sea levels, threatening Arctic communities’ water supplies, driving destructive floods, and increasing landslide and tsunami hazards. It also found that in more than 200 Arctic Alaska watersheds, iron and other elements released by thawing permafrost have turned rivers and streams orange in the last 10 years.

What's New

NOAA informed some of the report’s scientists on Monday afternoon and gave no reason for the immediate suspension of all agency support. The Trump administration ended NOAA data deliveries to the National Snow and Ice Data Center. The Arctic Report Card is typically released in mid-December.

The University of Alaska Fairbanks is a major contributor to the Arctic Report Card. Rick Thoman is a scientist with the University of Alaska Fairbanks’ Alaska Center for Climate Assessment and Preparedness and one of the three main editors of the Arctic Report Card. The Trump administration dismissed all the authors working on the Congressionally mandated National Climate Assessment. NOAA no longer produces an annual report on billion-dollar disasters or updates that database.