Joe Bastardi: Some ideas about NOAA – Agency needs reform & to move away from its ‘shady’ past

By Joe Bastardi

I do not want to run NOAA. I believe I know who should run it. I do not want to be the Noaa Communications Director. But I have an idea of who I should be. What I do want to advise in Elon Musk-type fashion strictly voluntarily on what I am observing and would try to get improved so that the world’s greatest meteorological organization, which they are, becomes even better.

Just because they are does not mean they are near where they could be. Think of the FBI and the reason they are off-kilter. It’s the same kind of thing.

Let’s look at maxing out in sports: To run at maximum efficiency, you must have the most applicable amount of muscle relative to whatever sport you are in and the least resistance to using it efficiently—same thing with a government agency. You can’t be bloated and run efficiently. However, one thing to consider is this. Maybe its just the wrong calories you are putting into you. (wrong agendas) Suppose you only need to cut targeted calories but force a change in how those calories are used. This may be the case here. A crash diet will mean you lose your muscle, and you are simply a smaller, weaker version of what you were. That is not what I am advocating here. I am advocating for finding what works and making it even stronger. And there are a lot of things that are working great, but as you know, bloat slows you down.

For starters, early retirement offers should be extended. If you don’t want to play for a lean machine focused on winning wars with the weather for the good of the country (each forecast is a battle), then there is no use staying. It can’t just be a job. The second idea is a hiring freeze so that the talent available can be utilized in a focused manner. I suspect the people committed to pushing Noaa to a higher level will remain.

Ideally, when it comes to the magnitude of the weather and how important it is for NOAA to excel, you want people who love what they do so much that if they hit the lottery tomorrow, they would not retire. In fact, working in the weather is hitting the lottery

Over the years, I’ve noticed that many people hammer Noaa, including myself. That’s because when I was being brought up in the private sector they did a lot of shady things. One was trying to put the government weather service union into AccuWeather. They did so with the idea that the average government meteorologist was being paid 40 to 50% more than the average AccuWeather meteorologist, creating a lot of turmoil within the company. And for a good reason since they were feeding off the public trough, and we had to fight for every penny we got. So, in complete transparency, that bitterness carried down through the years until I managed to objectively start looking at all the great things that Noaa does. Consequently, I believe there is no one better suited to advise on how to make sure that this agency runs at maximum efficiency. There is so much talent in the agency that it’s not a matter of cutting drastically across the board as much as focusing.

The first thing they have to quit focusing on is shoving climate agendas that are the directives of the top people in charge down the throat of the American people. Obviously, if there’s so much money being granted to study climate change, which is crazy, if it is settled science as they claim it is, why do you keep doing research?  What are you going to settle it more?  If you really believed that, it would be akin to researching if water freezes at 32.  That is settled science. So, right off the bat, it has to change. This is where some big cuts can be made. That doesn’t mean we throw out all research. In fact, when it comes to weather, that is necessary.  It does mean they quit trying to shove an agenda-driven idea down the throat of the American public, which has cost us dearly by weaponizing weather in this phony climate war.

As far as the other various parts of NOAA, especially the warning agencies, they are vital. They are not vital because the climate is getting worse. They are vital because the weather has always gotten bad and always will, and with more people and infrastructure, warnings and the ability to get out in front and have the kind of public presence to annunciate the problems well in advance are essential. For instance, a Director of communications in Noaa may now have the task of calling press conferences with the president to emphasize the threat of long-term weather events.

Imagine if on September 8, when Weatherbell publicly and loudly proclaimed that the southeast was going to get hit the last week of September and the first week of October, you had authoritative people getting out in front and saying that we’ve got a watch out for that. Obviously, I can use example after example on this matter. In addition, it will take the mystery out of the weather so that people don’t think, “Oh my goodness,” this is the worst thing that has ever happened, and we’re all on the verge of an atmospheric apocalypse.

I would advise talking directly to all the warning centers and in addition, there’s no way I would cut funding for research and development in the major warning centers like the hurricane center, severe weather, fire, etc. In fact, I have ideas on what the hurricane center can do better to annunciate what they need to do. My role should not ever be in disagreeing with them, it should be simply adding to what they are saying. But as I’ve advocated before, they have a lot to do with things like the Saffir Simpson Scale and re-analysis of past storms, so we have a concrete idea of where we are today compared to yesterday. That idea is twofold. If you show people what happened before, they will understand.

The other thing is it will shut down the climate hysteria. That has got to go. And instead of having these NOAA publications come out with all the hysteria about the global temperature which is a very poor metric for climate as wet bulb temperatures and saturation mixing ratios are better, we go at the weather and teach people the linkage. And we do it beforehand rather than becoming a bunch of punching bags after it has happened.

I’m saying I would love to work with the new administration, and I want to make sure people understand that you cannot go and gut the greatest overall weather organization on the planet. (ECMWF is great, but they are not under the kind of pressure Noaa is to produce. IOW. NOAA, in football terms, has a tougher schedule) You focus. To the Noaa rank and file, believe me, I know how good you are. I read discussions, and we have talent. It’s sort of like the FBI. But change has got to occur not because you’re not good at what you do, but because you can be better if the focus is on weather weather weather. Climate should simply be something that helps the focus on the weather, not portrayed as something that will lead to doom.

Since life has never been better on the planet, adaptation to adversity and then making it lead to your advantage, no matter what the cause, is a large part of the solution to saving lives and protecting people. Part of adaptation is a skill in getting longer-term ideas out ( We just issued our hurricane forecast, for instance, to clients and now the public; you can see it here: https://www.cfact.org/2025/02/11/the-2025-hurricane-season/.)And I have ideas on how to do that I have ideas on who the director should be, I think he should be young, dynamic, innovative, and in love with the weather. The communications Director should be also. Maybe I’m just the old guy who will make suggestions and hopefully work with some of the great people in that organization. If you used the Noaa sites as much as I do, you would see things the way I do.

50 years in the business, and in the part where the rules are right enough or get fired, you can add some of the knowledge and hope it helps your country.

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Joe Bastardi is a pioneer in extreme weather and long-range forecasting. He is the author of “The Climate Chronicles: Inconvenient Revelations You Won’t Hear From Al Gore — and Others,” which you can purchase at the CFACT bookstore. His new book, The Weaponization of Weather in the Phony Climate War, can be found here: www.phonyclimatewar.com