Report Highlights Community Pushback Stalling $64 Billion in Data Center Development Nationwide
On Tuesday, a small crowd gathered outside Tom's Restaurant in New York City. The cozy, neon-lit diner appeared regularly on the sitcom "Seinfeld," but this group wasn't there for a photo op or to recreate one of George and Jerry's many arguments over a cup of coffee.
They were saying goodbye to the building above it.
Since 1966, this Upper West Side location has been the home of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, a laboratory dedicated to unraveling the complex dynamics of natural and man-made changes on our planet and beyond. The Columbia University-owned building, known as Armstrong Hall, has hosted scientists who have made a number of groundbreaking discoveries. Among them: Jim Hansen, who was one of the first to warn the public about the climate risks of greenhouse gas emissions.
However, on April 24, NASA informed scientists working at the institute that the agency's tenure at the location was about to end.
The move came shortly after President Donald Trump signed an executive order calling for agencies to re-evaluate their leased office space. Federal climate and Earth scientists are facing widespread budget and staffing cuts in the Trump administration's push to dismantle vast swaths of the government.
Experts say this downsizing will come at the expense of science that is crucial to American lives and livelihoods.
Even beyond job and funding rollbacks, it's a tough time to be a climate scientist. A growing number of researchers are speaking out about the mental toll of studying and witnessing increasingly devastating impacts of global warming firsthand. Many are calling for better support, while others are leaving the country -- or the field altogether.
An Unwanted Farewell: From the outside, the unassuming brick building at Broadway and West 112th Street looks like any other office space or apartment complex on the block. But within, the six floors that make up Goddard Institute for Space Studies offered a proving ground for scientific discovery over the past six decades.
Federal researchers have worked alongside Columbia scientists and other groups on a variety of cross-disciplinary projects, from better understanding how the ocean and atmosphere exchange carbon dioxide to running simulations on the potential for humans to survive on Mars. In the 1970s, Hansen developed a climate model on an IBM computer that took up the entire second floor to shed light on human-driven global warming, the findings of which he eventually brought before Congress to testify on the importance of reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
"We were put here for the purpose of having a free exchange of information and ideas between the academic community at Columbia and federal research scientists at NASA," a NASA scientist told me under the condition of anonymity for fear of retribution. "When you are face-to-face with people, sometimes this collective mind is able to make leaps that are ... difficult to make in isolation."
But the clock is ticking on this space. Despite still having the lease until 2031, as The New York Times reports, NASA informed staff working at the Goddard Institute for Space Studies that they would temporarily work remotely as the agency ends its operations in the building. Many employees have not yet been told where they will work, leaving the future of their research and jobs uncertain.
"You're taking the pace of science from being very dynamic and quick and cutting edge and intentionally disrupting it," the same NASA scientist told me.
At Tuesday's outreach event, scientists from the agency and Columbia University lined the street outside Tom's with posters of their work and passed out free stickers and books on climate science to passersby. They were enthusiastic about their research, but there was an undeniable sense of somber nostalgia as people reminisced about caffeine runs to fuel brainstorms or popping by a colleague's desk to work out a problem.
Though NASA has other centers operating around the country, the Goddard Institute for Space Studies has the only large facility in NYC. The Trump administration recently proposed a budget that seeks to cut 24 percent of the agency's funding, putting a range of locations and the programs within at risk, experts say.
Many Goddard Institute for Space Studies employees are operating in a holding pattern as they work remotely and wait for instructions from higher ups.
NASA told me the agency is canceling the lease, effective May 31, as part of "the administration's government-wide review of leases to increase efficiency."
"Over the next several months, employees will be placed on temporary remote work agreements while NASA seeks and evaluates options for a new space for the GISS team," NASA press secretary Bethany Stevens said in a statement to Inside Climate News. "Additionally, this decision is specific to the lease; the GISS mission continues. NASA's GISS has a significant place in the history of space science and its work is critical for the Earth Science Division, particularly as the division looks to the future of its modeling work and capabilities."
NASA did not answer my questions about whether the federal government will have to continue paying the lease despite the cancellation, and where they will host employees after the period of remote work is over.
An Emotional Toll: Budget and staffing cuts have disrupted science for researchers across nearly all agencies, adding a layer of stress to those working in the field within the U.S.
More broadly, working in climate science comes with its own set of mental burdens, research shows. In recent years, climate scientists have reported higher levels of anxiety, distress and hopelessness as they analyze the ways global warming is altering life on Earth. But some are hesitant to share their experience for fear that they may seem biased or unprofessional, according to a 2024 commentary in the journal Nature Climate Change, authored by a group of researchers.
"Many scientists are understandably hesitant to express what they really feel, at the risk of being accused of either being alarmist or simply being too unscientific -- in other words, emotional," the commentary's authors wrote. "In reality, however, individual scientists -- including the authors here -- often cycle through feelings of both despair and hope, and/or work to actively cultivate optimism (despite despair) to ensure contributions to addressing the problem."
In a recent response to that piece, researchers based in Germany zeroed in on the emotional impact of climate fieldwork specifically. The authors pointed out the "deeply embodied experience" of fieldwork, which requires people to immerse themselves in places being impacted by climate change -- from smelling the acrid smoke of wildfires to hearing "the silence in a once-vibrant ecosystem."
I asked lead author Anna Lena Bercht to tell me about a particular climate impact that stuck with her during field work. She primarily studies small-scale coastal fisheries in the Arctic, where Northeast Arctic cod fish stocks are shifting migration patterns as water temperatures warm and unpredictable weather hinders traditional fish-preparation practices.
"I saw the eggs that flies had laid in the fish hanging outside on wooden racks to dry. When the weather gets too warm, the flies come," she said over email. "A stockfish producer showed me the fish. He could no longer sell it -- or others like it -- because of the loss in quality. I could see the worry and despair in his eyes. His fear for his livelihood, culture and identity."
Bercht believes emotions like compassion and curiosity, as well as anxiety and concern, can strengthen science and build trust with communities. But she emphasized the importance of institutional support to help researchers manage the emotional challenges of fieldwork.
Scientists studying climate change from a lab or those who use models to understand warming's impact on Earth systems have also reported feelings of anxiety, which has influenced their personal life decisions such as whether to have children, The Guardian reports.
As a way to cope, some researchers have formed climate science support groups, while others have turned to comedy. Amid ongoing assaults on climate science in the U.S., many researchers have organized protests to defend scientific integrity and fight to retain funding, as my colleagues reported in March.
"I'm here basically to support the idea that science is really important, and it's important for everybody," physicist Rob Semper, chief science officer at the Exploratorium, the storied San Francisco science museum, told my colleagues. "It's not just doing the research, it's the results of the research, and it's also thinking about how to help the world with new knowledge, new information."
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration says the upcoming Atlantic hurricane season is forecast to be "above normal," with 13 to 19 possible named storms this year between June 1 to Nov. 30. Of those, six to 10 are forecast to become hurricanes with winds of 74 miles per hour or higher, with the possibility of three to five major hurricanes with winds of 111 mph or higher. (My colleague Amy Green reports on that as well as the major cuts that could impact the federal government's ability to help respond.)
"As we witnessed last year with significant inland flooding from hurricanes Helene and Debby, the impacts of hurricanes can reach far beyond coastal communities," acting NOAA Administrator Laura Grimm said in a statement. "NOAA is critical for the delivery of early and accurate forecasts and warnings, and provides the scientific expertise needed to save lives and property."
Meanwhile, national parks are expected to experience a summer surge this weekend, but public lands advocates are concerned that staffing cuts will leave park employees overwhelmed, Trevor Hughes reports for USA Today. Memorial Day weekend is typically one of the busiest holidays for national parks across the country, and Interior Secretary Doug Burgum recently issued an order to ensure that parks stay open despite staffing constraints.
But as Jonathan Jarvis, the past head of the Park Service under former President Barack Obama, recently told me, pulling staff from other parts of park operations to fill in gaps that support visitor experience "means that the stuff the visitor doesn't see, the natural resources, the cultural work, the archeology, the historic preservation, anything that isn't front and center of the visitor, is going to be set aside."
My colleague Wyatt Myskow reached out to the nonprofit Trust for Public Land to ask about park readiness ahead of the weekend.
"More Americans than ever are heading outside -- and just as demand is surging, key federal agencies like the National Park Service face staffing reductions and hiring freezes," Trust for Public Land CEO Carrie Besnette Hauser said over email. "These reductions threaten the ability to care for the very places we love."
New research suggests that humpback whales struggle to see one of the biggest threats to their lives: fishing nets. Despite having grapefruit-sized eyeballs, humpback whales have shockingly low-resolution vision, Elizabeth Anne Brown reports for The New York Times. The scientists say this is due to the anatomy of their eyes, a large part of which is sclera -- the tissue that isn't involved in vision -- and have a low density of cells that help capture images and convert them into signals that the brain can understand.
This means it is difficult for the whales to see distant and thin items such as fishing nets or even boats before it is too late. These threats are also driving North Atlantic right whales toward extinction, as I've reported in the past.