What is "clarreo"

The CLARREO (Climate Absolute Radiance and Refractivity Observatory) was selected as a high priority NASA Decadal Survey mission by the National Research Council in 2007. The CLARREO mission is intended to provide a metrology laboratory in orbit to accurately quantify and attribute Earth's climate change (see List of climate research satellites). If launched at the earliest opportunity, CLARREO's observations could be used to detect the largest of climate trends above natural variability by the year 2039. Then it may go on to further test, validate, and improve prediction by climate models. The mission also might provide the first orbiting radiometers with accuracy sufficient enough to serve as reference calibration standards that can fine-tune other spaceborne sensors and climate research- making climate trends apparent in their data sets within a 30-year time frame.

When the mission was scaled back in 2012 due to cuts in funding, the CLARREO science team turned their focus to instrument studies that would further enhance the mission’s key climate measurements and develop the new concepts to meet the specified accuracy standards.

In the President's FY16 budget request, CLARREO was provided $76.9M to demonstrate essential measurement technologies of the CLARREO Tier 1 Decadal Survey mission. That funding will potentially support the flight of two instruments, Reflected Solar (RS) and Infrared (IR) spectrometers, hosted on the International Space Station in FY 2019.