As Hurricane Helene batters the Southeast, leaving at least six dead and millions without power, it leaves no doubt we are in the middle of an especially dangerous hurricane season. So why won’t the government’s weather forecaster release its most accurate predictions?
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration says it can't disclose potentially lifesaving data because of stipulations in a 2020 agreement it signed with a private vendor, whose proprietary prediction analysis technique is incorporated into the NOAA-developed forecast model.
This secrecy wrongly places commercial interests above public safety.
NOAA’s misguided approach became clear this week, thanks to The Washington Post’s reporting on its Freedom of Information Act request to NOAA about why the agency is endangering families planning for deadly hurricanes. In response, NOAA released the terms of the agreement with the vendor, RenaissanceRe Risk Sciences, which specifies that forecasts using its prediction analysis are “trade secrets and confidential information” that must be withheld from the public until 2025.
It’s hard to imagine that, with all the bargaining leverage the federal government holds, it could not have negotiated a way to release the model’s final predictions without revealing trade secrets. NOAA should publish the agreement with RenaissanceRe Risk Sciences so the public can see what information the agency bargained away, to the detriment of its safety.
The PR nightmare that RenaissanceRe Risk Sciences is likely (hopefully) enduring following the Post's reporting is a perfect opportunity for agency lawyers to right this wrong and renegotiate so that people don't die in hurricanes in the name of corporate secrecy.
Exemption 4, Supreme Court worsen the problem
The contract’s dangerous language mirrors FOIA’s Exemption 4, which allows agencies to withhold trade secrets and confidential business information that have been submitted to the government. This exemption has been abused to hide information on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (more commonly known as food stamps), federal contractor diversity data, and privately run federal prisons.
The Supreme Court made matters worse by further expanding the interpretation of “confidential business information” in a controversial 2019 ruling. Justice Department guidance now gives federal agencies permission to call almost anything they receive from private industry confidential, as long as the government does not explicitly say it will publish the information when it receives it.
Placing business interests over public disclosure cannot be the precedent for public-private industry partnerships, and certainly not for projects that have the ability to save lives. It also goes against the United States’ commitment to open data and making taxpayer-funded research available to the public.
Withholding information on hurricanes also makes the work of other federal agencies, like the Federal Emergency Management Agency, more difficult. If people are not given the most accurate information to escape a natural disaster, it increases the likelihood they will need to rely on FEMA assistance to replace what they could not evacuate.
Going forward, it should not preemptively agree to withhold vital information from the public. NOAA should immediately reverse course and make its best hurricane predictions available, citing the clear and immediate harm members of the public will face if they do not have access to the data.
