Dusting Off An Old Satellite

The president's 2014 budget request includes a plan to dust off an old satellite. It calls for $35 million to refurbish a bird once championed by Vice President Al Gore. The Bush administration shelved the project in 2001. The satellite has sat in a NASA storage locker ever since. If Congress approves, it would be launched by the Air Force. It would park in a spot of equal gravity between the Earth and the sun, and send warnings of sunspots. It was originally designed to detect climate change, a pet concern of Gore's. Under the new plan, the satellite would be operated by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.