First published on the Steem blockchain by @remlaps on August 31, 2025. View the original post.
TL;DR: An outline for a Steem-based DeSci project proposes a decentralized global climate dataset using blockchain to improve data reliability, community involvement, and reduce politicization.
Pixabay license from naturepost |
Introduction
Yesterday, I was in a Home Depot store, and I happened to walk past an aisle that was displaying a bunch of different home weather stations. This reminded me of a possible Steem dapp for DeSci that I've been imagining for a while. Namely, a decentralized global climate dataset.
As a science and numbers geek, I have loosely followed the field of climate science for a couple of decades. This is not (by any means) to say that I'm anything close to an expert on the topic, but just that I do have some familiarity with the subject. To me, one of the weak points for the field has always been the temperature measurement. It suffers (IMO) from multiple threats to its reliability:
- Urban expansion leads to localized temperature increases that are not "climate" related.
- It depends on measurements by volunteers, which limits the amount and quality of available data.
- Outside of the US and Western Europe, many regions of the world don't have temperature measurements at all, so those temperatures are estimated by combining data from other areas.
- The conditions around thermometers can change in other ways: Trees can grow up and start shading the area or blocking wind, nearby forest can be cleared, which changes the prevailing wind flow, etc.
- Other biases exist (such as Time of Observation).
- The whole field depends on government funding, which frequently leads to politicization.
Scientists argue that data adjustments can correct for these challenges, and they disagree on how much they matter (if at all), but I don't think anyone disagrees that they exist.
I'm not here to join one side or the other in the political debate on the subject of "global warming" (i.e. climate change). Instead, I'm wondering if we can improve the reach and quality of future climate data collection.
It seems to me that the Steem blockchain has the potential to improve the reach and quality of the data, so I want to start thinking about how this might be done.
