NASA, Northern Michigan Team Up To Measure Earth's Radiation

MARQUETTE, Mich. (AP) - NASA has teamed up with a Michigan university and installed equipment on a Lake Superior island to measure Earth's radiation.

Northern Michigan University says NASA's Clouds and the Earth Radiant Energy System experiment launched last month on Granite Island. That's a dozen miles northwest of Marquette, where the school is based.

The university says NASA picked the island after closing a Chesapeake Bay site in the Mid-Atlantic because of safety issues. It also was attracted to existing weather-monitoring equipment.

Officials say NASA has been measuring radiation by satellite for three decades and ground monitoring can help validate data. The experiment seeks to reveal more about the role of clouds and the energy cycle in climate change.

Northern Michigan says work with NASA could expand if the island proves effective.