Empowering Climate Resilience in La Margarita, Salinas, Puerto Rico: Lessons Learned From the Co‐Production of NASA Earth Observation Data Applications for Environmental Justice

Abstract

Confronted by daunting environmental risks and disasters, communities in the Caribbean–particularly those in economically disenfranchised areas–face disproportionate consequences from climate change, such as hazardous air and water quality. Chronic conditions of poverty and marginalization constrain their capacity to mitigate these environmental exposures. Many tools have been developed to provide communities with scientific data for mitigating these conditions, but often these tools are only accessible to individuals with technical expertise. Via community engagement techniques, this study explored how the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA) Earth Observation (EO) resources could be leveraged by La Margarita, a community in Salinas, Puerto Rico for addressing environmental justice (EJ) concerns. Three phases of this study–community interviews, an in‐person collaborative session, and community reactions to the summary results –led to the successful identification of La Margarita's top EJ concerns, a curated list of relevant NASA EO resources, and scenarios of how these resources could be applied to support EJ efforts. Collectively, these efforts highlight the critical importance of integrating community insights into scientific processes, thereby ensuring that the benefits of technological advancements are equitably distributed and address their most pressing needs. Additionally, the intentional team design, emphasizing relationship and trust dynamics between the research team (Global Resilience Institute at Northeastern University and Puerto Rico Science, Technology & Research Trust), NASA staff, and La Margarita residents, employed in this study offer key lessons for developing scientific resources for use by non‐scientific end users.