In 1994  President Bill Clinton merged the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite and a Defense Department meteorological system after concluding they used similar instruments Known as the National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System  or NPOESS  the joint program to monitor the global climate and earth and space weather was supposed to launch before the existing satellites died to maintain continuity of data  eliminate redundancy and save taxpayer money