BAMOS
Sep 2019
which essentially all weather and climate services in every
country depend. I also believe that the uniquely public
good character of most public forecasting, warning and
information services makes the cooperative provision of
the underpinning global meteorological infrastructure a
fundamental responsibility of national governments and
free and unrestricted international exchange of data and
products a continuing global imperative for meteorology
in the 21st century.”
The WMO Commission for Basic Systems, CBS, led a review on
emerging data issues and recognises that data is the lifeblood
for the national meteorological services of the world. Also, that
data is a means to an end, not an end in itself. Its true value lies
in how effectively it is used to meet societal needs, be it over the
short term to support response to severe weather events, over
the medium term to facilitate planning and preparedness for
weather hazard resilience, or over the longer term for historical
climate insight and assessment of impacts. CBS has identified
two challenges that it is exploring on behalf of the wider WMO
membership. In particular:
• the challenges of managing and capitalising on the increasing
diversity, volume and velocity of data; and
• public‑private engagement and partnership, regarding data
but also as it more broadly affects the WMO and, in particular,
the future role of public sector meteorological and hydrological
services.
4. Global Weather Enterprise (GWE) Forum
The WMO, the Association of Hydro‑Meteorological Equipment
Industry (HMEI) and the Global Facility for Disaster Reduction
and Recovery (GFDRR) of the World Bank Group created the
GWE Forum to facilitate dialogue among the public, private and
academic sectors. The Forum is an independent, consultative
platform to assist the sectors in considering the necessary
coordinated actions to address the growth of the GWE, and to
make recommendations for consideration by relevant bodies,
including the WMO and development partners. A report on
the future of GWE is published in the Bulletin of the American
Meteorological Society.
5. Australia—meteorology, oceanography and broader
environmental data developments
Integrating many observation types (including from radars,
satellite data, NWP output and third‑party networks) into
nowcasting and forecasts for the very near‑term opens up
opportunities for improvements through near‑fully automating
the forecasts. This heightens the need for better data
assimilation/QC (or machine‑learning) systems. Increased use of
sensors in many devices and the Internet of Things creates new
opportunities for weather and climate but challenges and risks
too. The benefits for emergency services, energy services etc. are
significant and growing. Risks include poor decisions that arise
from accepting poor data if forecasts are fully automated. Good
risk management will require good metadata, data provenance
and well‑documented assimilation and QC systems.
It is worth noting that since the millennium drought, that led
to the Water Act 2007 legislation, there has been a significant
drive for more national data collection and usage, particularly
of course for water‑related data.
The Good Practice Guidelines for Water Data Management Policy
contains strong argument for open data policies:
" International experience shows that the more “open” that
data is, the more economic and social benefit is created.
... Numerous studies have identified the multiple benefits
of adopting an open data approach to government data in
general. Analyses published by Lateral Economics (2014)
and the European Union (EU) assert that the potential
economic value that could be unlocked by adopting open
data policies across all activity areas of government is
massive."
For broader environmental monitoring: the observational,
data management and monitoring lessons from weather,
climate and hydrology should be relevant as concerns are
heightened around land and water management, ocean and
marine systems and biodiversity. Where data is available, we're
seeing disturbing trends in biodiversity loss, land and marine
degradation. But recent national State of the Environment
reports have highlighted data gaps for terrestrial and marine
systems.
6. The AMOS Position Statement on International
Cooperation and Data Sharing in Meteorology and
Oceanography
The AMOS Council and full AMOS membership have recently
approved a new AMOS Position Statement to cover this topic.
The statement is intended to help provide a framework for a
national dialogue on data issues to help progress our sciences
and services and strengthen the international cooperation on
which they depend. In the statement, AMOS notes that:
Australia has benefited greatly from more than a century
of international cooperation and data exchange in
meteorology. Recent scientific progress in meteorology
and oceanography and the big‑data revolution offer
exciting new opportunities for better meeting national
needs for societally valuable weather, climate and ocean
information. Realisation of those opportunities will
require new and stronger commitment to atmospheric
and oceanic science as a global public good and
increased collaboration between the public, private and
academic sectors in data collection to support national
and international research, applications and services.
Innovative new approaches to data sharing and analysis
will be needed to ensure that maximum community
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