NOAA Climate Service

V. Ramaswamy and Chet KoblinskiWCRP JSC-31

Antalya TurkeyFebruary 16, 2010

Information Delivery and Decision SupportNOAA uses its national and regional infrastructure to deliver climate services today

Assessments of Climate Change and Impacts NOAA is a leader in national and regional climate impact assessments Over 70% of Federal IPCC AR4 WG1 authors were from NOAA

Climate Change Research and ModelingInternational award winning models of the global climate

Climate Observations and MonitoringNOAA operates over 90 observation and monitoring systemsNOAA is mandated to monitor and provide access to climate data and information

DRAFT – FOR INTERNAL DISCUSSION PURPOSES ONLY 3 12/03/2009

Security

Forestry

Water

Health

Infrastructure

Oceans

Other

Energy

LandManagement

Global

NOAA commits to providing critical assets in science and service to a Federal partnership

NOAA’s AssetsPartnerships & Collaboration

*Representative Organizations & Sectors

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Proposed NOAA Climate Service (NCS)

Questions• What is the role of climate and Earth system research and

observations towards understanding, predicting and providing the necessary information for climate adaptation, mitigation and risk management?

• What is/are the contributions of your programme/organization to the first question?

• What is/are the expectations from the WCRP in meeting your organization/programme objectives/contributions?

• What is/are potential contributions of your programme/organization to WCRP plans and activities?

1. What is the role of climate and Earth system research and observations towards understanding, predicting and providing the necessary information

for climate adaptation, mitigation and risk management?

NOAA’s climate mission is to understand climate variability and change to enhance society’s ability to plan and respond. Its objectives and capabilities are:

1) describe and understand the state of the climate system through integrated atmosphere, oceanic, and arctic observations and maintains consistent, long-term access to historical climate data;

2) understand, predict, and project climate variability and change from weeks to decades to a century to attribute casual forces to climate effects; and

3) improve the ability of society to plan for and respond to climate variability and change to evolving user needs by assessing climate impacts, supporting regional adaptation strategies, and developing new products appropriate to evolving user needs.

NOAA is using these capabilities to build comprehensive science-based climate services to inform the nation’s weather and climate sensitive industries, ecosystem services, national security, and future climate adaptation and mitigation choices.

2. What is/are the contributions of your programme/organization to the first question?

• Observations and Monitoring– Climate System Observations (Satellite and In Situ)

• Atmosphere (Physical and Chemical), Ocean, Arctic

– Data Management and Information

• Research and Modeling– Understanding Climate Processes– Earth System Modeling. Predictions and Projections– Analysis and Attribution

• Service Development– Assessing Climate Impacts and Adaptation– Climate Services Development and Delivery

Near-Term Enhancements• Observations

– Satellites• Solar irradiance, earth radiation budget, ozone profiling on

NPOESS– Climate Reference Network

• Add 29 stations in Alaska• Climate Change Modeling

– Reduce uncertainties in decadal variability, abrupt change, and Arctic processes

• High Performance Computing for Climate Modeling– New Installations at Oak Ridge and Fairmont, West Virginia

under construction with a goal of pflop capacity

Near-Term Enhancements

• Black Carbon– Instrument development to measure aerosol

concentrations, optical and chemical properties– Measure abundances, properties and effects– Quantify emissions from sources

• Ocean Acidification– Monitor OA at 20 deep ocean and coastal moorings– Develop protocols for OA lab experiments on effects

on marine organisms– Establish OA Program Office

Near-Term Enhancements

• Regional Services– Select 6 Federal Regional Directors to begin

development of federal based regional services

• Assessment Services– Build a permanent capability to produce climate

assessments at national and regional scales• National, Regional and sector assessments • Regional modeling and downscaling• Technical support unit

Near-Term Enhancements

• Sector focused Services– Coasts

• Coastal inundation hazards decision support

– Drought• Develop regional early warning systems for Colorado

River Basin, California and Southeast US.• Continue installation of soil moisture sensors around

US

Near-Term Enhancements

• Information Services– Prototype Climate Services Portal – Develop Climate Model Data Portal for centralized

archive and access to selected seasonal to century model based data sets, including re-analyses

• Data Services– Develop Climate Data Records to transform raw

satellite data into unified and coherent long-term environmental observations and products critical to climate modelers and decision makers.

3. What is/are the expectations from the WCRP in meeting your organization/programme objectives/contributions?

• Value of an international climate research enterprise vs National implementation– The major activity of WCRP should be to bring together international

scientists in sharing data and resources. Such activities are difficult for individual national organizations.

– WCRP should provide a venue for scientists of multiple disciplines and from different regions to cooperate to address issues at the intersection of sciences.

• There needs to be a progression towards addressing the challenges and concerns of society with respect to climate change based on scientific basis. Further, increasingly, the element of human dimensions will have to be considered.

• Balance Science Push vs User Pull

4. What is/are potential contributions of your programme/organization to WCRP plans and activities?

NOAA is involved in most aspects of WCRP

NOAA’s Strategic Climate GoalsContinue to Build, Evaluate and Adapt NOAA’s Core Competencies in Three Key Strategic Areas:

1. Delivery of Sustained & Effective Services – Promote integrated service delivery at the national and regional scales;– Develop science-based climate information, products and decision support tools needed for informed

decision making;– Expand sustained engagement, dialogue and collaborations with users to build a robust service-centric

program.

2. Promoting Collaborative Partnerships– Use existing partnerships and networks, and address gaps as needed;– Commit to strong federal partnerships that promote effective leveraging of unique capabilities to meet the

nation’s needs;– Promote a thriving private sector to deliver diverse climate services to businesses and individuals.

3. Advancing Climate Science– Build and sustain comprehensive observations and monitoring systems and provide state of the art

research, modeling, predictions, and projections;– Guide the evolution of NOAA’s science enterprise based on changing societal needs, new scientific insights

and continuous evaluation in collaborations with users, scientists and partners;– Link natural and socio-economic sciences to support decision-making.

The End