NOAA Space Weather Prediction CenterProducts and Services

T. Onsager, J. Kunches, W. Murtagh, and C. BalchNOAA GPS/GNSS WorkshopBoulder, COOctober 24, 2007

Outline

• Customer needs and actions

• Recent customer growth

• Products and services

• Vision for future products

Impact Area Customer (examples) Action (examples) Cost (examples)

Radiation dose

(dose limits & health risks, possible acute effects for space exploration missions)

• NASA exploration • ISS• Space tourism• Airline crews/passengers

• Postpone activities• Seek shelter• Re-route flight paths

• Safety Issue • Health risks

Spacecraft

(Individual systems to complete spacecraft failure; comm, drag, and radiation effects)

• Lockheed Martin• Orbital• Boeing• Space Systems Loral• NASA, DoD

• Postpone launch • In orbit - Reboot systems• Turn off/safe instruments and/or spacecraft• Maintain orbit

• Loss of spacecraft ~$500M• Commercial loss exceeds $1B• Worst case storm - $100B

Electric Power

(Equipment damage to electrical grid failure and blackout conditions)

• U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission• N. America Electric Reliability Corp.• Allegheny Power• New York Power Authority

• Adjust/reduce system load • Disconnect components • Postpone maintenance

• Estimated loss ~$400M from unexpected geomagnetic storms

• $3-6B loss in GDP (blackout)

Airlines (Communications)

(Loss of flight HF radio communications)

• United Airlines, Continental, Lufthansa, Korean Airlines

• NavCanada (Air Traffic Control)

• Divert polar flights• Change flight plans• Change altitude• Select alternate comms

• Cost ~ $100k per diverted flight

• $10-50k for re-routes

Surveying & Navigation

(Use of magnetic field or GPS could be impacted)

• FAA-WAAS • Dept. of Transportation• BP Alaska and Schlumberger• Fugro Chance – offshore oil rig

• Postpone activities• Redo survey• Use backup systems

• From $50k to $1 mil daily for single company

Space Weather User Community

Recent Trends

SEC Product Subscription Registrations2005 - 2007

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s• Steady overall growth of users• Fastest growing user areas: GPS & Polar Aviation

• Drivers for GPS market• Deep-sea drilling• Surveying • FAA navigation systems• DOD operations• Mining & Farming operations• Construction

• GPS Global Production Value – expected growth:– 2003 - $13 billion

– 2008 - $21.5 billion

– 2017 - $757 billion

State ATM CorporationState ATM Corporation

Crosspolar Traffic Countsfrom 2000 through Aug 2007

840 776 884

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Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) – Mar 2005

Recent Trends

If airborne survey data, or marine seismic data, are useless or poor, due to high solar activity levels…the financial and scheduling impact is significant, with costs in the $50,000 to $200,000 range daily for large airborne and marine platforms.

Fugro Chance (April 2006)

- “We use GPS worldwide to position oilrigs and survey vessels, perform marine construction survey operations as well as a variety of airborne GPS survey operations…It is crucial to our organization to receive information on impending solar activity”

AE & E Trucking, Etc., LLC Geoconsultants, Inc. Planning Consultants, Inc.AEI-CASE Engineering GeoLogic Solutions, Inc. Portland Natural Gas Transmission Airmag Surveys GlobalSantaFe Drilling Co. Raymac SurveysAssociated Engineers, Inc GRW Aerial Surveys, Inc. Schlumberger Drilling & MeasurementsAthens Group (oil & gas) Halcyon Exploration Company SeelyeBaker Hughes (drilling) J. D. Barnes Ltd. (survey) SP SurveysBanks Engineering Johnson Engineering Surveying and MappingBarr Engineering Co. Jones, Wood & Gentry, inc SutherlandBennett KCI TECHNOLOGIES Teledyne Brown Engineering, Inc.Black Hawk County Engineer Kraus The Boeing Company/GPS OperationsCarver County Survey Office marine R/D Survey THE Keith Companies,IncChristopher B Burke Eng Ltd. NC Geodetic Survey The Troyer GroupClarida Engineering Co. Nexen Inc. (oil) Transocean DrillingConsulting Engineer NOVA Engineering & Consulting, Int'l. Unintech EngineersDGR Consultants NYS Professional Engineer Vickrey & Associates, Inc.Diamond Offhore Drilling, Inc. Old Dominion Freight Lines WaggDMG Olson Trucking WatfordEarth Energy Consulting Oxy (oil & gas) Westerngeco/SchlumbergerEastern Topographics Pape-Dawson Engineering Winzler & Kelly EngineersExcel Geophysics PGS Onshore Zonge EngineeringFugro Chance

SEC Customers – Drilling/Surveying

Major Forecast Center Products

• Daily Forecasts:

- Solar flares

- Solar energetic particles

- Geomagnetic activity

- 10.7 cm radio flux

• Event-Driven Warnings and Alerts:

- Warnings: geomagnetic storms, proton events

- Alerts: solar flare, proton event, geomagnetic storm,

electron event, solar radio burst

Operational Models

• U.S. Total Electron Content

• D-Region Absorption – HF Comm Outage

• STORM time empirical ionospheric correction model

• Geomagnetic Activity Index Prediction

• Solar Wind Prediction

• Relativistic Electron Forecast Model

U.S. Total Electron Content Model

Real-time ionospheric maps of total electron content every 15 minutes

Currently uses about 100 real-time GPS stations

Model uncertainty is provided as the standard deviation in estimated TEC

US-TEC slant path total electron content uncertainty < 2 TECU

US-TEC vertical electron content uncertainty < 1 TECU

Goal: Provide regional maps of TEC over the entire globe

NOAA POES

NOAA GOES

NASA ACE

ESA/NASA SOHO

L1•ACE (NASA)

–Solar wind speed, density, temperature and energetic particles–Vector Magnetic field

•SOHO (ESA/NASA)–Solar EUV Images–Solar Corona (CMEs)

•GOES (NOAA)–Energetic Particles–Magnetic Field–Solar X-ray Flux–Solar EUV Flux–Solar X-Ray Images

•POES (NOAA)–High Energy Particles–Total Energy Deposition–Solar UV Flux

•Ground Sites–Magnetometers (NOAA/USGS)–Thule Riometer and Neutron monitor (USAF)–SOON Sites (USAF)–RSTN (USAF)–Telescopes and Magnetographs–Ionosondes (AF, ISES, …)–GPS (CORS)

Key Data Sources

•STEREO (NASA)– Solar EUV Images– Solar Corona &

Heliosphere (CMEs)– In-situ plasma & fields– In-situ energetic particles– SWAVES

Future Products

• Forecasts, Forecasts, Forecasts!!!

– IF GOES, STEREO, and SDO give better solar observations

– AND ACE, STEREO, KwaFu give the solar wind propagating earthward

– PLUS CORS, COSMIC give ionospheric conditions globally

– THEN USTEC and newer renditions give predictions for Positioning /Navigation/Timing (PNT) users

• External user base continues to grow

– Electronic navigation (GPS III, Galileo, Glonass, Compass, etc., plus backup system eLoran)

– Commercial providers, per recent interaction with AGI

– NextGen, E911/E112, ADS-B implementations all rely on GPS/GNSS to be the best it can be

• Internal to NOAA, user base also expanding

– Airborne, marine, ground surveying all need optimal GPS/GNSS