C-SRNWP Programme
Second Quarterly Report for 2013 (April - June 2013)
Prepared by: Gergely Bölöni, C-SRNWP PM
Hungarian Meteorological Service
1024 Budapest, Kitaibel Pal utca 1., Hungary
For submission to: EIG EUMETNET Secretariat
Summary:
Action required: For information and comment
Distribution: Public
|
Reference |
Date |
Author(s) |
Content |
|
|
July 31, 2013 |
Gergely Bölöni |
First version |
|
|
September 20, 2013 |
Gergely Bölöni
(based on Sergio Pasquini’s suggestions) |
Second version |
1. Headlines
- The
C-SRNWP PM supported the organization of the Obs-SET
meeting by gathering inputs (observation impact diagnostics and
recommendations on monitoring standards) on behalf of the SRNWP community.
- A webex meeting was held for planning actions for the
promotion of European NWP models for education.
- A
contribution to the planning of the SRNWP-EPS Activity was made during the
SRNWP-EPS meeting at AEMET.
- Communication
continued with ECMWF on the possible extension of EPS boundary conditions
from the IFS model. LAM EPS experiments are ongoing to assess the added
value of high-resolution test LBCs prepared by ECMWF. A workshop is
foreseen for early December 2013 in order to present the results to ECMWF
and to prepare a proposal for the 2014 ECMWF TAC for the extension of IFS
EPS LBCs (in terms of resolution and forecast base times)
- A
summary of current SRNWP coordination activities has been presented to the
Forecasting Programme Manager, other PMs in the Programme and to the Secreteriat.
- The
status of the C-SRNWP project was presented at the HIRLAM-ALADIN All Staff
meeting where also the most important current research activities of the
ALADIN, HIRLAM and LACE consortia have been learnt by the C-SRNWP PM.
- There
are vacant positions for chairing 4 Expert Teams: Surface aspects, System
aspects, Dynamics, Physics
2. Status
of programmatic targets
The main activity of the C-SRNWP programme is the scientific and technical (operational)
coordination between the five LAM Consortia in Europe (ALADIN, COSMO, HIRLAM,
LACE and Met Office). The coordination is ensured by the eight Expert Teams
(data assimilation and use of observations; diagnostics, validation and
verification; dynamics and lateral boundary coupling; link with applications;
physical parameterization: upper air; predictability and EPS; surface and soil
processes: model and data assimilation; system aspects) established in 2008 and
through the regular correspondence, including the annual meeting, between the
members of the SRNWP Advisory Expert Team Committee (previously called Advisory
Committee), which consists of the consortia heads and the Expert Team chairs. Standing
for the success of the EUMETNET programmatic targets, coordination with other
Forecasting (SRNWP-EPS, Nowcasting) and Observation
(EUCOS, OPERA) Projects/Activities is done. During the second quarter of 2013
the following coordination efforts have been made.
Participation at the
ALADIN-HIRLAM All Staff meeting
A presentation was given by the C-SRNWP PM
about the recent and future coordination activities within the project
Latest NWP research and operational achievements
of the ALADIN, LACE and HIRLAM consortia have been presented at the workshop.
Webex meeting on promoting European NWP
models for education
A webex meeting has
been organized by the C-SRNWP PM in order to set up concrete goals for the
general aim of promoting European NWP models in education and research. The
main motivation of this anticipated promotion activity is to compete with the
freely available open source limited are models developed mainly at the US,
which are popular education tools at European
Universities. The use of European NWP models in education at universities might
be one of the key issues in successfully supplying expertise in NWP at NMSs.
The Forecasting PM, the EUMETCAL PM and the OpenIFS
team from ECMWF were the participants of the webex
meeting beside the C-SRNWP PM. Possible promotion efforts with three levels of
complexity have been identified: 1) promotion by connecting interested NMSs and
universities showing successful examples; 2) Promoting the OpenIFS
as an education tool for NMSs and universities; 3) Developing “education
versions” of operational NWP models in the consortia and promoting these at
NMSs and universities as common tools. It has been decided that the heads of
consortia and Expert Team chairs (SRNWP Advisory Expert Team) will be contacted
with a questionnaire in order to measure, which of the above 3 options is
realistic within the current Programme Phase. Also
the UK MetOffice and ECMWF will be contacted to get
an estimation of the necessary system development efforts for creating
“education versions” of NWP models.
Participation at the
SRNWP-EPS meeting and EPS-Physics scientific workshop
The EPS and Physics Expert Teams have been
active in identifying the most interesting scientific subjects for the forthcoming
EPS-Physics scientific workshop (18-20 June, Madrid). Also the C-SRNWP PM was
chairing the final discussion of the workshop aiming to set up a more enhanced
cooperation between EPS and Physics experts in the future. The main subject of
the SRNWP-EPS meeting was to agree on how to proceed with the EPS project
proposal for the second phase (June 2014 – December 2017). It has been decided
that 4 Working Groups ( 1:EPS - data assimilation;
2:EPS – surface aspects; 3:EPS – Physics; 4:Use and interpretation of
probabilistic products) will be established, which will prepare a short
document (2-3 pages each) on the envisaged plans within their fields. The
documents will be summarized by the SRNWP-EPS PM, the Forecasting PM and will
be presented to the autumn STAC in 2013.
Forecasting Programme meeting
The Forecasting Programme
Manager organized a face to face meeting of the PMs within the Forecasting Programme. A good opportunity to meet was given by the
SRNWP-EPS meeting at AEMET, where the FPM, the SRNWP-EPS, Nowcasting
and the C-SRNWP PMs were anyway present. The EUMETCAL PM joined us via webex,
the EMMA Project was not represented. Each PM gave an oral overview of the
current activities within their projects.
Preparations for the Obs-SET meeting
Input was prepared for the annual Obs-SET meeting (previous E-SAT) on behalf of the SRNWP
community. This included a survey on the SRNWP activities regarding the
assimilation of BUFR radisonds including the use of
the position and exact time of the measurements during the ascents. Also the
EUCOS monitoring standards were commented by the SRNWP community, which was
presented at the Obs-SET meeting. Degrees of Freedom
for Signal (DFS) and Forecast Sensitivity to Observations (FSO) are widely used
tools in global models to measure the importance of the elements of the
observing network and thus for suggesting their redesign. For the Obs-SET meeting DFS and FSO results from short-range NWP
models have been collected to complement the picture shown by the global
experiments. Information was also collected from the OPERA PM about the status
of OPERA radar volume data handling for NWP purposes foreseen for Odyssey.
Communication with
ECMWF regarding the extension of IFS EPS boundary conditions for very high
resolution EPS systems
A half year after that ECMWF kindly provided an
EPS lateral boundary condition test-bed, the COSMO and HIRLAM SRNWP consortia
gained experience using these boundary conditions within their very high
resolution EPS systems. The ALADIN and LACE consortia will do so until the end
of September presumably. In order to give a feedback to ECMWF a scientific
workshop is proposed for late Autumn, where SRNWP and
ECMWF EPS experts will make a common overview of the results. The purpose of
the meeting would also be to help the preparation for next year’s ECMWF TAC
meeting where a proposal for the extension of the EPS LBC provision by ECMWF
will be requested (regarding the 06 and 18 UTC base times and the horizontal
resolution T1279). Besides the above preparations, the SRNWP EPS Expert Team
proposes an early request on the extension of the current operational EPS LBCs
(with base time 00 and 12) in terms of update frequency (1 hourly files instead of 3 hourly, up to 48 hours).
3. Communication and cooperation
The communication with C-SRNWP member
representatives, the Forecasting Programme Manager,
other PMs of the Forecasting Programme, Expert Teams is
mainly maintained via email. Also the following meetings were used to enhance
the communication and cooperation with different partners:
- HIRLAM-ALADIN
All Staff Meeting, 14-21 April, Reykjavik
- SRNWP-EPS
workshop and SRNWP-EPS Activity meeting, 17-21 April, Madrid
- Forecasting
Programme Management meeting, 21 April, Madrid
It is to be mentioned as well, that 2 new users
(Czech Republic, Germany) have joined to use the surface data base initiated by
the C-SRNWP Expert Team on Surface processes (and maintained by the COSMO
consortium).
4. Benefits delivery
In general, the coordination of European
limited area modeling activities is clearly beneficial for the EUMETNET
partners, since it enhances the development of SRNWP models used by the
modeling consortia and their members, significantly contributing to the
improvement of forecasting activities of the meteorological services with
special emphasis on the protection of life and property.
More particularly the coordination work done
within the 2nd quarter of the year implicitly contributes to the
development of limited area model (LAM) data assimilation systems (through the
improvement of observation monitoring standards and through the collection of
LAM DFS and FSO results) and to the development of physical parametrizations
and short range probabilistic forecasts (through the enhancement of cooperation
between EPS and physical parametrization scientists).
3. Financial report
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
6. Risks
and issues
None to report.
7. Programme change requests
None.
8.
Outlook
The most important SRNWP related coordination goals
for the second half of 2013 are to
- follow
the conversation between the OPERA and SRNWP communities (relevant members
of the OPERA User Group) regarding the NWP use of radar data (supply of
Odyssey by radial wind data by NMSs, quality indication of radial wind and
reflectivity data)
- continue
the communication between the SRNWP EPS experts and ECMWF about the possible
extension of lateral boundary conditions from the IFS EPS system for very
high resolution EPS experiments and operations
- discuss
the priorities of SRNWP consortia (and possibly universities) regarding
the promotion of European SRNWP models for education
- organize
the scientific programme of the EWGLAM/SRNWP
workshop (30 September – 3 October, Antalya), which is the most
appropriate meeting for the C-SRNWP member representatives to meet
- also
several meetings are foreseen for autumn with the participation of the
C-SRNWP PM: Cosmo General Meeting (3-5 September, Sibiu), ECMWF SAC
meeting (14-16 October, Reading)
