Observing Weather and Climate from the Ground Up A Nationwide Network of Networks (2009) / Chapter Skim
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Summary
Pages 1-14
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Mesoscale observations capture atmospheric phenomena such as thunderstorms, squall lines, fronts, and precipitation bands at horizontal scales ranging in size from the area of a small city up to the size of a state such as Iowa. The data support such services as weather and air quality forecasting, as well as decisionmaking in many sectors including transportation, agriculture, and homeland security.
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In mesoscale features, vertical air motions can be intense and vary significantly over short horizontal distances, resulting in strong fluctuations in the temperature, moisture, momentum, and chemical species concentrations observed at any given location. These are some of the quantities associated with the weather "sensed" by humans where they live.
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National priorities demand ever more detailed meteorological observations at much finer spatial and temporal resolutions than are widely available today. These priorities include tracking atmospheric dispersion of chemical, biological, and nuclear contaminants from industrial accidents and terrorist activities, as well as smoke dispersion monitoring and prediction for wildfires, prescribed burns, and seasonal agricultural fires; more extensive air quality forecasting, high-resolution "nowcasting," and short-range forecasting of high-impact weather; high-resolution weather information for aviation, surface transportation, and coastal waterways; and support to regional climate monitoring.
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Comprehensive metadata enable customized network configurations to best meet custom user needs as specified by the users themselves, including all aspects of observing system performance that are germane to a given application. Infrastructure Needs Beyond collaboration among existing surface networks, additional types of observations are critical to achieving the desired result of a comprehensive and integrated national mesoscale observing network of networks.
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Considering the danger of traveling in the winter or fighting forest fires in the summer, the need for observations in the mountains goes beyond that for weather forecasting alone. Coastlines and cities, both of which are heavily populated, also take on special importance, particularly when one considers the critical role for observations in response to a release of toxic substances, to treat the roads in response to an ice storm or blizzard, or evacuate people in advance of hurricane landfall.
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• Forums to further discuss and recommend implementations of the mesoscale observing system should be organized by professional societies and associations such as the American Meteorological Society, National Council of Industrial Meteorologists, American Geophysical Union, Commercial Weather Services Association, National Weather Association, American Institute for Chemical Engineering, American Society for Civil Engineering, and American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials. A leading role should be assumed by the Commission on the Weather and Climate Enterprise of the American Meteorological Society, the constitution of which is particularly well suited to this task.
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National Climate Data Center (NCDC) for archival of selected data, as deemed appropriate by NCDC, • development and provision of software tools and internet connectivity for data searches, information mining, and bulk data transmissions, • development and provision of a limited set of end-user applications software, which would enable selection of default network data configurations for major applications as well as tools for creation of custom network data configurations, and • provision of a data quality checking service with objective, statistically based error-checking for all major categories of data, including manual intervention and feedback to providers.
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Recommendation: A national design team should develop a well a rticulated architecture that integrates existing and new mesoscale networks into a national "network of networks." To serve multiple national needs, the United States needs a system that is a network of networks in an architectural sense. The term "architecture" includes the fundamental elements as well as the organizational and interfacial structure of the mesoscale network.
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Among other issues, testbeds should address the unique requirements of urbanized areas, mountainous terrain, and coastal zones, which currently present especially formidable deficiencies and challenges. Applied research and development should include but not be limited to transitional activities, including the operation of prototype networks and evaluation of their forecast impact; development of tools to facilitate data access for real-time assimilation; development of additional tools to serve the general public and educate the citizenry; and exploration of advanced and innovative technologies to serve multiple national needs better, cheaper, and sooner than otherwise might be possible.
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Humidity, wind, and diurnal boundary layer structure profiles are the highest priority for a network, the sites for which should have a characteristic spacing of ~125 km but could vary between 50 and 200 km based on regional considerations. Such observations, while not fully mesoscale resolving, are essential to enable improved performance by high-resolution numerical weather prediction models and chemical weather prediction at the mesoscale.
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From page 11... ...
This number corresponds to a characteristic spacing of about 50 km for a network that is spatially distributed across the continental United States. Although this spacing is insufficient to capture the full spectrum of shortterm spatial variability of surface soil wetness, it is small enough to represent seasonal variations and regional gradients, thereby supporting numerous important applications such as land data assimilation systems in support of numerical weather prediction, water resources management, flood control and forecasting, and forestry, rangeland, cropland, and ecosystems management.
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of limited size and near-surface location can escape detection or be only poorly resolved by the current low-density network of weather radars. Collaborative and adaptive sensing and related technologies can efficiently enhance the detection and monitoring of adverse weather for hazard mitigation and other applications, particularly for convective scales and in complex terrain and coastal and urban environments.
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From page 13... ...
Likewise, meteorological stations near roads and railroad tracks could have sensors added to them that would provide data that are beneficial to transportation, for example, water depth measurements near culverts. Recommendation: The Department of Transportation should assess and eventually facilitate the deployment of high-density observations through the Vehicle Infrastructure Integration initiative.
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From page 14... ...
National gaps result from weaknesses in the federal government's observational infrastructure pertaining to mesoscale numerical weather prediction and chemical weather forecasts. Observational deficiencies in the mountains, at the coasts, and near urbanized areas require special attention.
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