NCEP Overview

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NCEP Overview
3rd NCEP/NWS Ensemble Users Workshop
Dr. Louis W. Uccellini Director, National Centers
for Environmental Prediction
Laurel, MD October 31, 2006

• Where Americas Climate, Weather and Ocean
  Services Begin

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Overview

• NOAAs Seamless Suite of Products
• Service Center Perspective
• Model Perspective
• Multi-model Ensembles
• Implications for NCEP
• Future for NAEFS
• NOAA Center for Weather and Climate Prediction
  Update

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What Does NCEP Do?
From the Sun to the Sea

• Solar Monitoring, Warnings and Forecasts
• Climate Forecasts Weekly to Seasonal to
  Interannual
• El Nino La Nina Forecast
• Weather Forecasts to Day 7
• Hurricanes, Severe Weather, Snowstorms, Fire
  Weather
• Aviation (Turbulence, Icing)
• High Seas Forecasts and Warnings

• Model Development, Implementation and
  Applications for Global and Regional Weather,
  Climate, Oceans and now Space Weather
• International and National Partnerships in
  Ensemble Forecasts
• Data Assimilation including the Joint Center for
  Satellite Data Assimilation
• Super Computer, Workstation and Network
  Operations

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NOAA Seamless Suite of ForecastProducts Spanning
Climate and Weather
Service Center Perspective
Forecast Uncertainty
Years
Seasons
Months
Week 2 Hazards Assessment
CPC
2 Week
Climate/Weather Linkage
6-10 Day Forecast
1 Week
NDFD, Days 4 -7
TPC
OPC
HPC
Days

• Winter Weather Desk Days 1-3
• Tropical Storms to Day 5
• Severe Weather to Day 3

SEC
AWC
SPC
Hours
Minutes
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NOAA Seamless Suite of ForecastProducts Spanning
Climate and Weather
Forecast Uncertainty
Years
Seasons
Months
Climate Forecast System
2 Week
North American Ensemble Forecast System
Climate/Weather Linkage
1 Week
Global Forecast System
Days
Short-Range Ensemble Forecast
Ocean Model Hurricane Model
North American Forecast
Hours
Rapid Update Cycle for Aviation
Minutes
Dispersion Models for DHS
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Multi-Model Ensembles Implications for NWS

• Since late 90s, NWS committed to expand
  probabilistic forecasts Provide weather, water
  and climate forecasts in probabilistic terms
  (p11, Vision 2005, published in 1999)
• From climate to the mesoscale, arguments are
  being made for multi-model ensembles to address
  probabilistic forecasts
• See NRC Completing the Forecast recommendations
• The new NWS CONOPS reaffirms the need to provide
  uncertainty in forecast products and related use
  of ensembles
• Computer resources do not exist to run all of
  these model systems internally (nor to address
  resolution issues) even with upcoming 3 fold
  upgrade of operational computers

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Ensemble ModelsComputational Resource Comparison

• Current (October 2006) status
• NCEP 14 members at T126L28
• 4 times per day, out to 16 days
• ECMWF 50 members at T399L62
• Twice per day, out to 10 (soon 15) days
• Ratio of ECMWF vs. NCEP resources on global
  ensemble
• 1-10 days 114 times less resources available
• 1-16 days 35 times less resources available
• Inadequate level of general NWP computational
  resources
• 10 years behind leading center(s)
• Serious handicap

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Multi-Model EnsemblesNCEPs Need for
Partnerships

• SREF
• NCAR (WRF core) run internally at NCEP
• NAEFS
• NCEP runs 80 members GFS/day
• Canada runs 40 members at CMC/day
• Navy plans to run ensemble members at FNMOC
• Output sent to UNIDATA for real-time distribution
  and to NCAR/NCDC for archive (still tentative)
• Multi-Model Ensembles for climate/SI exploring
  options
• Operational centers?
• Research centers?

All centers share output
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NAEFS Status

• Major accomplishments
• First operational multi-center ensemble system
• Running operationally at NCEP/MSC
• Data exchanged in real-time
• Data Availability
• Bias corrected products available now
• ftp//ftpprd.ncep.noaa.gov/pub/data/nccf/com/grns/
  prod
• Available on NAWIPS at NCEPcenters

• Project participants
• EMC Bo Cui, Yuejian Zhu, Richard Wobus,
  Dingchen Hou, Zoltan Toth
• NCO David Michaud, Brent Gordon, Scott Jacobs,
  Steve Schotz, Luke Lin
• CPC Ed Olenic, David Unger, Dan Collins

1-6 days gain in skill due to bias correction
multi-model approach
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NAEFS Future

• Plans to be coordinated with THORPEX
• Links with Phase-2 TIGGE archive and beyond
  (GIFS)
• Expansion
• FNMOC
• Experimental data exchange by Dec 06
• Preliminary evaluation by Dec 07
• Operational implementation by Dec 08 (subject to
  improved performance)
• UK Met Office,KMA, CMA, JMA
• Expressed interest, no detailed plans yet
• Data exchange with MSC
• Replace current ftp with more reliable telecom by
  Dec 08
• Statistical post-processing
• Continual enhancements to current methods (2nd
  moment correction, additional vars.)
• Testing (Dec 08) possible implementation (09)
  of advanced methods
• Products
• Week-2 experimental by Nov 06
• Web graphics
• MSC Nov 06
• NCEP Mar 07

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Update NOAA Center for Weather and Climate
Prediction

• NOAA Center for Weather and Climate Prediction
  offers a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to
• Apply Team NOAA approach to address current and
  future strategic advancements in environmental
  prediction (e.g., ocean modeling, air quality,
  water quality)
• Link NOAA research and operations to larger
  research and academic communities (USWRP, WRF,
  THORPEX)
• Co-locate with UMD interdisciplinary centers
  basis for the Advanced Study
  
  Institute for Environmental
  Prediction

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Status NOAA Center for Weather and Climate
Prediction

• Defined requirements for 268,762 RSF
• Includes housing 800 Federal employees,
  contractors, and visiting scientists
• NCEP Central Operations, Environmental Modeling
  Center, Hydrometeorological Prediction Center,
  Ocean Prediction Center, Climate Prediction
  Center
• NESDIS research and satellite services
• OAR Air Resources Laboratory
• Groundbreaking
  occurred 13 March
  2006

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NOAA Center for Weather and Climate Prediction
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NOAA Center for Weather and Climate Prediction
NORTH
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Summary

• NCEP is
• Strategically aligned with NOAAs seamless
  suite of products from the Sun to the Sea
• Working with NOAA on expanded responsibilities
  (e.g, oceans air and water quality, ecology,)
  success is based, in part, on expanding
  production and use of multi-model ensembles
• Actively pursuing opportunities for
  collaboration in research, transition
  to operations and
  operational
  production and delivery of services
• There is an increasing focus on model ensembles
  and related uncertainty measures applied to all
  products