Study Group on Future Data Infrastructure (SG-FIT) Workshop

Study Group on Future Data Infrastructure (SG-FIT) Workshop

23-25 September 2024, Online

Introduction

The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) is organizing an online workshop from 23 to 25 September 2024 to explore the future technologies of data sharing and their practical implications for public weather services in the context of real-time international exchange of Earth system data. These explorations focus on the challenges faced by WMO Members in utilizing the increasing volumes of data provided by the WMO Integrated Processing and Prediction System (WIPPS) Centres, globally and regionally, World Meteorological Centres (WMCs), satellite operators, and the communities they serve. 

The workshop will review the current user needs and how users are projecting to work in the future, then discuss various approaches to overcome challenges associated with Big Earth system data through the following themes:

  1. Moving less data: e.g. use of compression algorithms and/or discrete sampling/extraction of essential information  

  1. Moving the postprocessing / product creation to where big data resides: e.g. data proximate compute 

  1. Moving where the modelling happens: e.g. locally generated data like AI models 

  1. Lowering the barriers for implementation and federation of the systems through standards and interoperability  

The workshop will be divided into two parts: presentation sessions from 9h to 13h UTC and interactive discussion sessions (90 minutes before or right after the presentation sessions). Each discussion session to further explore the presented topics is offered twice to accommodate participants from different time zones. Both presentation and discussion sessions are open to all participants. 

Objective

The outcome of the workshop will contribute to the work plan of the Study Group on Future Data Infrastructure (SG-FIT), established by the Commission for Observation, Infrastructure and Information Systems (INFCOM) of WMO. 

Pre-workshop survey

Survey link. (Closed on 25 September 2024)

The survey is your opportunity to influence the choices of topics that SG-FIT will examine over the next 18 months, leading to recommendations to WMO. 

Presentation & recordings

All the presentations and the recordings of presentation sessions will be shared here after the workshop. 

Download: Presentations on Day1  | Presentations on Day2 | Presentations on Day3

Recordings on Day1-Session 1, 2 & 3

Recordings on Day2-Session 4 | Recordings on Day2-Session 5 

Recordings on Day3-Session 6 | Recordings on Day3-Closing

Tentative Agenda (CEST)

Day 1: 23 September (Monday)

Session 1: Introduction
Session 2: User requirements
Session 3: Discrete sampling and compression methods

Session 1 - Introduction

(Chaired by Véronique Bouchet/Paolo Mazzeti)

11:00 – 11:10

Kick-off and welcoming participants 

Véronique Bouchet (SG-FIT Co-chair)

11:10 – 11:30

WIS introduction

Jeremy Tandy (SC-IMT Co-vice-chair)

Session 2 - User requirements

(Chaired by David Richardson/Yuki Honda)

11:30 – 11:50

WIPPS introduction

David Richardson (ECMWF)

11:50 – 12:05

Data workflows and needs at NMS Belize

Dwayne Scott (Belize NMS)

12:05 – 12:20

Addressing NWP data challenges for limited-area models

Edson Nkonde (Zambia Meteorological Department )

12:20 – 12:35

Changes of information infrastructure to adapt technology changes in WWW Programme

Eizi Toyoda (JMA)

12:35 – 12:50

Q & A 

 

12:50 – 13:30

Coffee and Lunch break

Session 3 - Discrete sampling and compression methods
(Chaired by Tiago Quintino)

13:30– 13:50

Compressing multidimensional weather and climate data into neural networks

Thorsten Hoefer (ETH Zurich)

13:50 – 14:10

Bytes from Petabytes - Extrating usable data from very high resolution datasets, a Destination Earth perspective

Tiago Quintino (ECMWF)

14:10 – 14:30

Data visualisation as a way to extract information​ from (big) data

Caroline Bain (Met Office)

14:30 – 14:45

Q & A 

 

14:45 – 15:00

Coffee break

15:00 – 16:30

Interactive Discussion session 1A (Chaired by David/Tiago)

16:30

Closure Day1

Day 2: 24 September (Tuesday)

Session 4: Data proximate approaches (cloud)
Session 5: Data-driven approaches to forecasting and NWP

09:15 – 10:45

Interactive Discussion session 1B (Chaired by David/Tiago)

10:45 – 11:00

Coffee break

Session 4 - Data proximate approaches (cloud)
(Chaired by Joel Scott/Jeremy Tandy)

11:00 – 11:20

Navigating Cloud Computing Federations

Miruna Stoicescu (EUMETSAT)

11:20 – 11:40

From Cloud to Edge: Cloud Strategies for Building a Resilient Data Infrastructure

Brett Tackaberry (Google Cloud for Public Sector)

11:40 – 12:00

Lakes and Clouds: The challenge of moving 50 years of apps to the cloud

Robert Bunge (NOAA)

12:00 – 12:20

CMA Big data and Cloud Service Platform

Kehan Wang (CMA)

12:20– 12:40

NASA Earth science's data storage and proximate compute strategy

Patrick Quinn (NASA)

12:40 – 13:00

Q & A 

 

13:00 – 13:40

Coffee and Lunch break

Session 5 - Data-driven approaches to forecasting and NWP
(Chaired by Kanghui Zhou)

13:40 – 14:00

Data driven weather forecasting and its application in operation

Yang Xuan (CMA)

14:00 – 14:20

ICONIC - a cloud based approach to numerical weather prediction

Sascha Brand (DWD)

14:20 – 14:40

AI-driven weather and climate forecasting

Rahul Ramachandran (NASA)

14:40 – 15:00

Global to local data-driven predictions in a common framework

Jørn Kristiansen (Met Norway)

15:00 – 15:15

Q & A 

 

15:15 – 15:30

Coffee break

15:30 – 16:45

Interactive Discussion session 2A (Chaired by Jeremy/Kanghui)

16:45

Closure day 2

Day 3: 25 September (Wednesday)

Session 6: Standards
Session 7: Closing

10:30 – 11:45

Interactive Discussion session 2B (Chaired by Jeremy/Kanghui)

11:45 – 12:30

Coffee and lunch break

Session 6 - Standards
(Chaired by Tom Kralidis/Miruna Stoicescu)

12:30 – 12:50

Big Data Standards

Scott Simmons (OGC)

12:50 – 13:10

EO Common Architecture Initiative - EOEPCA+

Claudio Iacopino/Richard Conway (ESA/Telespazio)

13:10 – 13:30

OpenEO: Executing user applications next to large EO data backends

Alexander Jacob (Eurac Research)

13:30 – 13:50

Leveraging AI and Best Practices to Bridge Standardization Gaps in Natural Disaster Management

Arif Albayrak (University of Maryland)

13:50 – 14:10

Q & A

 

14:10 – 14:30

Coffee break

14:30 – 15:15

Concluding discussion session (Chaired by Tom/Miruna)

Session 7 - Closing
(Chaired by Véronique 
Bouchet/Paolo Mazzetti)

15:30 - 16:00

Reports from themed presentations and interactive discussion sessions

Session leads

16:00 - 16:10

Perspectives and next steps

Véronique Bouchet/Paolo Mazzetti

16:10

Workshop Closure

Contact

For further information, please contact Ms. Xiaoxia CHEN at xchen@wmo.int

(Last update: 30 September 2024)