America is Behind in Weather Forecasting

Brandi Slavich

Weather is important. We all experience it on a day-to-day basis and getting warnings out in time saves lives yet our country, the United States of America, is behind compared to other nations. The issue begins with the people who argue that the U.S. inferiority in numerical weather prediction really does not matter. Despite the facts that compared to other countries the United States has third rate status in numerical weather prediction some assume that since we have access to the superior forecasts of the models of the European Center (EC), the UK Met Office, and others that that is enough.

The technology of weather prediction has improved dramatically during the past decades as faster computers, better models, and much more data (mainly satellites) have become available. The problem is that the U.S. global model is number 3 or number 4 in quality, resulting in our forecasts being noticeably inferior to the competition (Mass, The U.S.). Consequently, even though we have all the potential to be on top and have the most destructive weather in the world, the U.S. is settling with substandard forecasting. With this in mind, a major contributor to the United States inferiority is that we have inadequate computers/lack of computer resources. The European Center for Medium range Weather Forecasting (ECMWF) is running models with substantially higher resolution than ours even though we can afford the processors and disk space is definitely part of the problem. The U.S. does not have enough computer power available for numerical weather prediction and the U.S. modeling inferiority is costing us big bucks. For example, if you read the National Weather Service (NWS) forecast discussion online you will notice that they frequently depend on the ECMWF, not the U.S. models.

Time and again, we’ve learned the value of improving the “resolution” of our numerical models, say, describing the weather on a grid where the points are separated by 15 km instead of 30 km. But that’s computationally expensive. [Yet] typically when we increase the resolution, the change permits us to notice deficiencies in the model that we didn’t worry about before. A number of companies and U.S. entities are paying hundreds of the thousands of dollars EACH to get European Center model output. (Hamill)

Europe has the advantage with models that have twice the resolution as ours. To illustrate, the NWS has two computers that are not even on the worldwide top 500 list while the ECMWF has two machines that rank 37th and 38th worldwide; each with 24,546 cores and a computational ability of 0.75 petaflops while the NOAA’s Fairmount location only has 0.38 petaflops. Furthermore for the past twenty years the U.S. has been using Three Dimensional Variational Assimilation (3DVAR) while the European Center, the UK Meteorology Office, and our Canadian neighbors have upgraded to 4DVAR. In fact, a Professor in Atmospheric Sciences asserts “the lack of computer power and poor coordination between research and operational weather communities in the U.S. has crippled our ability to move forward towards the high-resolution weather prediction capability” (Mass, Second Rate). Hence why resolution is considered a key aspect for weather prediction.

        Under those circumstances, when it comes to research the U.S is on top, having the largest meteorological research establishment in the world; however we are not taking advantage of it. The Environmental Modeling Center (EMC) continues to be reluctant when it comes to using models and approaches developed by the U.S. hence why the interactions with the research communities are bounded. Similarly, not only has the EMC been isolating themselves and has become known for their “not invented here” attitude, the NWS is not innocent either. Due to the fact that the NWS’s budget has been under pressure, university research has been the first thing they seem to cut out.

The government weather research is NOT in the NWS, but rather in NOAA [National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration].  Thus, the head of the NWS and his leadership team do not have authority over folks doing research in support of his mission.  This has been an extraordinarily ineffective and wasteful system, with the NOAA research teams doing work that often has a marginal benefit for the NWS… The folks in NCEP [National Centers for Environmental Prediction], NWS, and NOAA leadership have been willing to accept third-class status, providing lots of excuses, but not making the fundamental changes in organization and priority that could deal with the problem.  Lack of resources for NWP is another issue...but that is a decision made by NOAA/NWS/Dept of Commerce leadership. (Mass, The U.S.)

The result is inefficiency, there is no group to coordinate the research and development of the U.S. research community so the progress of pressing problems is slow and money ends up wasted. Likewise, the NOAA/NWS polar orbiter acquisition program has been characterized by mismanagement for years, not only delaying the next generation satellites, but again costing the nation billions of dollars.

        All-in-all the most disturbing part of this is story is not that we are behind the Europeans and others, but that we are well behind what this nation is capable of (which is far beyond ECMWF). Our inferior computers, poor management, lack of effective leadership, and inability to tap the large weather research community are just some of the issues that makes forecasting in the U.S. inferior. We may have the potential to be at the top but nothing is going to change until people begin to see that weather prediction is an incredibly complicated enterprise. NOAA deploys satellites, weather balloons, radar data, and more. Our data assimilation algorithms synthesize this data. Our models and our supercomputers crank out the numerical guidance 24/7. Our forecasters are always on the job and bust their humps in ways you could not believe when severe weather is on the way. All of this costs taxpayers pennies a day. And the data is free to all and free to you without advertising (Hamill).

Overall, although the weather enterprise has a great deal going for it and “the large U.S. meteorological community has made significant strides in weather diagnosis and prediction, progress has been slowed by a lack of cooperation, coordination, and pooling of resources” (Mass, Uncoordinated Giant). It is time to incorporate all our strengths together. We need to regain our stature as a world leader in research and operational meteorology so that U.S. meteorologists can better serve and protect our nation.

Work Cited

Hamill, Thomas M. "Has the US fallen behind in numerical weather prediction: a response from a NOAA scientist." ABC 7: Storm Watch 7 Weather Blog. Allbritton Communications Co., 5 Apr. 2012. Web. 3 Mar. 2014.

Mass, Clifford. "Second rate U.S. numerical weather prediction: Why you should care." The Washington Post 26 Feb. 2013, Local: 1. The Washington Post. Web. 3 Mar. 2014.

- - -. "The Uncoordinated Giant: Why U.S. Weather Research and Prediction Are Not Achieving Their Potential." Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society 87.5 (2006): 573-84. EBSCO. Web. 17 Mar. 2014.

- - -. "The U.S. Has Fallen Behind in Numerical Weather Prediction: Part I." Cliff Mass Weather Blog. Blogger, 18 Mar. 2012. Web. 7 Mar. 2014.

Miller, Petter. "Why Are Europeans Better at Predicting Weather?" National Geographic 7 Mar. 2013: n. pag. Print.