Strategic Initiatives: ESIG Annual Scientific Report 2003

NCAR Strategic Initiatives

ESIG spearheads two of NCAR's strategic initiatives in collaboration with several other NCAR/UCAR divisions, and contributes to two more.

Geographic Information Systems (GIS) Initiative

In early 2001, NCAR recognized a need to explore and reevaluate the capabilities of GIS as an integrating tool for scientific research and applications NCAR, as well as in the geosciences community at large. The GIS Strategic Initiative promotes and supports the use of GIS an an analysis and infrastructure tool in atmospheric research, addresses the broader issues of spatial data management, interoperability, and geoinformatics, and helps to integrate NCAR data and knowledge across disciplines. Olga Wilhelmi co-leads the Initiative with Terri Betancourt (RAP). During FY03, Jennifer Boehnert (ESIG/RAP) was hired from the Environmental Systems Research Institute (ESRI) to become the GIS Coordinator at NCAR. The newly redesigned website at www.gis.ucar.edu contains extensive information on the expanded four major program elements: (1) education, training, and user support; (2) research enabled by GIS; (3) data integration and distribution, and (4) research in GIS technology. This year, the Initiative partnered with GIS technology leaders in the public realm (the OpenGIS Consortium) and the private sector (ESRI). Through these partnerships, NCAR participated in the OpenGIS Consortium Conformance and Interoperatibility Test and Evaluation (CITE) project, and has been working with ESRI to develop an atmospheric data model that will provide a structure for seamless integration of atmospheric data in GIS. A lecture series on GIS was also initiated in FY03 to encourage the use of GIS at NCAR and UCAR through training and education.

Weather and Climate Impact Assessment Initiative

Linda Mearns is the Director of this multiyear Intiative and co-leads it with scientists Doug Nychka and Jerry Meehl (both of CGD), with significant involvement from RAP. Begun in FY02, the Initiative expanded in FY03 to include several new projects. Many ESIG scientists are currently engaged in characterizing uncertainty in impact assessment work and assessing extreme weather and climate events. More information on each project is available in other parts of this Annual Scientific Report. (Click on the project to access this information.) The three main thrusts of this Initiative are:

(1) Characterizing Uncertainty in Impact Assessment Science, containing the following projects:

Hindcasting Little Ice Age and Last Millennium, NCAR team: Caspar Ammann and Bette Otto-Bleisner (both of CGD), Gene Wahl (ASP/ESIG), Doug Nychka (CGD), and Susan Foster (E&O). External collaborators located at U. Colorado, Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, U. Bern, and U. Arizona.
Land Cover Forcing from the SRES (Special Report on Emission Scenarios) Scenarios in Climate Models, NCAR team: Linda Mearns, with Gordon Bonan, Jerry Meehl, and Keith Oleson (all with CGD). External collaborators are located at U. Kansas and RIVM (Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency).
Managing Wildland Fire Risks, NCAR team: Kathleen Miller and Robert Harriss, with external collaborators from U. Washington and U. Colorado.
Uncertainty in Climate Model Simulations, NCAR team: Linda Mearns, Doug Nychka (GCD), Claudia Tebaldi (ESIG/RAP), Jerry Meehl and Tom Wigley (both of CGD). External collaborator located at U. North Carolina.

(2) Methods and Assessment of Extreme Weather and Climate Events:

Climate Variability and Uncertainty in Flood Hazard Planning, NCAR team: Mary Downton, Rebecca Morss (ESIG/MMM), Olga Wilhelmi, and Melissa Crandall. External collaborator at U. Colorado.
Downscaling of Extreme Weather Events, NCAR team: Linda Mearns; external collaborator from NOAA's National Severe Storms Laboratory.
Extreme Events in Climate Models and Spatial Scaling, NCAR team: Linda Mearns, with Jerry Meehl and Doug Nychka (both of CGD). External collaborators located at U. North Carolina and U. Colorado.
Extremes in Aviation-Related Weather, NCAR team: Barb Brown and Marcia Politovich (RAP); external collaborator from U. Colorado.
Extremes Toolkit, NCAR team: Rick Katz and Barb Brown (RAP). External collaborators located at U. North Carolina and U. Colorado.

(3) Development of a Climate/Human Health Program:

NCAR team: Robert Harriss, Linda Mearns, and Sasha Madronich (ACD). External collaborators at Johns Hopkins U., U. South Florida, U. Washington, and U. Michigan.

A preliminary climate/health document was produced in FY03 to assist in establishing an education and research program designed to address the relationship between climate and human health. As a first step in this process, ESIG will convene an interdisciplinary Summer Institute on Climate and Health during FY04.

More information on this comprehensive Strategic Initiative can be found on the website at www.assessment.ucar.edu.

Wildland Fire Collaboratory Initiative

The Wildland Fire Collaboratory began in FY02 and is led by RAP, with ESIG contributing to the societal impacts research of the Initiative's three major components. Those components are (1) wildland fire science, (2) societal impacts, and (3) operational applications. During FY03, Olga Wilhelmi worked with Christine Wiedinmyer (ACD) and Janice Coen (MMM/RAP) on developing techniques for wildfire fuel characterization and assessing the impacts of spatial resolution of the vegetation cover information on fire modeling. Wilhelmi is continuing to develop a methodology that allows the integration of fire models with GIS (geographic information systems). The project website can be found at www.rap.ucar.edu/projects/wfc.

IT Cyberinfrastructure Strategic Initiative

Formed in November 2002, the Web Outreach and Redesign (WORD) effort is one of the primary components funded out of NCAR's IT Cyberinfrastructure Initiative. Jennifer Oxelson has represented ESIG in this project, which aims to redesign NCAR's web presence and elevate our ability to use the Web to communicate, share, and work with NCAR's stakeholders and the general public. WORD membership spans NCAR, UCAR, and UOP to facilitate coordination and communication among the web activities of the three organizations. The first phase of the prototype website is expected to be on line in early 2004. The project website can be found at word.ucar.edu.