The Joint IOC (of UNESCO) and WMO Collaborative Effort for Met-Ocean Services

Abstract

Pinardi et al. Marine Monitoring to Services resulting from the observations and data management. Future developments should enhance coordination in these three program areas by considering the inclusion of new and emergent observing technologies, the interoperability of met-ocean data assembly centers and the establishment of efficient research to operations protocols, in addition to better fit-for-purpose customized services in both the public and private sectors.

Ship-Based Contributions to Global Ocean, Weather, and Climate Observing Systems

“…Development of datasets to support climate studies began in 1963 when the international exchange of delayed-mode marine climatological data was put in place through establishment of the WMO Marine Climatological Summaries Scheme. The JCOMM Expert Team on Marine Climatology updated the summaries scheme to facilitate timely exchange, access, and longterm preservation of marine climate data (Pinardi et al, 2019). This new Marine Climate Data System (MCDS), endorsed in 2012 by JCOMM, provides a JCOMM-wide unified approach to data management and higher-quality climate observations.…”

“…This center could accept data received from the GTS by multiple NMHS, conduct duplicate evaluation, and provide these observations to downstream users and product developers. The result would be a consolidated source for real-time GTS data with agreed quality control that could be aggregated to climate datasets such as ICOADS or the World Ocean Database, providing full provenance from instruments to archives/products as intended by the MCDS (Pinardi et al, 2019). Aggregating the data in the MCDS would provide a more complete collection and assure permanent preservation in international archives and repositories, guaranteeing their existence for future applications.…”

Data Interoperability Between Elements of the Global Ocean Observing System

“…Smith and Hankin (2014) examined user requirements for the 2014 Tropical Pacific Observing System (TPOS) 2020 review and Smith (2018) undertook a similar task for the review of the Tropical Atlantic Observing System. One common finding was that neither observing system had significant gaps or issues at a technical level that were peculiar to that region; globally implemented systems such as those overseen by WMO and IOC data and information systems and including those under JCOMM oversight (Pinardi et al, 2019), were the best route for improvement, innovation and enhancements. Routine ocean and climate productions systems (data assembly, analyses, forecasts) and associated downstream users drove real-time data and information system requirements, but in both cases, research remained an important pathway for impact.…”

“…Data systems, such as the aforementioned Argo and tropical mooring systems, are rather mature and therefore have higher levels of conformity to those guidelines. Interoperability among the various networks, however, is an issue that needs improvement and that the JCOMM community is working to improve (Pinardi et al, 2019). The most successful data systems, such as Argo, tend to be those systems that are also widely used by the community for which they were built.…”

“…Ensuring both communities are served should be a requirement for the GOOS Data System. The JCOMM Open Access to GTS project is taking steps to address this inefficiency by simplifying the process of getting data onto and off of the GTS for the research community (Pinardi et al, 2019). NOAA's Observing System Monitoring Center (OSMC) 38 provides access to near real-time ocean observations through the ERDDAP data platform.…”