CARIBBEAN METEOROLOGICAL COUNCIL Doc. 10
FIFTY-SECOND SESSION
Rodney Bay, SAINT LUCIA, 15-16 NOVEMBER 2012
OTHER PROJECT UPDATES AND PROPOSALS
(Submitted by the Coordinating Director)
Introduction
1. Weather, climate and water are at the heart of the environmental issues affecting the planet. National Meteorological and Hydrometeorological Services (NMHSs) in the Caribbean and the world over must provide accurate information, analyses and timely forecasts of hazardous weather-related conditions that affect the sustainable development of their nations in the short term. At the same time, the NMHSs must provide the appropriate data and scientific-basis for studies on the long-term potential impacts of both natural and human-induced climate change on the environment. The contribution of meteorology and related sciences to these global studies is driven by the constant adaptation to and use of technological changes and opportunities.
2. In this regard, many of the projects being undertaken or planned have observational and scientific data information components involving the use of new or modern technologies. This is primarily an information document intended to keep the Council up-to-date on the progress of implementation on any on-going projects of this nature, which involve CMO Member States and partner organizations, such as the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) and the Association of Caribbean States (ACS). The document will also inform the Council and seek its guidance, on activities or proposals for new projects.
(a) WMO CARIB-HYCOS Project - Project Termination – Future Activities
3. In 1993, the WMO launched the World Hydrological Cycle Observation System (WHYCOS). Its aim is the development of water resources information systems to assist Member countries to improve their water management, mitigate the impact of water-related disasters such as floods and droughts and contribute to regional and global studies of the impact of climate change on water resources. WHYCOS is being developed through a series of regional HYCOS components. Some 17 HYCOS projects are at varying stages of development and implementation in various regions of the world; Carib-HYCOS is one of these projects (see Figure 1). Carib-HYCOS has been organized into two components, one addressing the needs of the Caribbean Island countries (CIC) and the other, the needs of the mainland countries of the Caribbean Basin. This document will bring the Council up-to-date on the status of the Carib-HYCOS Islands Component, which is approaching the end of its implementation phase.
CMC52, DOC 10, page 8
Figure 1: WMO HYCOS Projects around the world
4. The Carib-HYCOS Project is aimed at improving basic hydrological observational activities, strengthening regional and international cooperation in the exchange in technology and expertise, making available a regional water resource database, and fostering improved exchange of hydrological data and products.
5. Eleven Caribbean island States participated in the Project, namely Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Cuba, Dominica, the Dominican Republic, Guadeloupe, Haiti, Jamaica, Martinique, Saint Lucia and Trinidad and Tobago. The WMO is the Supervising Agency of the Project, while the Institut de Recherche pour le Développement (IRD) of France served as the Executing Agency. IRD hosted the Project Regional Centre (PRC) in Martinique, including the Project Management Unit (PMU) and a server for a regional database. The PMU has been assisted by the Caribbean Institute for Meteorology and Hydrology (CIMH) and the Instituto de Meteorologia (INSMET, Institute of Meteorology) of Cuba for the English- and Spanish-speaking countries respectively. As a regional institution, the CMO has been supporting Carib-HYCOS, particularly to ensure that the Hydrological Services of its Member States, as well as the CIMH, play an integral part in this important activity. The CMO HQ is on the Project’s Steering Committee (PSC).
6. The project was co-financed by the Regional Council of Martinique, the General Council of Martinique and the FEDER (European Funds for Regional Development) for a total of 1,317,000Euros with an additional 1,200,000 Euros as the IRD`s in-kind contribution, and 400,000Euros as countries’ in-kind contribution.
7. Project implementation started officially in 2008, with most of the activity coming after 2010. This first phase focused on the evaluation of hydrometeorological measurement networks in each participating State, in order to determine their equipment needs. Several actions were implemented to address these needs, including:
- Purchasing and installing material to upgrade existing hydrological networks;
- Providing each National Hydrometeorological Service with a centralized database management system;
- Running training progammes on software installation, instrument installation and maintenance;
- Creating a regional hydrometeorological database, an Internet Website and an FTP server to collect and transfer data remotely.
8. The fourth Project Steering Committee meeting is scheduled to take place in Guadeloupe in November 2012. The Committee session will conduct a final evaluation of the Project impacts and will essentially bring this implementation phase to an end. A major task of the Steering Committee will be to consider whether or not a second phase of the Project is needed. The purpose of a second phase would be to continue the initiatives of the Project and to develop activities to further knowledge and data sharing with various end-users of hydrometeorological data, especially with regards to monitoring the impacts of climate and adaptation climate change. In this regard, the Steering Committee will consider various regional institutions that have expressed interest in coordinating activities in a second phase.
(b) Finland Initiative - Strengthening Hydrometeorological Operations and Services in the Central America and the Caribbean (SHOCS)
9. Between the years 2001 and 2004, the Government of Finland funded the SIDS-Caribbean Project titled “Preparedness to Climate Variability and Global Change in Small Islands States, Caribbean Region”. As a continuation of its activity among the Caribbean Small Island Developing States (SIDS), the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland (MFA) has provided 500,000 Euros to carry out a needs assessment and feasibility study project entitled “Strengthening Hydrometeorological Operations and Services in the Central America and the Caribbean (SHOCS)”. The Project commenced in 2010 and implemented by the Finnish Meteorological Institute (FMI) under the direction of the Association of Caribbean States (ACS), in collaboration with WMO and CMO. The CMO is a member of the Project Board, along with the ACS, WMO, the Caribbean Emergency Management Agency (CDEMA) and FMI.
10. The States that participated in the feasibility study project are:
CMO Member States· Antigua & Barbuda
· Barbados
· Belize
· Dominica
· Grenada
· Guyana / · Jamaica
· St. Kitts & Nevis
· Saint Lucia
· St. Vincent & the Grenadines
· Trinidad & Tobago
Other States
· Bahamas
· Cuba
· Dominican Republic / · Haiti
· Suriname
11. The beneficiaries of the Project have been the Meteorological and Hydrological Services and Disaster Management Agencies of the above States, along with the CIMH as a regional institution. The feasibility phase of SHOCS (Phase I) was due to be completed at the end of 2012. Results of SHOCS Phase I project during the period 2010-2012 can be summarized as follows:
- Increased Capacity in the Caribbean on the development methods for Multi-hazard Early Warning Systems (MHEWS) and Disaster Risk Reduction. National Meteorological and Hydrological Services (NMHSs) and Disaster Management Agencies (DMAs) of the 16 beneficiary SIDS have been supported to participate in a few of the MHEWS/DRR-related regional workshops and meetings in the Caribbean.
- Increased capacity of the NMHSs in developing Quality Management Systems. Two inter-linked training workshops on QMS for Aeronautical Meteorological Services were organized in May and Dec 2011 with participation from the 16 beneficiary and five other Caribbean SIDS Meteorological Services/Offices.
- Capacity assessment on future needs of development of MHEWS and DRR. Feasibility Assessment Missions to visit the 16 beneficiary SIDS were carried out in Dec 2011 – March 2012. Meetings, lasting 1-2 days, included presentations and interaction between invited representatives from the NMHS, DMA and related regional and local organizations. Reports from these meetings and the summary assessment report are under review.
12. The results of SHOCS Phase I will be discussed at some meetings, symposia or workshops in November-December 2012, including the CMO Meeting of Directors of Meteorological Services that precedes the CMC52 session. Discussions are already underway between the Project Board and the Government of Finland for a new set of activities that will seek to implement a number of issues that emerged from Phase I. The meetings at the end of 2012 will be used to seek guidance for the preparation of the next phase of SHOCS.
13. The Overall Objective and Purpose of SHOCS II have been formulated as:
Objective of SHOCS II: Caribbean societies are better prepared, able to respond and to manage risks related to severe weather and hydro-meteorological hazards. Societies have also attained stronger resilience on adverse impacts of climate and long term natural hazards.
Purpose of SHOCS II: To Enhance the role and strengthen the capacity of National Meteorological and Hydrological Institutions and Disaster Management Agencies in ACS Member States in the provision of early warning services and preparedness to mitigate impacts of natural hazards.
14. Four themes have been tentatively identified as priority result areas in the Work Plan for SHOCS II:
Result 1: Improved operational capacity of the Caribbean SIDS weather observation network. Activities could include:
- Training on enhancement of AWS networks; tailored solutions for flood forecasting and coastal monitoring; creation of an automated and manual Quality Control monitoring;
- Create an operational verification system for NWP forecasts;
- Weather radar training:
· Maintenance training for technicians;
· Meteorological staff training.
- integrating on-line lightning data with other data for severe weather forecasting;
- Training on ‘state-of-the art’ meteorological workstation technology and software.
Result 2: Improved capacity for communication of risk information and early warnings
- Coordination between NMHSs and Disaster Management Agencies (DMAs) on the use of EMWIN to tailor the products exchanged and to actively sustain its use;
- Workshop on regional coordination of Early Warning System (EWS) products, training on appearance, accessibility, timeliness, clarity, etc, of EWS products;
- Improving the quality of warning and advisory products and introduction of relevant protocols, such as the Common Alerting Protocol (CAP).
Result 3: Improved capacity to provide specialized services to the society
- Continue QMS training with focus on auditors, link this to certification at CIMH; review gaps in certification regionally;
- Training on tools for institutional governance/management, including QMS and results-based management (RBM) as components in institutional capacity building; creation of performance monitoring pilots, e.g. availability of radar/observation data, forecast accuracy etc.;
- Create pilot customer services targeted to specified user groups: e.g. a platform for climate information services (linked to the Global Framework for Climate Services (GFCS);
- Training on media broadcasting (radio/TV), communicating with non-experts audience/clients.
Result 4: Enhanced Climate monitoring and Services through an internet portal
- To provide an internet portal to present temporal and spatial variability of climate data. The user interface will be open to public use;
- Demonstrate the strength and impacts (casualties, physical and economical) of extreme hydro-meteorological conditions (hurricanes, tropical storms, drought, flooding etc.) based on existing reports and climate data;
- To provide operational medium and long-term weather and climate outlooks using medium and long term NWP-prediction results (based on CIMH RCC activities).
15. Within the tentative SHOCS II proposals above, there are items which are viewed as investments by the funding-agency. These are:
(i) Upgrade of workstations and server hardware at some SIDS NMSs (including Cuba);
(ii) Enhancement of AWS networks; acquire/upgrade non-corrosive AWS technology;
(iii) Acquisition of on-line lightning detection data for a pilot period (option for 1-3 new lightning detection sensors);
(iv) Acquisition of TV-broadcasting software with an option for shared regional use.
(c) Lightning Detection System
16. For some years, the CMO Headquarters indicated its intention to establish a ground-based Lightning Detection System in the region in partnership with the Meteorological Service of France [Météo-France]. The CMO HQ has studied this system in great detail and is of the opinion that such a system is very necessary in the Caribbean. During the 2012 Meeting of Directors of Meteorological Services, which preceded the 52nd session of the Council, a demonstration of a long-range lightning detection system was scheduled to be made. A visualization of the system is shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2: Long-range Lightning Detection, superimposed on satellite data - GLD360 Global Lightning Data
(Courtesy University of Hawaii, in collaboration with Vaisala Inc)
17. The long-range system shows that lightning data can be acquired over the oceanic areas associated with weather systems that are well outside of radar range. At this distance, the resolution of the data at these distances is not critical. However, at distances closer to land, higher accuracy and thus a high resolution detection are necessary. Ground-based systems use triangulation from sensors at multiple locations to determine location of the lightning flash. Therefore, for this higher resolution to be achieved, it will be necessary to install some lightning sensors along the island chain to allow for adequate triangulation using the commonly known phenomenon “lightning spherics”.
18. There are three basic options for consideration for an island-chain set of sensors; (i) the number and location of processing units for the data; (ii) the mode of transmission among the countries involved and (iii) the method of paying for the system. A further issue for consideration is to build onto existing lightning systems owned by non-regional entities and then subscribe to the service, as is done by many countries. One such possibility has already been identified under the SHOCS II Project, as noted in paragraph 15 above. Under this scenario, a suitable mechanism subscribe to the system would need to be considered by the Council.
(d). Other CMO Project Proposals
19. In addition to projects above, the CMO Headquarters has been bringing to the attention of Council, its proposal to organize or participate in several projects aimed at reviewing, updating, improving and even widening the observational networks and data collection in the Caribbean, to ensure the constant availability of the highest quality data. Several of the planned activities in connection with proposed projects continue to be slow because of the lack of resources. Attempts will continue to secure funding for project activities. However, the CMO is collaborating with other partner organizations to implement the following activities that will ultimately involve the Meteorological Services of all Member States: