# Presentation: 193760

## NPOESS User Working Group 

**Gregory W. Withee**
- Assistant Administrator for Satellite and Information Services
- November 3, 2003

**A Proposal to the NOAA**
**Science Advisory Board**** **

## Background

- The IPO and NESDIS together share responsibility for the overall NPOESS system
- A number of groups provide guidance, advice and/or oversight concerning various aspects of the overall NPOESS system
- There is no group looking at the overall NPOESS system from the perspective of NOAA end users

## NPOESS Functional Architecture

**Data Collection**

***NPOESS Satellite***

**NPOESS Functional Architecture**

**NOAA Central**

**Science Support**

**Long Term Archive**
**(CLASS)**

**User Community**

**XDRs**

**(HDF5)**

## Groups providing guidance, advice and/or oversight for NPOESS

- NPOESS Science Team, an internal group reporting to Northrop Grumman
- NPOESS Science Advisory Team, an external group chaired by Joe Friday reporting to Northrop Grumman
- Integrated Weather Product Test Bed Team, overseeing Raytheon’s IDPS and reporting to Northrop Grumman
- A number of Instrument Cal/Val Teams reporting to Northrop Grumman and the IPO
- Eight Operational Algorithm Teams (OAT) and a Central Users’ Forum reporting to the IPO
- Data Archive Board reporting to NESDIS OSDPD
- Climate Monitoring Working Group, chaired by Mark Abbott and reporting to NOAA SAB
- Climate and Global Change Working Group, chaired by Otis Brown and reporting to NOAA SAB
- A new 1-year NAS/BASC study looking at Climate Data Records

## Wide Range of NOAA Users 

- Operational – *operational* observations to support weather forecasting – where there is feedback within hours to days on the impact of observations on forecasts
- Research – *sustained systematic* observations to support climate change – where similar feedback may not come for years to a decade or more

## Proposed Terms of Reference

- As a sanctioned Working Group of the NOAA SAB, provide scientific advise and broad program direction on the on the condition and capabilities of the *NPOESS system* from the user perspective
- The *NPOESS system *is meant to include the space segment, NOAA Central (from Interface Data Processing Segment thru product generation to utilization), CLASS archive, and supporting science
- Complement, and coordinate with, the existing Climate Monitoring and Climate & Global Change Working Groups

## What are some initial issues? 

- _Identification of gaps:_ How will needs be met in the NPOESS era for:
- QuikSCAT-class surface vector winds?
- Jason-class sea surface topography?
- Preplanned product improvement EDRs (eg, carbon gases)?
- _Assessment of planned system:_
- Will CLASS have sufficient capacity in time for NPOESS?
- How well will resulting products contribute to the long-term climate record
- _Product improvement:_ What is the plan for evolving the algorithms in response to applications such as fine-spatial-resolution ocean products approaching the coast?

## What are some initial issues?(continued)

- _Regarding product improvement:_ During the NPOESS era, to what extent will/might there be:
- Access to lower-level data?
- Open and transparent algorithms?
- Competitively selected, peer-reviewed science teams?

## Next Steps

- NOAA SAB:
- approve written Terms of Reference
- address membership & designation of chair
- First meeting in early CY04
- NPOESS User Working Group starts by reviewing the components of the overall NPOESS system