ECMWF moves to open data
Authors: Venuti Fabio , Modigliani Umberto , Rabier Florence , Pappenberger Florian 
Published: June 2021

&lt;div&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;ECMWF is committed to move to an open data policy gradually over the next few years. ECMWF has already released&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;hundreds&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;of&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;web forecast charts and made archived data available with a Creative Commons&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;(&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;CC&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;BY&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;4.0&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;)&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&amp;#160;open licence&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&amp;#160;in 2020&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;The potential uses and benefits these products bring for a range of users and sectors is vast and particularly key in less economically developed countries&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&amp;#160;and&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&amp;#160;has the potential to supercharge research efforts&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;leading to&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;improv&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;ement in&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&amp;#160;weather&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;predictions&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;and&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;delivering important&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;socio-economic benefits&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;Making these products&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;available&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;with CC&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;BY&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;4.0&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;licence&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;s&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;means that users can&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;now&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;share, redistribute and adapt the information as they&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;need&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;,&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;including&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&amp;#160;for commercial applications,&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;as long as&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&amp;#160;they acknowledge&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;ECMWF as&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;the source&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;Archived&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;d&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;ata from all past ECMWF forecasts offer&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&amp;#160;immense opportunities for machine learning, where a computer uses observations or other data, to &amp;#8216;learn&amp;#8217; relationships between different variables&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&amp;#160;and will support ECMWF Machine Learning Roadmap&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&amp;#160;to 2030&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;.&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;The next steps&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;will be presented and&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;will&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;involve an expansion of the free and open datasets already available to increase their use&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;by targeted audiences&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;in&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;real-time.&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;ECMWF&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;recognizes&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&amp;#160;that giving free access to all data holdings in real-time will be&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;technically&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;challenging&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;in the short and medium term.&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;The plan is to maintain paid-for delivery services for demanding applications&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;that require access to large volumes of data&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&amp;#160;with&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;a service level agreement&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;.&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;This phased move towards free and open data aims to support creativity and innovation in the field of scientific research as well as weather applications.&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&lt;div&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;span&gt;Furthermore, to facilitate the efficient access and processing of such large volumes of data,&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;ECMWF is piloting c&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;loud solutions for&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&amp;#160;organisations of&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&amp;#160;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;Member States in collaboration with EUMETSAT and is investigating&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span&gt;&amp;#160;fast connections with commercial public clouds.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;