Reflections after the 8th Year of Polar Prediction - Southern Hemisphere (YOPP-SH) Meeting and the path forward for increased Southern Hemisphere collaboration
The 8th Year of Polar Prediction – Southern Hemisphere (YOPP-SH) Meeting took place at the Byrd Polar and Climate Research Center of The Ohio State University on 13-14 June 2024 in Columbus, Ohio, USA in conjunction with the 19th Workshop on Antarctic Meteorology and Climate. Notably, a discussion on PCAPS and its intended outcomes was held in the “Evolution of YOPP-SH into PCAPS and Participation Opportunities” session. David Bromwich, a PCAPS SG member, led this session, where he discussed how PCAPS follows up on the work undertaken during the Polar Prediction Project – Year of Polar Prediction (YOPP) and its Southern Hemisphere component (YOPP-SH), that is scheduled for completion at the end of 2024.
In-person and virtual attendees on the first day of the 8th YOPP-SH Meeting.
PCAPS is a global collaboration, and many of the individuals involved are a part of the social sciences community, aiming to communicate and evaluate the impact of improved weather forecasts. Specifically, PCAPS aims to enhance the Earth observing system and improve the usage of satellite data for forecast initialization and validation of forecast models. A key part of this is to improve coupled model analysis and prediction.
Task Teams are being formed for each PCAPS activity area, namely services, sustainability, prediction, partnerships, and inclusivity. A potential challenge, however, is funding. This will require proposals to national science agencies and other international funding agencies to fund new and innovative research efforts.
There are also practical considerations that need to be addressed for the successful competition of PCAPS. For example, extra observations in the Southern Hemisphere are crucial for forecast improvement but require creative thinking to realize. Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) have been advanced to supplement radiosonde launches that have declined overall in recent years. Testing of UAVs at McMurdo Station is feasible and one possibility to explore. A similar idea is the use of drones flying out of Neumayer Station, which may be more feasible than at other stations.
There is a clear and significant demand for more PCAPS activities in the Southern Hemisphere, but this will require dedicated community effort. Articulation of the positive outcomes from YOPP-SH could help motivate this. The Australian Bureau of Meteorology, Environment and Climate Change Canada (ECCC), Meteo-France, and the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) have expressed interest in participating, and PCAPS could be linked to activities of the Scientific Committee for Antarctic Research (SCAR), as we have already seen via the widely attended PCAPS-related presentations at the SCAR-Open Science Conference in Chile during August 2024 . Furthermore, it is hoped that WWRP and WCRP can help incentivise additional operational centers to participate via the Antarctic Regional Climate Centre.
Another possibility to explore is to how to establish an international cooperative observational resource. In the near future, a MOSAiC-type platform might be available through the forthcoming Antarctica INSYNC project.
Overall, PCAPS is a project that requires enthusiastic community efforts, and besides the anticipated challenges, there is considerable interest in it. It is a pleasure to report that it was well accepted by the YOPP-SH community after the presentation in June. Therefore, we encourage people and organisations to participate or initiate their involvement in the Southern Hemisphere aspects of PCAPS, by contacting the PCAPS SG or PCAPS ICO directly.
To learn more, check out the recording of the aforementioned discussion here.