2015-01-29 Per Undén

 

  1. Minutes from the UERRA General Assembly No 2 (GA2) 27-28 January, Tortosa, Spain.



The meeting was held at the URV premises in Tortosa.



  1. Consortium meeting

The GA started with the formal and administrative consortium matters. All partners except for EDI were present. EDI abstained this time and come back later when there is more significant work for them. EDI was informed and they had no issues or concerns to bring up for the GA.

The Financial Officer, Madeleine Benderyd, went trough the reporting schedule and deadlines. The Participant portal was still not ready for reporting but the REA and our PO will accept delays if the IT system is not ready. (After the meeting REA announced that it was ready). The list of the Deliverables for the period was shown but not discussed in this session. The deliverable reports are checked internally before uploading.

The DoW Part A still has the “DRAFT” mark on it but the final version (which is identical in contents) will be uploaded. (Action)

The Coordinator went trough the points that the partners might want to bring up under the terms of the Consortium Agreement. There were no concerns or comments from the partners.

A list of coming meetings, in the project and in associated projects was shown. The observation workshop in Julyy has been extended to a Copernicus observation service WS and in time.

Next year's GA will be held at MF in Toulouse at the end of January or beginning of February. For Toulouse, a mid day – mid day (the 3rd day) seems preferable (to travel in the morning and back in the evening).

  1. Work package presentations and discussions

The resolution of the MESAN cloud fraction analysis was discussed, and e en though it might be an advantage at 5.5 km there is not really more information in it than at 11 km. They should be compared and the cost is probably not an issue.

EEA is working on a new version of their extensive impact report, due for 2016. ClimateAdapt is planed to be connected to and use C3S.

In WP1 3.5 M data have now been digitized. They are from a few countries since others who have no scans or are in the process of, don't want to send their log books.

A data set from EURO4M has been encoded to ODB format but there are still some issues before it can go into ECMWF archives (sse later discussions).

It is important to check for gross errors and supervise the digitization. There is quite a lot of data missing in N Europe (Sweden and Norway, see the problem above) which is somewhat surprising. There are also difficulties identifying stations at the same (almost) location when AWS replaced manual ones.

WP2.

Dale showed benefit of downscaling with the model only and then additional benefit with assimilation. Most comes from the model. The developments and status were shown for the different RA groups.

In another WS the exchange of feedback files had been discussed and they concluded that the format is complicated and that simple text files could be used for exchanges. A novel feature at the MO is the plan to update the background statistics every few months. The Ens4DVAR has been decided on in spite of being expensive.

The HARMONIE RA is ongoing after a delayed start. The data assimilation statistics has been derived from both physics versions. It was unclear which boundaries to use before 1978 (ESAB question and comments).

DWD has carried out and are extending their 6 km CORDEX RA while the UERRA work on ensemble nudging is continuing at University of Bonn.

Ensembles of MESCAN surface analyses have been developed.

WP3

WP3 has developed a plan and document what to use for evaluation. Cloud products may be difficult to interpret so they are not in the list. The software package will be developed but using a number of existing components. Any licensing questions also need to be sorted out.

It was pointed out that the ICOS network should be explored as mast measurements.

On e question was about it the RA have balanced budgets, but it is more difficult for regional systems (fore3e at the boundaries).

WP4

The formats and names of the UERRA datasets to be archived in MARS are not quite clear yet and this needs to be agreed as soon as possible. A full inventory is needed and has started from the documents coming out of WP3. CORE-CLIMAX has made a very large data survey (user requirements) and this should be checked to see that we cover as much as possible.

The hydrological modelling at SMHI had not used the model evapotranspiration and instead used only the temperature input so that is a source of added error.

WP8

It is important to find the users who can be engaged in the planned User WS in about a year'e time. One option is to connect to the GA (see also later discussions in the MST meeting). One can lend on EURO4M lists and experiences.

The common web page will be developed to be more unique and by WP9 and CLIPC. E.g. There will be a common agenda and contacts.

  1. ESAB comments and the Evaluators and PO's views.

SMHI was unclear about which boundaries to use before 1978 and it is necessary to make a choice. There were issues with MARS that need to be sorted out. The ESAB would like to see a plan of the production phase (Action or to consider).

Many aggregated variables and indicators will come up and it is important to maintain a common terminology.

The Peiodic report (draft) has many individual parts but the links and connections between them and the WP s are not described (yet) It is recommended to use the ICOS network (masts) and OPERA data.

The PO encouraged UERRA to come out publicly with what it wants to achieve. User feedback is very important and again, it needs to be described in the Periodic report how the different parts connect.

We need to have an operationally oriented mindset since UERRA is a precursor project for Copernicus.

HORIZON 2020 calls are coming out and will provide the Research component for Copernicus.



The presentations will be available on the UERRA site in pdf formats.