1

Wireless Weather ServicesNWS and Weather Enterprise Roles

Edward JohnsonDirector, NWS Strategic Planning and Policy Office

Forum on Wireless Weather ServicesJune 28, 2011

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Agenda

• AM – Presentations• PM – Discussion• Summary and wrap-up

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Goal

• Engage weather enterprise (government, private sector, academia) and core partners (e.g., emergency managers) in discussions on how best to provide wireless services.

• Solicit feedback on most appropriate role for NWS in providing wireless weather services.

• This is not a “decision-meeting”

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Drivers

• Ownership of wireless devices - 89% US population (June 2009, 276.6M subscribers)

• Mobile devices will be world’s primary connection tool to the Internet in 2020

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Target Audience for Wireless Weather Information

• NWS Core Partners – for protection of life/property– Emergency managers (and their “agents”)– Agencies with missions closely allied to NWS (e.g.

FAA, water managers)– Electronic media (may not be key for wireless)

• General public – Protect life/property– General needs (Will it rain during my BBQ?)– Sustain national economy

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Needs - Core Partners

• Require timely, text and graphical information wherever they are, through multiple channels of dissemination

• NWS needs to know they are looking at same data/products forecasters are looking at

• Require tools to facilitate two-way information sharing and decision support with NWS

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Needs - General Public

• Wants instant, reliable information on-the-go• Need information presented in clear, non-

technical language• Seek corroborating information from many

sources before acting• Threats need to be better personalized to

ensure responsive action is taken• Concerns about limitations of wireless

dissemination systems (e.g., cell network failure/congestion)

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Current Mobile Alert Services

• Mobile Decision Support Service/ interactive NWS Alert System – Target Audience: NWS core partners (EMs, Gov’t decision leaders, media)– Alert Types: Sub-catastrophic, “usual” watch/warning/advisory for moderate to

high impact weather important to EMs

• GovDelivery (email alerts for general public)

• FEMA IPAWS/CMAS (Commercial Mobile Alert System)– Target audience: General Public– Alert types : Cell broadcast of imminent/catastrophic threats (e.g., tornado

warning)– In development and scheduled for 2012; all major wireless carriers participating;

requires cell tower/phone upgrades

• Private Sector fee services– Target audience: businesses; public subscribers– Alert types: Value-added and custom alerts

• Private Sector, academia free services– Target audience: General Public– Alert types: General weather info, all alerts

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MOBILE ALERTSSector Relationships

Ale

rt T

ypes

Target Audience

Community Leaders

and Decis

ion Make

rs

(eg, E

Ms)

Subscrib

ing Public

,

Business

es

General P

ublic

Advisories: Anticipate, Respond

and Recover

Watches: Prepare for Action

Warnings: Urgent, Immediate

Action Required

KEYiNWS

Private Sector

IPAWS/CMAS

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Other Related Government Efforts

• FAA – Weather Technology in the Cockpit Program

• DOT/FHA – Intelligent Transportation Systems – “connected vehicles” may receive critical weather information (research)

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NWS Guiding Principles

• Ensure NWS core partners have assured access to unaltered NWS products to facilitate communication with NWS forecasters – critical for decision support services

• Increase efforts to provide NWS information in standard formats/protocols to facilitate commercial provision of wireless services for general public

• Foster wide availability of NWS weather warnings and environmental information by diverse means

• Trademarks/copyrights– NWS data/products are not copyrighted and can be used freely – NWS encourages use of trademarked name/logo to identify unaltered

NWS products– Cannot assert your own copyright for NWS products– Use of NWS trademarks does not imply affiliation/endorsement

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Constraints on NWS for Providing Mobile Services

Resource challenges• Cost to provide a national guaranteed level of

wireless service delivery to the general public

• Cost for ongoing development and support of device-specific “Apps” to deliver NWS information

• Cost for maintaining/supporting direct email services to general public

Policy/Legal• NWS will only consider approaches that do not in

effect give anyone exclusive rights to NWS products.

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Draft NWS Position

NWS focus on core partners;

limited direct mobile

service for public

NWS supports commercial mobile development and national warning system through

information centric services

Balanced Way Forward

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Draft NWS Position

• NWS focus on core partners– Continue direct service to core partners – iNWS

• Limited direct support for general public– NWS web standards sensitive to access by mobile

devices (vs. “apps” designed for specific devices)– Build into weather.gov redesign / replace failed

mobile.weather.gov site

• Support commercial/academic sector development of services– information centric approach– Information more accessible; lower cost of entry– Promote visibility for available services

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Draft NWS Position

• Data Standards (current)– Common Alerting Protocol (CAP) - Emergency/alert information– Really Simple Syndication (RSS)/Atom feeds - Allow subscribers to

receive timely updates and aggregate feeds from many sites into one place

– Keyhole Markup Language (KML/KMZ) - Expresses geographic annotation and visualization on 2D and 3D maps

• Make information more accessible and lower cost of entry– Developers’ site/Wiki for better documentation of info feeds and

direct feedback to NWS– Application Programming Interface (API) for NWS data access– Developers’ conference

• Greater visibility for commercial/academic providers– Prominent public listing of mobile services (e.g., apps) that use

official NWS feeds (unaltered products, clearly labeled NWS content)– Provide information on services in NWS outreach booths

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Questions to Keep in Mind

• How can the weather enterprise (government, private sector, academia) best serve the needs of NWS core partners?

• How can the weather enterprise best serve the needs of general public/national economy?

• What do service providers need from NWS to support development of comprehensive wireless weather services?