Duration: 10/01/2005 to 09/30/2010

Administrative Advisor(s):

NIFA Reps:

Non-Technical Summary

Statement of Issues and Justification

Climate information, including historical, real-time and prognostic, is vital for the optimal management of agriculture and natural resources. The use of climate information supports policies, programs technologies, and practices that protect, sustain, and enhance water, soil, and air resources [drought]. Currently climatic data bases collected by Federal, state and local governments as well as private organizations are primarily stored by the organizations administering each climate data collection program. Communication among different government and private organizations is necessary to avoid duplicating climate data collection efforts and disseminate the data to all interested parties. Coordination between all entities collecting climate data could be accomplished at the national level. The State Climatologist is the coordinator of this activity at the state level, the regional climate centers accomplish the task at the regional level and NCDC stores the climate data at the national level. Internet tools need to be written by supportive organizations to fully use the climate data available on the internet. In the western United States, climate information comes from a variety of sources. Individuals as well as Federal, state and local government entities all share in the flow of information, including data collection and research into the relationships among weather, climate, agriculture and natural resources. Development of analytical tools and preparation and dissemination of analyses and forecasts are also shared. The resulting data, information, and products are used by researchers, policymakers, public land managers, extension personnel, professional consultants, growers and ranchers, to support development of new applications, transfer the technologies and practices used in the new applications, and adoption of those applications for better decision making by end users.

In particular because of the unique character of the Western U.S., with its complex climate zones, limited precipitation and the resulting dependence on water storage and transport, highly diverse agriculture, forest and rangeland structure, widely varying topography, and large percentage of publicly owned lands, coordination among these groups is critical to ensure consistency of information, efficiency of resources, and prioritization of research and its applications.

To these ends, the Western Extension Research Activity (WERA) has served, and continues to serve, a critical function in ensuring collaboration among the many and varied groups who have responsibility for climate and climate-related information in the West. In times of increasingly tight budgets, accompanied by significant economic impacts from adverse weather and variability in climate, it is prudent that the committee continue to serve as a focal point ensuring collaboration in weather and climate research and applications in the West.

Objectives

Procedures and Activities

A. Coordinate collection and dissemination of weather and climate data and information in the western U.S. and serve as a forum for discussion of related issues.

1. Identification and sharing of relevant weather and climate data and information resources.
2. Development of a set of distributed databases that will be compatible with the goals and objectives of the Automated Climate Information System (ACIS) including data from local and State Climate Offices.
3. Coordination of issues surrounding data collection and quality control/assurance, and resulting recommendations to appropriate organizations as needed to promote and ensure useful, high-quality data sets to support agriculture and natural resource research and applications.
4. Initiate the development of a data classification system according to adherence to published collection and quality control standards.

B. Identify weather and climate issues and support research related to agriculture and natural resources especially in the West.

1. Improved algorithms for landscape water management.
2. Support for monitoring and assessment of drought.
3. Development and enhancement of stochastic climate models (weather generators), and their application in agriculture and natural resources management, such as CEAP initiative to produce relevant time series scenarios that can be used in hydrological and natural resource models.
4. Development of models, calculators, and other tools that quantify or describe relationships between weather and climate and crops, forests, rangelands, pests, and diseases, including algorithms for estimating or predicting crop water use, and crop and pest phenologies for better timing of management interventions.
5. Improved understanding of climate variability and its effects on agricultural and natural resources management.

C. Coordinate the application of new climatological analysis technologies such as mesoscale modeling, remote sensing and geographic information systems.

1. Share methodologies for manipulating and presenting digital climate information spatially. Develop maps of climate elements (including temperature, frost dates and growing season, wind, snow water equivalent, etc.), using distribution and modeling techniques including physical and statistical methods.
2. Use of gridded data sets of commonly measured climatic elements, e.g., temperature, precipitation, evapotranspiration, such as OSU-SCAS 1971-2000 800m resolution United States mean monthly and annual ppt, Tmax and Tmin.
3. Coordinate wind climatologies from mesoscale models relevant to air quality, water and fire issues.
4. Identify use of Geographic Positioning Satellite (GPS) derived estimates of precipitable water.

D. Promote access to, and use of weather- and climate-based products in order to improve monitoring and decision making related to agriculture and natural resources issues (e.g.; drought, fire, water supply).

1. Improved, more effective presentation and dissemination methods for climate information using electronic media.
2. Improved dissemination of information critical to integrated crop and water management, including model outputs ready for application by agriculture and natural resource managers.
3. Drought advisories that may be applicable to policymakers, water managers, and end users.
4. Share methods to evaluate how well products and services are meeting users needs, including utilization of advisory structures and other feedback mechanisms. Conduct workshop in FY06 regarding how to measure the effectiveness of climate data/tools/product dissemination.
5. Promote use of revised precipitation depth-duration-frequency maps and information for the Western states.
6. Develop tools needed to be able to use climate data available on the internet from any climate network. The tools could include a drought return period calculator, irrigation scheduling programs, rainfall return period calculator, etc.
7. Provide information on the WERA-102 web site.

Expected Outcomes and Impacts

Projected Participation

View Appendix E: Participation

Educational Plan

Agricultural meteorology and climatology are integral sciences in virtually all research sectors of the AES. Participants are called upon to provide consultation to other researchers, extension personnel, and end users such as growers and consultants. A major focus of the WERA-102 is the development and dissemination of weather and climate information related to agricultural and natural resources management. Another purpose of the WERA-102 is the on-going education of its participants regarding activities of the complex web of agencies involved in weather and climate monitoring and application in the West. Specifically, the WERA-102 will: (1) Conduct detailed educational sessions at each annual meeting about current priority issues. For example, we will conduct one workshop on evaluation of product and outreach effectiveness; as well as a cooperative discussions regarding database quality descriptors, and confidence intervals; (2) Coordinate and publicize the availability of sources of weather and climate information; (3) Provide information and documentation about the various weather and climate-related products generated and disseminated under the Objectives and; (4) Provide a web page and ability to post committee progress and interaction.

Organization/Governance

Governance will be standard. Two officers are elected each year: A chair, who develops the agenda and leads the annual meeting and a secretary who prepares the minutes and the annual report. Traditionally, the secretary becomes the chair the following year.

Literature Cited

Chu, P.-S., W. Yan, F. Fujioka, 2002: Fire-climate relationships and long-lead seasonal wildfire prediction for Hawaii. International Journal of Wildland Fire, 11:25-31.

Doggett, M., C. Daly, J. Smith, W. Gibson, G. Taylor, G. Johnson and P. Pasteris, 2003: High-resolution 1971-2000 mean monthly temperature maps for the western United States. In: Preprints, 14th AMS Conf. Appl. Climatology, Jan. 11-15, Seattle WA.

Hanson, C.L, F.B. Pierson, G.L. Johnson, 2004: Dual-gauge system for measuring precipitation: Historical development and use. ASCE J. Hydrologic Engineering, Sept/Oct., pp. 350-359.

Harmel, R.D., C.W. Richardson, G.L. Johnson, 2002: Evaluating the adequacy of simulating maximum and minimum daily air temperature with the normal distribution. J. Appl. Meteor., 41, 744-753.

Johnson, G.L, J. Marron, C. Daly, G.H. Taylor, S. Hollinger and J. Angel, 2002: Mapping erosive potential across the United States. In: Preprints, 13th AMS Conf. Appl. Climatology, May 13-16, Portland OR. pp. 199-204.

Johnson, G.L., C. Daly and G.H. Taylor, 2004: An examination of the characteristics and time series of temperature and precipitation-related variables in western mountain systems. Poster and Abstract, Mountain Climate Sciences Symposium, May 25-27, Kings Beach Lake Tahoe, CA.

Jones, C., P.E. Dennison, F.M. Fujioka, D.R. Weise, J.W. Benoit, 2003: Analysis of space/time characteristics of errors in an integrated weather/fire spread simulation. Proc., 5th Symposium on Fire and Forest Meteorology, American Meteorological Society, Nov. 2003, Orlando, FL; J2.8:1-7.

Pielke, R.A. Sr., J.O. Adegoke, T.N. Chase, C.H. Marshall, T. Matsui, and D. Niyogi, 2005: A new paradigm for assessing the role of agriculture in the climate system and in climate change. Agric. Forest Meteor., Special Issue, submitted. http://blue.atmos.colostate.edu/publications/pdf/R-295.pdf

Roads, J.O., S.-C. Chen, F. Fujioka, 2001: ECPCs weekly to seasonal global forecasts. Bull. American Meteorological Society, 82:639-658.

Taylor, G.H., C. Daly, G.L. Johnson and P. Pasteris, 2004: Trends in snowfall and snow water equivalent in the Pacific Northwest, and their relation to temperature and precipitation variations. Poster and Abstract, Mountain Climate Sciences Symposium, May 25-27, Kings Beach Lake Tahoe, CA.

Attachments

Land Grant Participating States/Institutions

AZ, CA, CO, NM, NV, NY, OR, TX, WY

Non Land Grant Participating States/Institutions

BLM, FS-PSW, OR, US Bureau of Reclamation, USDA-NRCS