A look ahead to ECMWF events in 2020

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Graphic for ECMWF events 2020

Registration is open for ECMWF’s 2020 Annual Seminar as well as a workshop to discuss the forecasting challenges associated with warm conveyor belts. Other events in 2020 include the Using ECMWF’s Forecasts meeting (UEF) and our workshop on high-performance computing in meteorology, taking place in Bologna, Italy, and featuring a tour of ECMWF’s new data centre.

Events of this kind are a crucial way of sharing expertise to advance weather science, bringing together the scientific community to share findings and challenges and to discuss various options for the future. Most presentations are now live-streamed.

ECMWF workshops and the Annual Seminar complement our training programme, which offers courses for our partners in Member and Co-operating States to gain a deeper understanding of numerical weather prediction and to equip users to make the most of our global predictions.

An overview of some of the key events is provided below. Full details of all our 2020 workshops and seminars are available on the Workshops web page.

Annual Seminar, 1–4 September

2020 theme: Numerical methods for atmospheric and oceanic modelling: recent advances and future prospects

The Seminar will review recent advances in numerical methods for atmospheric and oceanic models that form part of modern weather prediction systems. It will also consider how to develop efficient time-critical, very high-resolution global solvers on massively parallel architectures, addressing demanding communication and algorithmic scalability problems.

The Annual Seminar is our flagship educational event, aimed at young scientists as well as those who are more established in their field. The programme features four days of invited lectures from speakers from meteorological services, universities, ECMWF and other organisations. We also invite delegates to submit abstracts for the poster exhibition.

  • Poster abstract submission deadline: 28 June 2020
  • Registration deadline: 28 June 2020
  • More details: Annual Seminar 2020

Using ECMWF’s Forecasts (UEF), 1–4 June

2020 theme: Keeping users at the heart of operations

Our long-established user meeting is open to all ECMWF forecast users and features talks by participants and ECMWF staff, keynote addresses on specific topics, and interactive sessions to encourage networking. The meeting provides an opportunity to give feedback to ECMWF on forecast performance and on the range of available products, and to learn about recent developments of ECMWF’s forecasting system.

We will explore how end-user needs feed into the operational activities of weather and environmental information providers to deliver added-value outputs. We will be looking at ECMWF processes and how they transform research, technical development and data inputs into desired products or services for the Centre’s data users in Member and Co-operating States and around the world.

Topics will include research to operations or operations to research; novel products and services; integrating new products in established processes; and user-focused planning.

  • Registration opens: 15 January 2020
  • Abstract submission deadline: 15 March 2020
  • More details: UEF 2020

Workshop: Warm conveyor belts – a challenge to forecasting, 10–12 March

Warm conveyor belts (WCBs) are cloudy regions of ascent and strong diabatic forcing along the cold front of a synoptic depression. They can lead to heavy local precipitation and can have downstream impacts such as the onset and maintenance of blocking. They are therefore important in both weather and climate prediction.

This new workshop will bring together observation, assimilation, model, forecast and research communities to discuss the forecasting challenges associated with WCBs. The aim is to improve understanding and to help develop optimal strategies to improve weather and climate prediction – a goal which would be very difficult for a single such community to achieve on its own.

The workshop will include invited and submitted talks, and will have a strong focus on posters.


Workshop on high-performance computing in meteorology, 14–18 September, Italy

Every second year ECMWF hosts a workshop on the use of high-performance computing in meteorology. The aim is to provide a forum where users from our Member States and around the world can report on recent experience and achievements in the field of high-performance computing; plans for the future and requirements for computing power will also be presented.

ECMWF’s new high-performance computing facility will be installed at the Tecnopolo di Bologna in 2020. To mark this occasion, the 19th workshop on high-performance computing in meteorology will take place in Bologna. The workshop programme will include a visit to the new data centre.