The Big Data Project (BDP) is an initiative undertaken by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to increase public availability of large volumes of environmental data collected and generated by the agency. As part of the Big Data Project, Unidata is working in collaboration with Amazon Web Services (AWS) on a demonstration project to provide access to a more than twenty years of archived NEXRAD Level II radar data — augmented continuously with new, real-time data — stored in Amazon's Simple Storage Service (S3) environment. In addition to assisting AWS with ingesting new data flowing from the NEXRAD sites, Unidata Program Center staff have set up a THREDDS Data Server in the AWS environment to provide services allowing community access to the stored data.
The Thriving Earth Exchange (TEX) is an activity sponsored by the Amercan Geophysical Union (AGU) with a focus on real-world environmental challenges that local communities face within three areas: natural hazards/disasters, natural resources, and climate change. TEX endeavors to build collaborative relationships between scientists and non-scientists and help them design and implement local solutions together.
TEX and Amazon Web Services (AWS) are collaborating to use cloud-computing and Earth and space science to advance solutions to community challenges related to natural resources, climate change and natural hazards. Together, they have issued “Sharing Solutions Challenge” with the title “Using Earth and space science and cloud computing to advance community solutions.” For this challenge, they are looking for projects that have working prototypes that address community challenges using Earth science data or tools. Winning projects will receive $15,000 in grant funds to use AWS on-demand cloud services, Free registration to attend the annual 2015 AGU Fall Meeting, and creative assistance and direction in developing videos that highlight the work.
The Open Journal of Cloud Computing (OJCC) is preparing a special issue on Sustainable High Performance Computing, and is soliciting papers for submission before September 10, 2015. Dr. Sen Chiao, Associate Professor of Meteorology and Climate Science at San Jose State University (and a member of the Unidata Users Committee) is one of the guest editors producing the issue.
