News

An upgrade of ECMWF’s Integrated Forecasting System to Cycle 48r1 on 27 June has substantially improved the skill of the Centre’s weather predictions and has increased the resolution of medium-range ensemble forecasts.

The ECMWF Annual Report 2022 is now available online, reviewing progress towards the goals set out in our ten-year Strategy under the pillars of ‘Science and technology’, ‘Impact’, and ‘Organisation and people’.

The global-mean surface air temperature was more than 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels in early June, which is a first for a summer month, the EU-funded Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) implemented by ECMWF has said.

Forecasts assembled by the EU’s Copernicus Climate Change Service implemented by ECMWF predict a growing El Niño event, which is a prolonged period of abnormally high sea-surface temperatures in the tropical Pacific Ocean.

The urban environment will for the first time be considered in ECMWF’s Integrated Forecasting System (IFS) from next year. This is important because in cities temperatures are often elevated compared to their surroundings.

Researchers from any organisation in ECMWF Member States are invited to apply for computing resources as part of the Special Project framework. For projects to start at the beginning of 2024, requests should be submitted before 30 June 2023.

In the next upgrade of ECMWF’s Integrated Forecasting System, extended-range forecasts will have 101 instead of 51 ensemble members and will run more frequently than before, at a consistent horizontal resolution of 36 km.

Machine learning was a prominent theme to which ECMWF scientists contributed at the European Geosciences Union (EGU) General Assembly 2023, while other issues related to weather forecasting across different timescales were represented, too.

Cycle 48r1 of ECMWF’s Integrated Forecasting System, which is to become operational this summer, will include extensive changes to the way the initial conditions of weather forecasts are established.

The spring 2023 issue of the ECMWF Newsletter is now available. As well as news about ECMWF staff and events, it features articles about new developments and the use that can be made of ECMWF products.