COSPAR ISWAT/PSW Panel Session - - Wednesday 29 September 2021 - 12:00UT-14:00UT.
Questions and important information from the Zoom Chat
From Mario Bisi:
Question for Jim: How does the 6.4, b., iii., International Agency SWx Coordination Group look to your mind? Follow-up to other panellists, based on Jim's response, what are your initial thoughts on that?
From Matt Taylor:
Question to Jim Spann, how would/can this International Agency Space Weather Coordination Group fit with ILWS?
From Jim Spann:
link for NASA space weather gap analysis - https://science.nasa.gov/science-pink/s3fs-public/atoms/files/GapAnalysisReport_full_final.pdf
From Mario Bisi:
UK Severe Space Weather Preparedness Strategy: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/uk-severe-space-weather-preparedness-strategy
From Masha Kuznetsova:
Question to Mark: There is a long road between unmet needs and new scientific knowledge that can be incorporated into capabilities. Do we need a Roadmap for this?
From Mario Bisi:
To Jussi: Are there plans for ESA to expand its ground-based infrastructures/capabilities as the Space Safety Programme evolves?
From Mario Bisi:
To Mark and Jussi: What more can be done, at least within Europe, to better-coordinate and better-align funding to meet national and European needs?
From Mario Bisi:
ESWW2021/ESWW17: http://esww17.iopconfs.org/ - registrations close soon!
From Jim Spann:
@MattTaylor The idea of this International Agency Space Weather Coordination Group would be that it would be a forum for those agencies that fund space weather research and observations to plan, coordinate and partner to implement space weather activities. In some ways it is a reboot of ILWS.
From Matt Taylor:
@JimSpann - ok, but if ILWS may already be re-booting? So we should avoid re-inventing the wheel or parallel activities. Perhaps we should talk :)
From Mario Bisi:
Thanks @Jim - I'll ask Matt to bring this up - and we can have this as one of the discussion areas...
From Jussi Luntama:
@Mario & everybody: ESA is working on projects including enhancement of ground based measurement system and we are planning to expand this role in the next phase of the Programme. We have already some ideas that have also been discussed with the users.
From Mario Bisi:
For Mpho: Is it just the ICAO products that require the ISO9001 certification, or do you want to use this standard for all your SPx products going forward?
From Hermann Opgenoorth:
Agreed, but remember ILWS was strictly aiming at coordination of “space weather enabling science” from multi-agency missions. I think coordinating SWx efforts may be wider… Like Mission ground-based models, prediction and user products.
Lets discuss!
From Joaquim Costa:
I agree, we may take some lessons from the consortium for ICAO and/or ESA for practicing how to work with a large number of members.
From Matt Taylor:
I was hoping you would speak up Hermann :)
From Nat Gopaswamy:
Look at Jim's paper
in https://cdaw.gsfc.nasa.gov/publications/ilws_goa2006/ on ILWS future collaborations
From Mario Bisi:
For all panellists: As representatives of agencies/countries that already have established good engagement with policy makers and also engagement on the recognition of the risks of space weather, how might people/organisations in other countries also try to do this in their home country? Are there best practices for starting this engagement process?
From Mario Bisi:
What on-going Roadmap update efforts will be useful for national/regional space-weather programmes?
And
What recommendations do you have for the updated roadmap to make it more useful beyond scientists?
From Mpho:
@Mario, because ICAO is highly regulated, once we get the products to their standard, then it will be easy to use the same products for other sectors as well. We may need to tailor them to suit their needs. This is what the new business model for SANSA is looking at.
From Masha Kuznetsova:
It does not matter how the activity is called. Making progress, remove barriers for partnership is the most important.
From Graciela Molina:
A comment,
Joaquim, as you may know, Argentina has different groups/institutions working in SWx, instrumentation and operative products e.g. in Tucumán, Argentina. There isn't a single centralized group. In this sense, we are interested in collaborating with other groups in a complementary manner to enhance SWx in Latam. I think it will be good for Latam to add the different groups capabilities.
From Mauro Messerotti:
With regard to the creation of an international agency for SWx coordination, I can see many issues both in founding it and in having it properly and effectively operating. In fact, an agency of this kind should be recognised by all the national agencies and organisations. This mean that it has to be authoritative in the coordination. Obviously, two key aspects arise: 1. who can provide this accepted status to this agency? 2. Would the role of this agency conflict with national policies and politics, i.e., with the sovereignty? I can see that only UN can have such a role. Any comments?
From Masha Kuznetsova:
Forum and Agency is not the same. The less bureaucracy the better
From Jussi Luntama:
@Mauro: It is not so much about authority, because the main target is to share information.
From Iwona Stanisławska:
Right. And UN is exactly for it.
From Masha Kuznetsova:
Agency who investing money into development of space weather capabilities (including modeling) need a Forum to agree how to join forces and maximize return on investments.
From Iwona Stanisławska:
Information is crucial.
An increase of UN COPUOS Expert Group activity is needed
From Masha Kuznetsova:
To Jussi: Sharing information is important. How about facilitating collaborative model development? How to maximize return on investments on development forecasting capabilities?
From Mauro Messerotti:
Jussi: for what you are saying, no agency is needed but just a high level forum, as Masha was stressing
From Dibyendu Nandi:
I believe there is a need to reactivate ILWS, which in many ways was playing a role in catalyzing global cooperation in space weather sciences. Alternatively, UN/COSPAR can take this up as recognized International bodies with some amount of credibility across nations. Problem is without funding for these activities, any major initiative would soon dissipate.
From Mike Marsh:
Should the coordination issue being discussed be covered by the WMO Inter-programme Coordination Team on Space Weather? If not, why not, what is missing?
From Iwona Stanisławska:
Right
From Jussi Luntama:
@Masha and Mauro: My view is a forum is the target. We do not have a need for yet another agency or international body. There are existing frameworks where this can be established.
From Christina Plainaki:
Hi all. I apologise for joining late…..I am out of office, officially in vacation nevertheless I managed to connect. Just wanted to stress out that I agree with the view of Jussi. I also think that there are existing frameworks and groups through which effective coordination can be achieved. We just need to define the best actions to reach the goal.
From Jussi Luntama:
@MIke: WMO is re-establishing their expert group. If all relevant entities are present, that might be a suitable framework. One issue is that WMO has very thin internal resources for space weather related work and WMO Member States have not been willing to increase those for the last 10 years.
From Mauro Messerotti:
Jussi: my comment was provocative. In fact, according to my view a well organised forum is the only viable solution. Considering the issues which are intrinsic to such an agency, I am almost sure that I could not work or even being funded. For the same reason, to say the truth, I am skeptical about the Quo Vadis initiative as well.
From Nat Gopalswamy:
ICG (for GNSS) has a good track record. If member states put enough resources into an International Coordination committee for Space Weather (ICS), it is can become an excellent neutral forum for coordination and collaboration
From Jussi Luntama:
@Mauro: I think provocation is what this discussion needs. As I said, I do not have a single solution in mind, but there are good options for frameworks without creating a new agency or organisation.
From Mauro Messerotti:
@Jussi: fully agree
From Jussi Luntama:
@Nat: I think you are touching the key issue: there has not been much interest in the states to make such coordination group feasible. It is not a huge investment, but such a group would require as minimum a hosting entity and 1-2 full time people.
From Nat Gopalswamy:
@Jussi: I agree Jussi. 1-2 people and some resources should be straightforward. We can even depute some people from spacefaring countries to temporarily work at UNOOSA for ICS.
From Manuela Temmer:
sorry, I need to jump to another meeting. Anyway, we are talking in circles here…my opinion…UN would be the best overarching coordination platform.
From Jussi Luntama:
@Nat: I have had some initial discussions about such secondment in ESA and the first reactions were positive. So, if there is will, there are means to do that.
From Dibyendu Nandi:
COSPAR Space Weather Panel already has a large group of representatives from various space faring nations and organizations working in space weather sciences. Perhaps to move this forward we can host a meeting of this group along with UNOOSA and ILWS representatives and chart a course forward.
From Mark Gibbs:
To support Mpho. ICAO require all service providers (not just space weather providers) to be ISO9001 certified.
From Matt Taylor:
I have to leave . Thanks! Very interesting discussion. I think here in ESA we need to look at science and operational services and how they can be spoken about in the same sentence. This feeds into coordination (sorry Mario :) ) which we need to do efficiently and with teeth at agency level. I think there is hope.
From Nat Gopalswamy:
@Dinbyendu. The main problem is ILWS and COSPAR have resources support scientific activities. They do not have the resources for international coordination in hardware, programs, and operations.
From Mark Gibbs:
Thanks to everyone for the interesting questions and debate.
From Lucia Abbo:
Thanks to everyone for the opportunity to attend to this exciting session. I just listened but carefully!
From Masha Kuznetsova:
Dibyendu, the approach is to relay on programs funded by national agencies. The Forum is to facilitate alignment between programs and facilitating collaborations between funded activities.
From Caterina Tiburzi:
I need to leave - see you soon!
From Dibyendu Nandi:
@Nat agree. But we can achieve a better alternative consortium only if we can get all space agencies and space weather organizations to come together and commit to resources including joint mission planning and resource sharing. That is hard as it is between two agencies, I am not sure how this is going to work with N agencies. I am not a big fan of top down approaches.
From Mike Marsh:
I think there's a lack of acceptance within the space weather community as a whole that space weather research and operations are motivated by different goals. Research is driven by gaps in scientific knowledge and operations is driven by gaps in user capability. These sometimes can conflict and ultimately issues due to a conflict may depend on how both are funded.
From Mario Bisi:
Thank you all - much appreciated for an informative and interactive session!
From Iwona Stanisławska:
Thanks for this discussion. It allows to have a hope.
From Mark Gibbs:
thanks for coordinating this Mario
From James Spann:
Thank you to everyone for the great discussion. Great ideas have been put forth. Now we need to cook it a bit to make the perfect dish.
From Mario Bisi:
No problem Mark - you're welcome.
From Dibyendu Nandi:
@Nat agree. But we can achieve a better alternative consortium only if we can get all space agencies and space weather organizations to come together and commit to resources including joint mission planning and resource sharing. That is hard as it is between two agencies, I am not sure how this is going to work with N agencies. I am not a big fan of top down approaches.
From Juha-Pekka Luntama:
Thanks everybody. This was a very interesting panel with great discussion. Let’s continue this in Glasgow.
From Christina Plainaki:
Thank you all