Introducing The Space Weather Roundtable

The PROSWIFT Act directed NOAA, NASA, and NSF to work with the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM) to create a Space Weather Government-Academic-Commercial Roundtable. The objective of the Roundtable is to to facilitate communication and knowledge transfer among Government participants in the White House Space Weather Operations, Research, and Mitigation (SWORM) Subcommittee, the academic community, and the burgeoning commercial space weather sector.

The Roundtable membership includes 15 members from the academic, government and commercial sectors, as well as participants from NASA, NOAA, NSF and the DoD. It fosters dialog with different groups and sectors of the Space Weather Enterprise through in-person meetings and monthly telecons. The discussions include activities that will facilitate advances in understanding space weather, its impacts, and how to forecast them.

The fact we were convened by an Act of Congress (PROSWIFT Act) means we can look at the US National Space Weather "Enterprise" as a whole and ask ourselves how it could be improved or transformed to better serve the Nation. “Business as usual” is not in the National Interest – so what changes would be helpful? The Roundtable is a Brainstorming group, exploring the "art of the possible", and generating new ideas that can strengthen the US National Space Weather Enterprise. The Roundtable is also identifying Gaps that prevent the Enterprise from being as effective as it might otherwise be. We explore why are there Gaps, and what are the blockers that are preventing them from being filled. We discuss those blockers in terms of money, politics, awareness, missing technology, lack of a sponsor, contracting issues, etc.

Lively discussions during the first year of the Space Weather Roundtable have included: the importance of, and support for, ground-based observations in support of space weather research and operations; how to enhance the success of various R2O2R programs, Technology Readiness Levels and crossing the Valley of Death; the need for Space Weather Testbeds; Observing System Simulation Experiments (OSSEs) and their usefulness in determining the impact of different datasets on specification and forecasting; establishing space weather benchmarks; how commercial space weather providers can contribute to the Enterprise; how commercial providers can help NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center (SWPC) address requests from SWPC customers; space weather modeling and data products developed by commercial companies that could be utilized by government, and how that transition could be accomplished; the need for a Decadal Survey for space weather operations ; the pause in funding for NASA’s Geospace Dynamics Constellation (GDC) mission.

For more information visit: https://www.nationalacademies.org/our-work/space-weather-roundtable