Next Steps in Establishing Benchmarks for Extreme Space Weather Events (Invited Presentation)

The United States kicked off their Next Step Space Weather Benchmark effort in the spring of 2019. The goal is to refine the Space Weather Benchmarks released by the U.S. National Science and Technology Council in 2018. The objective is to set benchmarks for extreme space weather events by quantifying extreme values of five observable environmental parameters: induced geo-electric fields, ionizing radiation, ionospheric disturbances, solar radio bursts, and upper atmosphere expansion. This talk will discuss the recommendations and priorities developed by a group of 32 leading space weather scientists and broad community input. The report makes recommendations for longer-term studies, data acquisition, and future research activities to improve the extreme space weather benchmark values, reduce their uncertainties, and improve their usability.

The Next Step Space Weather Benchmark project is sponsored jointly by NSF and NASA and coordinated by the IDA Science and Technology Policy Institute (STPI).