Evolving NOAA's Climate Data Portfolio In Response to Validated Sectoral Needs

NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI) operationally provides hundreds of long term homogeneous weather and climate data records and assessments that describe Earth’s atmosphere, oceans and land surface. For decades, these data have underpinned leading climate research and modeling efforts and provided key insights into weather and climate changes.  Recently, NCEI has focused on improving its support to decision-makers in economic and societal sectors beyond climate research by emphasizing use-inspired product development and information services that facilitate prosperity and resiliency. Accordingly, NCEI has begun rigorously assessing customer needs and user applications. In parallel, NCEI is analyzing and adjusting its product portfolio to best address those needs and applications. In this presentation, we will describe NCEI’s new approaches to capturing needs, performing use analytics, and molding a more responsive portfolio. We will summarize the findings of a quantitative relevance- and cost-scoring analysis that suggests the relative effectiveness of NCEI science and service investments. Finally, we will describe NCEI’s effort to review, document and validate customer-driven product requirements. Results will help guide future prioritization of measurements, research and development, and product services.