85th AMS Annual Meeting

Tuesday, 11 January 2005
Ground Level Assimilative Model (GLAM) for Geomagnetic Storm Conditions – A System for Nowcasting and Forensic Analysis of Geomagnetic Storms
John G. Kappenman, Metatech Corp., Duluth, MN
Geomagnetic disturbances have caused widespread disruptions to power grids throughout North America and other power grids around the world. To assess the disturbances that storms can cause to power grids, it is necessary to fully describe the complex physical manifestation and morphologies of geomagnetic disturbance environments to model how and to what extent these disturbances impact modern ground-based critical infrastructures. Under a NOAA SBIR Phase 1 effort, Metatech developed and demonstrated that the Ground Level Assimilative Model (GLAM) would provide the general public and operators of land-based infrastructures concerned about GIC impacts a set of geomagnetic storm climatology data in a context that can be readily used in power network models or other infrastructure models. A meso-scale resolution geomagnetic storm modeling and visualization capability was demonstrated and validated in extensive forensic analysis of prior storms and their impacts on power grids. The results indicate that development of a Real-time GLAM that would continuously ingest real-time data and provide for high resolution synoptic visualizations are possible.

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