NOAA Information Systems

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) collects vast amounts of environmental information. These data include weather, climate, oceanographic and ecological information. Collected, cataloged, and maintained by several NOAA offices, the data characteristics vary in both format and accessibility. Our challenge is to create an environment to allow seamless access of these data. The Global Earth Observing System of Systems extends beyond NOAA to important geophysical data available internationally.

NOAA is starting to address this challenge. The concept of the “One NOAA Environmental Information System” has been proposed to bridge these gaps. The concept is to interconnect all information sources (data, model outputs, studies, etc) within an “intranet” using web technologies and to develop useful visualization tools. Standards for accessing data would be defined and available within NOAA, advancing the quantity of data available to its research community.

In addition, new and innovative visualization tools will be available to peruse data sets. Leveraging current GIS standards as well as readily available software tools, a user will be able to pinpoint all of NOAA's data within geographical boundaries, and view a fusion of these data in a timely manner. Extracting this information in various forms (png, gif, text) would allow more advanced processing (spreadsheets, presentations, etc).

The challenge for NOAA's future is great. The quantity of observation data over the next decade is growing tremendously. Recognizing and developing an information environment to complement the investments in observing systems is paramount. This paper will explore visionary ideas using these data for NOAA's, and the public's, best interest.