Recent Progress and Future Plans for NCEP Global Data Assimilation

The NCEP Global Data Assimilation System (GDAS) is a critical component of the NCEP production Suite. There have been several recent upgrades to the GDAS to allow for improved use of observations. At the same time, plans are already underway for version 17 of the Global Forecast System (GFS), which will include a major upgrade to the GDAS to evolve toward a coupled assimilation system to initialize the coupled model application derived from the Unified Forecast System. This presentation will give a brief summary of the recent developments and future plans for the GDAS.

Within the context of the UFS, the integration of a unified data assimilation system based on the Joint Effort for Data assimilation Integration (JEDI) is underway. As part of this process, NCEP has developed a strategy for data assimilation over the next decade. This presentation will also provide highlights of this longer term strategy, including the identification of key challenges and priorities.