New Data Portal to Help Analyse Climate Risks

The information will help facilities managers understand climate change better

A new climate data portal by the Met Office went live recently with a focus on helping facilities managers better manage buildings. The Met Office’s Climate Data Portal aims to give organisations improved access to climate data and other resources, allowing them to better understand and respond to climate change.

It is a part of the Met Office’s wider strategy to maximise the benefits of its data and contains 60 different data layers, as well as guidance and information. The portal also makes it easier for any business or government organisation to combine open climate data with their own data and reveal the future impact of extreme conditions on their operations, including heat waves, floods or droughts.

Besides, it presents complex scientific climate projections in “easy-to-use formats, ready to visualise and analyse in GIS [geographic information systems] and non-spatial applications or integrate into business processes for improved decision making”. The Met Office says that spatial analysis can be performed at “a global, regional or local level, enabling location-specific action plans to be developed”.

The project is part of the strategic partnership between the Met Office and software company Esri UK, which have been working together for more than 20 years. Professor Jason Lowe, head of climate services at the Met Office, said, “Historically, climate science has defined the problem – now it’s moving to help with the solution, providing information at a local level which is highly relevant to UK organisations. By combining the Met Office’s latest projections with Esri UK's geospatial tools, the reach and value of this data is greatly extended. UK stakeholders can investigate their physical climate risks over the next 50 to 100 years.” He added, “The most detailed climate projections reveal a greater chance of warmer, wetter winters and hotter, drier summers – and these help users plan and prepare for extreme weather, climate change and the reporting which new regulations, linked to climate change, will require.”

The portal will also provide insight to help organisations start their response to regulatory climate reporting programmes such as TCFD (Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures), which is being rolled out across the UK. Pete Wilkinson, managing director of Esri UK, added, “The Climate Data Portal is a giant step forward in making climate data more usable for UK stakeholders. Climate change presents a major challenge, and this challenge is a geographic one. Using geospatial technology as a delivery mechanism for climate data makes it quickly accessible and usable in spatial and temporal analysis, helping to identify at-risk areas and develop location-specific action plans.”