Air Quality Meeting during GEO-VI Plenary

From Earth Science Information Partners (ESIP)

On 18 November 2009, during the GEO-VI Plenary in Washington DC, USEPA and partners will convene a meeting on Air Quality and GEOSS. You are invited to join us. During the meeting we will discuss:

  • Air Quality Projects that contribute to GEOSS. A large, diverse group of projects are underway which strive to use earth observations to provide decision support for air quality management. Many of these projects are related to Tasks in the GEO Work Plan. In some cases similar and/or complementary projects are underway in different locations.
  • The emerging GEOSS Common Infrastructure (GCI) and the Air Quality Community Infrastructure, which is designed to interface with the GCI, so that AQ data products registered with GEOSS are more findable and usable for the AQ community.
  • The role and priorities of a GEO Air Quality Community of Practice. GEO looks to Communities of Practice to identify / prioritize needed observations and for general feedback from the wider community. An AQ CoP could also help develop and fill gaps in the GEO Work Plan, particularly for tasks that build upon the GCI and the AQ Community Infrastructure. Finally, an AQ CoP would provide a clear point-of-entry for air quality practitioners into GEO and GEOSS.

Agenda and Format

A preliminary version of the agenda is here.

Please feel free to comment on the goals and agenda, or make suggestions directly by editing these pages. Comments can be directed to David McCabe at EPA.

Presentations

Presentations will be quite short – most speakers will be limited to 10 minutes with a few minutes left over for questions for each speaker. Presentations should focus on these questions:

  • What data or service does the Project produce?
  • Who are the Project's intended target audience / users?
  • How does the Project deliver data / services? How can GEOSS help with that delivery?

To save time, please do not devote time to the societal rationales (i.e., protecting human heath) that motivates our work to understand and improve air quality. The audience for this meeting will be quite familiar with these.

Discussion

We will devote a substantial amount of time to discussion. Goals for this discussion include:

  • Identify opportunities for collaboration, coordination, and further discussion between similar Projects occurring in different locations or organizations.
    • Identify how these projects are contributing to GEOSS, and opportunities for GEOSS to benefit more from these projects
      • Registering data services in the GCI
      • Describing work underway in the GEO Work Plan
    • Identify gaps. What work is underway that needs to be connected to GEOSS? What gaps are not being addressed at all?
  • Discuss the infrastructure described (goals, approach, implementation). Is it what is needed?
    • Define, or identify how to find, best practices for contributing data to GEOSS. Many datasets (including AQ data) are currently registered in ways that do not allow the infrastructure to use that data in a full way.
  • Discuss next steps for forming an AQ Community of Practice. US EPA, GEO, and others believe that it would be very useful for the informal, ad-hoc group represented at this meeting to formalize a GEO CoP, reaching out to other colleagues to participate. What this means is flexible and open, but potential steps should include:
    • identifying points-of-contact
    • establishing a simple website with links from/to GEO
    • discussion of initial steps, e.g. review of the GEO Work Plan, review of user needs for AQ observations...

Logistics

The meeting will be held in the Ronald Reagan Building in downtown Washington DC. You will need your passport, a (US) State-issued drivers license, or a US Government ID to enter the building (and you will have to go through metal detectors if you do not have a US government ID). The meeting will be open to the public, but please contact David McCabe if you are planning to attend. See the GEO Plenary GEO Plenary page for information about lodging, etc.

The GEO Plenary exhibits will also be open to the public, in the Reagan Building, on November 17 - 18. USGEO / Agencies (NOAA, EPA, NASA...) will exhibit there, as will agencies from overseas, ESIP, and other international organizations.

The GEO Plenary itself, which is on November 17 - 18, is only open to official delegates from member nations, recognized or observer international organizations, etc.

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