Automation of State Climate Office Processes & Products: Developing Efficient Approaches for Data Dissemination

• Main Author: Shoop, Michael
• Format: Others
• Language: English
• Published: Digital Commons @ East Tennessee State University 2019
• Subjects: Python; Automation; GIS; Climate; web application; Tennessee; Geographic Information Sciences
• Online Access: https://dc.etsu.edu/etd/3626; https://dc.etsu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=5084&context=etd

State Climate Offices (SCO’s) in the United States are critical conduits for improving weather and climate data in local communities. Two states do not have a state-recognized SCO: Tennessee and Massachusetts. Efforts are underway at East Tennessee State University to develop the Tennessee Climate Office (TCO). Currently, climate services and products are severely lacking across Tennessee. This thesis provides an improved methodology for an existing TCO product and outlines the development of a new product using Python scripting. Daily storm reports within the monthly climate report are automated and a Weather Forecasts Hazard Index (WFHI) web application is developed. Both products utilize data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), with the automated daily storm reports providing substantial time savings and the WFHI providing a high resolution web application for emergency managers and others to interpret potentially hazardous forecasts for extreme temperatures, high winds, snowfall/ice accumulation, and tornado/hail events.