Quantifying the Benefits of Meteorological Services APM Benefits Summit 2016

Claire Ross

Contents • Business case for a new supercomputer

• Evidence of real life

• Success criteria

Business Case for a new supercomputer

Business Case

Generic Benefit Map

Customers

Decision making

process

Changes to

Prediction Models

Improved Generic

Prediction

Capabilities

Business Changes

Socio-Economic

Beneficiaries

Increase in

Supercomputer

Capacity

MET

OFFICE

UK

ECONOMY

Improved

customer specific

services

SEB Case Studies

Use case 1-5 day

forecasts

Seasonal Decadal+ Additional

value over

5 years

Land travel √ ~£75k

Airport

operations

√ ~£300k

Flooding √ ~£250k

Food chain √ √ ~£100k

Renewables √ √ ~£500k

Climate

change

√ ~£900k

“Standard” SEB Methodology – cost-loss model

Event A

happens

Event B

happens

Forecast

event A

HIT FALSE

ALARM

Forecast

event B

MISS HIT

Event A

happens

Event B happens

Forecast

event A

Improved

HIT rate

Reduced FALSE

ALARM rate

Forecast

event B

Reduced

MISS rate

Improved HIT rate

Event A

happens

Event B

happens

Action for

event A

£ correct £ wrong

Action for

event B

£ wrong £ correct

Event A

happens

Event B

happens

Action for

event A

£ correct Fewer £

wrong

Action for

event B

Fewer £

wrong

£ correct

Land Transport – Quarmby Review

• severe winters of 2008/09 and 2009/10;

• Scaled up to include whole of UK so …

• … scaled down meteorological extent;

• scaled down for attribution to Met Office HPC

Loss of Information Value The

perfect

forecast

Accuracy

Accessibility

Understanding

Willingness

to react

Ability to

react

Effectiveness

of response

Actual Value of

Benefit

Maximum

Potential Value of

Benefit

Climate Change SEB Methodology – Integrated Assessment Model

Evidence of Real Life

Generic Benefit Chain with measuring points

Customers

Socio-Economic

Beneficiaries

Decision making

process

Changes to

Prediction Models

Improved Generic

Prediction

Capabilities

Business Changes

GDP Sector

Increase in

Supercomputer

Capacity

MET

OFFICE

UK

ECONOMY

Improved

customer specific

services

Qualitative

descriptions

Quantitative

verification

statistics

Quantitative

Perception

surveys

Quantitative

Govt statistics

Qualitative

Benefit Maps

Customer Indicators – the challenges

• customers may not collect appropriate data;

• commercial sensitivities;

• data costly to collect and analyse;

• external factors influencing indicators;

Value Attenuation Model for Climate Information ?

Individual benefit

cases

HCCP Programme

Monitoring

Reduced

uncertainty in

reversable

climate

change

Increased

understanding

of triggers for

irreversable

events

SME Advice

Stakeholders

Politics

International

negotiations

on GHG

emissions

Review UK

GHG

emission

targets

Review

abatement

policies

Review

mitigation

policies

Review

adaption

policies

CMIP / IPCC

UKCPnext

Economics

Integrated

assessment

model

International

economic

growth

International

abatement

activity

UK abatement

activities

UK mitigation

activities

UK adaption

activities

Climate change

cost avoided

Stern Review Costs:

Reversible ~4% UK GDP; high

probability;

Irreversible ~4% UK GDP; low

probaability

Stern Review

Costs:

~2% GDP

~3% GDP

assuming 1:1.5

CBA

Adaption economic

opportunities

Value Attenuation for Climate Change Research

Draft 1/3/2016

Activity specific

research

tbc

Government Statistics – the challenges

• need to remove influence of the actual weather;

• would include impact of all decision threads;

• climate change information influences policy not economic activity;

Wheat Yield

Re-Run SEB Case Study Models

• doesn’t evidence theoretical value chain;

• original case studies only considered forecast accuracy improvements not longer lead times;

• point-in-time rather than ongoing;

• doesn’t reflect any new or changed customer processes

What will success look like?

Success Criteria

• annual report to BIS (and Treasury?)

• approval of next Met Office investment business case!

• enhancement of Met Office’s General Review http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/learning/library/publications/corporate

• … and PWS value-for-money http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/about-us/what/pws/value

Any Questions?

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