Action 719’s objective was to broaden and enhance the potential of GIS to advance research in the fields of climatology and meteorology. New applications were developed with the emphasis on the procedures and capabilities for integrating and adding value to data from various sources. Applications relating to control and presentation of climate and other related data were also developed. The Action fostered European cooperation in the development of operational GIS applications in meteorology and climate research and strengthened links between National Meteorological Services, the research community and GIS industry.
The more detailed objectives included: regularly assess the state-of-the-art of GIS tools (software/hardware) and developments in progress, assess the availability, content and accessibility of meteorological, climatological and other relevant data sets; and assess the potential and limitations of GIS (interpolation) tools for spatialisation of meteorological and climate data. Action dissemination efforts informed a range of users, scientists, technologies suppliers and data providers about both existing expertise and the results of the Action itself. Other Action outcomes included b-testing of ArcGIS 9.2, questionnaires on the use of GIS software in the meteorological and climatological community, participation in projects like UNIDART and Land-SAF and active participation in the INSPIRE initiative. In spite of some obstacles, an inventory of data programmes and available geographical datasets was prepared. The Action successfully compared spatialisation algorithms for several meteorological elements, from several countries, in different scales (mean monthly air temperature, daily minimum and maximum temperature, precipitation totals and extreme precipitation totals, surface wind power density, surface wind velocity, air pollution and air quality, global radiation, sunshine duration and cloudiness, snow cover depth, various climate indices and phenological data). The Action carried out a comparative analysis of different interpolation methods for main meteorological elements (air temperature, precipitation totals). A literature review of previous studies on inter-comparisons of interpolation methods was also produced. The scientific results of the Action 719 have appeared in 14 scientific contributions.
