Professional Documents
Culture Documents
March 2016
DIVISION ON E ARTH AND LIFE STUDIES
Improved subseasonal
to seasonal forecasts
will inform critical
planning and
management decisions
that must be made
weeks to months in
advance.
Water Resources
Agriculture
CLIMATE
PROJECTIONS
THREAT
ASSESSMENTS
2 Weeks
1 Week
FO
RE
CE
T UN
CAS
Aviation
Plan evacuations and sorties
Issue aviation weather alerts
Days
R TA I N T
Hours
WATCHES
Minutes
SUBSEASONAL TO SEASONAL
DECISION TIMESCALES
Energy
Emergency Management
SHORT-TERM
FORECASTS
Months
Years
Seasons
Maritime Planning
SEASONAL
OUTLOOK
GUIDANCE
Infrastructure planning
Plan for water allocation during
drought
Manage reservoir levels for
flood control
Figure 1.S2S
forecasts (shown
in blue and green)
fill a gap between
short-term weather
and ocean forecasts
(shown in red) and
longer-term Earth
system projections
(shown in black).
They inform critical
decisions (also
shown in blue and
green) across many
different sectors by
providing information about likely
conditions between
these more established prediction
times.
SOURCE: Modified
from the Earth System
Prediction Capability
Office.
Observations
Data Assimilation
Models