White House Opens Climate Data, Launches Innovation Challenges

In his FY15 budget, President Obama proposed a sweeping, multi-agency push for new research and improved infrastructure to combat the effects of global climate change. The largest piece of the president’s climate effort is a $1 billion Climate Resistance Fund, intended to fund climate-change preparedness at the federal, state and local level. Though the budget has not found much support in Congress, the administration has begun moving forward with other parts of the climate strategy, launching a Climate Data Initiative to make potentially valuable climate data available to entrepreneurs developing climate-related products.

The White House recently unveiled the full scope of its Climate Data Initiative, along with details of private sector and foundation efforts that will be launched in concert with the administration’s push.  The federal data.gov site now features a section devoted to climate data, which can be downloaded and freely used by individuals, businesses, researchers and others.  In addition to making existing federal data related to climate available to the public, NOAA has issued a request for information for partners to help make the vast amounts of data it collects each day on weather patterns available to commercial services and other potential users.

Businesses, universities and foundations will help promote easy access and use of this data through federal partnerships. For example, Intel Corporation, MIT Climate CoLab and EcoHack are planning events and competitions to spur the use of the data in visualizations, apps and simulation models. Other groups, including Google and Microsoft, plan to offer additional resources, such as mapping data and cloud storage, that can assist in the creation of tools. Read the White House summary of the administration’s Climate Data Initiative…

The new, climate-focused addition to data.gov provides access to federal datasets covering weather, coastline vulnerability, population, evacuation routes, flood hazards, transportation infrastructure and more. Over 100 datasets are now available, which the administration hopes will provide the basis for software and mobile apps that will generate new jobs and inform people about climate change.  View the data sets…

The federal government will promote the commercialization of this data through its own series of competitions. NASA and the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) have launched an innovation challenge focused on the use of data related to coastal flooding. This challenge is part of the ongoing International Space Apps Challenge, which culminates in a two-day app development event that takes place in cities around the world.

Read more about the NASA NOAA Innovation Challenge on Coastal Vulnerability and Preparedness…