By Tech Brew Staff
less than 3 min read
Definition:
Predictive climate data is AI-generated data based on historical weather and natural disaster patterns, as well as traditional forecasting that predicts future weather and natural disasters, while taking climate changes into account. It helps users manage risks caused by the climate crisis. For example, predictive climate data might forecast future storms, floods, and heat waves.
Some predictive climate data is publicly available, while other datasets are bought from companies that specialize in generating them. The data can be based on geographic information system (GIS) data from the US Geological Survey, federally funded data from National Laboratories available through public-private partnerships, or data from public agencies.
What’s it for?
Safety first: Predictive climate data is one of the pillars of climate resilience, or the government policies and business decisions based on knowledge of future weather events that help keep people, buildings, and company assets safe. If predictive climate data tells city leaders they’re in for extremely hot summers, for example, they might invest in publicly available cooling centers and shaded infrastructure for public spaces. If the data indicates there could be extreme snowstorms where a company is headquartered, company leadership might hire a snowplow—or plan some work from home days.
Grid resilience
Sometimes company assets are connections to the electrical grid, which need to be reinforced in the event of extreme weather caused by the climate crisis. Predictive climate data that would physically affect the electrical grid includes storms, heavy rain, or severe winds, and reinforcement can look like improved insulation if data indicates upcoming cold spells or snowstorms, vegetation management if equipment is at wildfire risk, or using microgrids for customers who regularly experience weather-related power outages. And in the case of predictive climate data forecasting extreme heat, utilities might employ microgrids more widely to avoid the grid becoming overloaded by customers cooling their homes.
Climate modeling: A form of predictive climate data is used in climate modeling, or the practice of portraying past and future global temperatures and weather via a computer simulation. Climate models are used by scientists to predict how the atmosphere, ocean, ice, and land masses on earth will interact with each other, thus forecasting future climate changes.
