Private weather sector vs NWS?

[Jeremy Miller]

It was quite some time about when there was a H.R. bill that alot of people were being worried about. I kept hearing that someone wanted to limit the nws's responsiblity and let the private sector take more of a role in forecasting for the public and charge the public for it.

Is this or was this ever a threat to the NWS being the primpary free public weather forecast/warning agency?. Could there come a point to where we the people may loose a good chunk of what the nws provides to a private sector forecast company that would charge us for the same forecast that the NWS provides for free as a gov't service?.

I remember this was a topic back in the late 90s to early 2000s.
Can anyone shed some light on this?.

Thanks,

Jeremy

 

[Robert Dewey]

I think the argument was over the NWS building their websites as a public-facing weather forecast service. In other words, people no longer need to go to http://www.weather.com to get their forecast - they can just go to their NWS homepage and get much more detail.

TWC is losing traffic to the NWS. The problem is that while TWC loses money because of that traffic loss, TWC continues to pay taxes which undoubtedly go to the NWS. It's like paying your competition. Imagine if Yahoo was a government entity, and Google had to pay them 33% of revenue; that's not a very fair relationship.

As long as the NWS keeps the watches, warnings, forecast discussions, and data distribution, I'm happy. For everything else (point forecasts), it wouldn't matter to me if it disappeared. Maybe because I don't keep track of the weather anymore unless it's something interesting...

It's simply a corporate issue and you'll see strong opinions from both sides.

 

[Jay McCoy]

The thing that most people didnt like was the idea ofd private comapnies charging us for forecasts we have already paid for with our tax dollars. Thats what the NWS is for.

How do these private companies get their data to make forecasts?? Thats right.. using satellites, radars, mesonet stations, balloons, etc... paid for with taxpayer money.So if they are going to charge for forecasts then we as the taxpayer should charge them for use of government data WE provided them..

It is an argument that mostly was fueled my Accuweather and Senator Santorum who was given tons of $$ in contributions by Accuweather. Now that he is no longer in officethe argument has quieted somewhat. At least until AccuWeather can get their hands into the pockets of other congressmen.

 

[Robert Dewey]

Jay has some valid points. Just goes to show how it's a circular argument.

I agree with Jay, but I also agree with private sector mets. On one hand, my tax money pays for the data, so it's not right for a company to use that data and then charge us to distribute it. It's also not right for a company to use that data and then not pay for it (again, through taxes).

On the other hand, those companies should have the option to 1) discontinue use of that data, and be assured that tax money won't go to the NWS, or 2) use the data, and be assured that the tax money is going only to those data sources and not point forecasts or other public-facing competing products.

Should I run for office?

 

[Ryan McGinnis]

Jay has some valid points. Just goes to show how it's a circular argument.

I agree with Jay, but I also agree with private sector mets. On one hand, my tax money pays for the data, so it's not right for a company to use that data and then charge us to distribute it. It's also not right for a company to use that data and then not pay for it (again, through taxes).

On the other hand, those companies should have the option to 1) discontinue use of that data, and be assured that tax money won't go to the NWS, or 2) use the data, and be assured that the tax money is going only to those data sources and not point forecasts or other public-facing competing products.

Should I run for office?

Problem is, nobody ever gets to choose where their tax dollars go and they never will.

I don't think most people have a problem with companies charging money to repackage data that taxpayer dollars pay for, so long as those companies don't then turn around and lobby that the taxpayer-paid data never be disseminated through any other channel other than the commerical sector. If the commercial sector weather services really can't compete with the National Weather Service, then they either aren't targeting the right markets, aren't hiring the right talent, or just plain aren't capable of providing anything commerically that is better than what the government can do, in which case, they have little reason to exist in the first place. We have this thing called the postal service that will get you a letter from New York to the top of a mountain in Hawaii for a tenth the price of a latte, and yet companies like Federal Express and United Parcel Services have no problem whatsoever making money hand over fist charging 100 times as much to do the exact same thing -- because they target different markets and offer increased performance for their price premium. What, exactly, does Accuweather give a weather client that the National Weather Service can't? Apparently, not very much, if the market isn't rewarding their efforts.

 

[Damon Poole]

Ryan is dead on right! The fact that NWS does for free, what Accu Weather charges for, shouldn't be a hinderance to any legitimate company. To say that it is a competitive hinderance, is a red herring. Customers will always pay for high quality tailored weather services. Instead of trying to monopolize public forecast and warning services, why not try to innovate services that go beyond what the NWS currently provides? If the private companies would do that, instead of trying to fight and restrict the NWS, customers would break the door down trying to get private sector services. Apparently, the private sector doesn't want to carve a niche for itself, it wants to monopolize publicly provided services. Fortunately, the public is smart enough to tell them, "No thanks, we're not buying!" That's why Senate Bill 786 died a slow painful death.

 

[Damon Poole]

1. "Storm-based warnings instead of county-based? Private sector.
High-res local modeling? Private sector.
Now you can add NWS to both..."

Both of the products you mentioned have a public forecast and warning application, and were developed with public data.

2. "NWS now does the exact same thing for free." - That's a cop out excuse. Find a way to do better, and do it, or do something else, period.

3. "There used to be a line where NWS concentrated on delivering the best public forecasts and warnings, and the data for outsiders to get into more detail with. Now they provide the detail -- at the expense of warnings and forecasts." Very wrong indeed...the increased detail is what is helping to improve both public and private warnings and forecasts.

4. "Who's going to pay?" - Anybody who wants improved performance over what the NWS does now. There is a lot of room for the private sector to go after specialized customers. Ryan Mc Ginnis hit the nail on the head with his post office analogy. The solution for the private sector is to do like WeatherTap and offer tailored products and services like their hi-res radar data which many storm chasers use frequently. Chasers are glad to pay because WeatherTap offers products and resolutions that NWS RIDGE data can't begin to. Give value for the buck and you'll make money. Do the things that government can't, or won't, and customers will flock to you. That's called free enterprise.

5. "What's the reason for private sector to innovate if the NWS can simply walk in and say "we want to do that too"?" - Here's two, 1. Advancement of the science, and 2. economic survival.

 

[Joe Nield]

Now they provide the detail -- at the expense of warnings and forecasts.

Admittedly, I haven't been in the field a very long time, but I've been with the weather service in various capacities for six years now, beginning just prior to the NDFD era. I've heard the assertion several times that NDFD and other higher resolution products impact mission-critical operations negatively, and I have yet to see a decrease in warning performance attributable to the method by which routine forecasts are produced. Could you elaborate on this assertion?

Standard disclaimer applies. Any and all opinions are mine and do not reflect upon DOC/NOAA/NWS, etc.

 

[mark plate]

Admittedly, I haven't been in the field a very long time, but I've been with the weather service in various capacities for six years now, beginning just prior to the NDFD era. I've heard the assertion several times that NDFD and other higher resolution products impact mission-critical operations negatively, and I have yet to see a decrease in warning performance attributable to the method by which routine forecasts are produced. Could you elaborate on this assertion?

Standard disclaimer applies. Any and all opinions are mine and do not reflect upon DOC/NOAA/NWS, etc.

Not only is there no decrease, but performance has been INCREASED at our office due to the detail available...we compute convective indices off the observed data and severe weather probabilites directly from our forecast grids...with very good success. Perhaps other offices are different...I don't know?