The European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF), one of the world’s leading meteorological institutions, announced on Wednesday that it has opened access to its real-time data to help strengthen early warning systems for extreme weather events worldwide.
The move comes amid an escalating global climate crisis marked by increasingly severe heatwaves, floods, droughts, and storms. As accurate forecasting becomes critical for disaster preparedness, open access to quality meteorological data is being recognized as a global public good.
A MASSIVE EXPANSION OF OPEN DATA
The ECMWF, which is supported by 35 member and cooperating states, collects around 800 million weather observations every day and manages one of the largest meteorological data archives on the planet.
Under the new policy, the agency will make 16 times more data freely available than it currently does. However, users requiring large-scale data downloads will still incur service fees, the agency’s data policy lead said.
The change aligns with a broader European movement toward open data sharing, aimed at making high-quality weather information accessible to researchers, governments, and emergency responders across the globe.
SUPPORTING DEVELOPING COUNTRIES AND EARLY WARNING SYSTEMS
As preparations continue for COP30, the United Nations climate conference set to be held in Brazil in November, the focus on climate adaptation and resilience is intensifying — especially for developing nations hit hardest by extreme weather but with limited data infrastructure.
In support of these nations, ECMWF said it would waive data service fees for some early-warning projects affiliated with the World Meteorological Organization (WMO). The agency will also explore how artificial intelligence–based forecasting models could help nations with limited access to meteorological resources.
“If you have this disruptive technology, there’s always the danger that countries that are less well-resourced get left behind,” said Florian Pappenberger, ECMWF’s director-general-elect. “We’re aware that there’s a large part of the globe where accessing machine learning forecasts is challenging.”
The initiative underscores Europe’s effort to democratize access to environmental data and ensure that AI-driven climate forecasting benefits both wealthy and developing nations alike — a crucial step toward reducing global inequality in climate preparedness.