Session 3 - Advancements and opportunities towards national and global resilience for space weather events: research, forecasting, and mitigation

Seth Jonas, Christopher Cannizzaro
Monday 5/11, 13:30-15:00
MTC 01.03

With increasing global awareness of space weather as a hazard, governments and the private sector have been taking actions to increase resilience: from assessing risks to mitigating consequence. Differences among infrastructure systems, interdependences, and priorities, among other things, have resulted in different approaches to address the issue. These difference present an opportunity to advance global resilience through identifying best practices, and building upon and tailoring existing approaches towards resilience. They also present the opportunity to develop collaborations to enhance resilience through joint or complementary endeavors (e.g., programs, platforms, missions, etc.). This session will provide the opportunity for presenters to showcase advances in research, observations, or analyses that can inform and enhance actions to improve resilience to the effects of space weather events. It also presents the chance for presenters to identify opportunities for additional research and collaboration to enhance resilience to the effects of space weather events.

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Talks : Time schedule

Monday November 5, 13:30 - 15:00, MTC 01.03

13:30	ESA SSA activities to support resilience for space weather	Luntama, J et al.	Invited Oral
	Juha-Pekka Luntama
	European Space Agency
	ESA SSA Programme is developing European Space Weather System providing space weather services to the end users. The objective of the system is to support mitigation of adverse impacts of space weather on European infrastructure both on ground and in space. The activities within ESA SSA Programme are particularly addressing R2O and O2R utilising European space weather expertise and assets, but including also development of new assets and capabilities. ESA is actively involved in international coordination and collaboration in the frameworks of, for example, UN, WMO, ISES, CGMS, COSPAR and ESF, for improving global resilience for space weather.
13:40	PROGRESS: An overview of the data products available	Balikhin, M et al.	Oral
	M. A. Balikhin[1], S. N. Walker[1], R. J. Boynton[1], H.-L Wei[1], G. Bailey[1], R. Erdelyi[2], T. D. Arber[3], K. Bennett[3], M. Liemohn[4], B. van der Holst[4], P. Wintoft[5], M. Wik[5], V. Yatsenko[6], V. Krasnoselskikh[7], N. Y. Ganushkina[4,8], S. Dubyagin[8], Y. Y. Shprits[9], A. Tibocha[9]
	[1] ACSE, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, UK [2] SoMaS, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, UK [3] Dept Physics, University of Warwick, Coventry, UK [4] Climate and Space Sciences Engineering, University of Michigan, AnnArbor, USA [5] Swedish Institute for Space Physics, Lund, Sweden [6] Space Research Institute, NASU SSAU, Kiev, Ukraine [7] CNRS/LPC2E, Orleans, France [8] FMI, Helsinki, Finland [9] GFZ, Potsdam. Germany
	The aim of PROGRESS, an EC funded Horizon 2020 project, was to use state of the art modelling techniques for the forecast of the solar wind parameters at L1, the evolution of geomagnetic indices, and the electron environment within the inner magnetosphere. This presentation reviews the aims of the project and provides an overview of the tools developed to meet these aims.
13:50	Improving the Resilience of Australia's Critical Infrastructure to Space Weather	Arsov, K et al.	Invited Oral
	Richard Marshall
	Australian Bureau of Meteorology
	The Australian Bureau of Meteorology’s Space Weather Services (SWS) is the national provider of space weather information to the Australian region and beyond. Over recent years SWS has engaged with the Australian Government's Trusted Information Sharing Network (TISN), which is tasked with improving the resilience of Australia's Critical Infrastructure (CI) against all hazards. This engagement has raised the profile of space weather amongst the various CI sector groups such as energy, transport, communications, water, and space. SWS continues to collaborate with these sectors to better understand and mitigate the impacts of space weather to Australia's important infrastructure. This presentation will describe some of the recent engagement activities with government and industry, and the research results arising from these collaborations.
13:55	Embrace Initiatives to Foster Space Weather Forecast Centers	Costa, J et al.	Invited Oral
	C. M. Denardini, J. E. R. Costa, C. M Wrasse, M. B. Pádua, and Embrace Team
	Embrace, National Institute for Space Research, 12227-010, S. J. dos Campos - SP, Brazil
	On August 2007 the National Institute for Space Research started a task force to develop and operate a space weather program, which is known by the acronyms Embrace that stands for the Portuguese statement “Estudo e Monitoramento BRAasileiro de Clima Espacial” Program (Brazilian Space Weather Study and Monitoring program). The mission of the Embrace/INPE program is to monitor the Solar-Terrestrial environment, the magnetosphere, the upper atmosphere and the ground induced currents to prevent effects on technological and economic activities. The Embrace/INPE system monitors the physical parameters of the Sun-Earth environment. Additionally, Embrace/INPE has being working close to other colleagues in Latin America to foster Space Weather Forecast Centers. Two excellent examples (but not limited to these) are the International Space Environment Service (ISES) Regional Warning Center (RWC) Mexico, and the Space Weather Initiative in Argentina (SWI-Argentina). The former (RWC-Mexico) was able to gather several elements of a research and partially bridge it to the operational space weather sector. The later (SWI-Argentina) is in a straight forward process to follow the same path. In both, cases Embrace/INPE struggle and keep supporting with its limited resources to support the initiatives. The reason for such support is not only to build up regional strength, but it also based on the knowledge that the ground effects due to space weather drivers very often causes different effect on different latitudinal and/or longitudinal sectors. Finally, endorsing the Embrace commitment with fostering Space Weather Forecast Centers, a comprehensive data bank and an interface layer are under commissioning to allow an easy and direct access to all the space weather data collected by Embrace through the Embrace web Portal and several bilateral agreements have being signed or under development.
14:00	International Collaboration Within the United Nations Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space: Framework for International Space Weather Services (2018–2030)	Mann, I et al.	Invited Oral
	Ian R. Mann
	University of Alberta
	Since 2015, member states of the United Nations (UN) Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (COPUOS) have considered issues relating to space weather through a Space Weather Expert Group. The Expert Group reports to the Scientific and Technical Subcommittee (STSC) of the COPUOS through the permanent space weather agenda item. In the summer of 2018, the UN Conference on the Exploration and Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (UNISPACE+50) will take place on the occasion of the fiftieth anniversary of the first UNISPACE I held in Vienna in 1968. Space weather has been proposed within COPUOS as a future UN priority for the period 2018–2030 under the UNISPACE+50 process, with proposals for space weather actions being developed by the Expert Group and defined in Thematic Priority 4: Framework for International Space Weather Services (A/AC.105/1171) (see also the Commentary in Mann et al., Space Weather, (2018) doi:10.1029/2018SW001815). As the Chair and Rapporteur for the Expert Group, participation in this panel will offer perspectives on the potential role of the UN in delivering expanded international coordination towards the goal of mitigating the impacts arising from extreme space weather events.
14:05	Preparedness for Space Weather disasters -- in case of Japan --	Ishii, M et al.	Invited Oral
	Mamoru Ishii, Daikou Shiota, Chihiro Tao
	National Institute of Information and Communications Technology
	When the X9.3 solar flare occurred on September 6, 2017, we were surprised at a big response of Japanese society. It reflected that Japanese people are interested in or scared of Space weather disasters. Comparing with other countries, e.g., US, UK, Korea, Japanese government does not seem to be interested in Space weather. However some actions can be observed. We will introduce some governmental activities for space weather mitigation in addition to our work for preparing space weather hazardous map.
14:10	Advancements in UK Preparedness	Gibbs, M et al.	Invited Oral
	Mark Gibbs, Mike Hapgood, Mario Bisi
	Met Office, STFC RAL Space, STFC RAL Space
	An update will be provided on recent progress within the UK's preparedness for an extreme space weather event, including recent and planned table top exercises to assess preparedness. Finally the output of the recent review of the UK's Reasonable Worst Case Space Weather Environment will be presented.
14:15	U.S. National Space Weather Policy	Clarke, S et al.	Invited Oral
	Steven Clarke
	Office of Science and Technology Policy/ Executive Office of the President
	Improved forecasting, notification, preparation, response, and recovery from extreme space weather events continue to be important to the protection of critical infrastructure systems. Recent policies released by the United States government helped identify the need to update the National Space Weather Strategy and Action Plan to align with the Administration priorities. Building on the previous National Space Weather policy is an opportunity to align ongoing and future activities that will not only further national preparedness, but also increase the Nation’s capabilities in space technology development and application, and national security endeavors. This new strategy will serve as a road map for a global approach to develop effective policies, practices, and procedures to decrease the Nation’s vulnerability to electromagnetic hazards, both natural and adversarial. This talk will provide more details on the updated National Space Weather Strategy and how the U.S. government is working with the commercial sector and academia to better prepare for the threat of space weather including electromagnetic pulse hazards.
14:20	Panel discussion	Jonas, S et al.	Invited Oral
	Seth Jonas, Chris Cannizzaro
	By above speakers

Posters

1	Space Weather Products and Services of Bucharest Solar Station	Octavian, B et al.	p-Poster
	Octavian Blagoi, Cristian Danescu, Adrian Sonka, Liliana Dumitru, Diana Besliu-Ionescu, Cristiana Dumitrache
	Astronomical Institute of Romanian Academy, Institute of Geodynamics
	After many years of hibernation the Bucharest Solar Station provides Space Weather products and services again. We present our new services of synoptic observations and nowcasting bulletin, as well as the products released. The synoptic data are published on the web and can be delivered on demand as 1 or 2 hour data-sets with one minute resolution. The nowcasting bulletin is delivered on workdays in Romanian.
2	Characters of Solar Cycle 24 and Prediction of Solar Cycle 25	Juan, M et al.	p-Poster
	Juan Miao, Siqing Liu, Zhitao Li, Tingling Ren
	For many forecasters, solar cycle 24 is an unexpected cycle. Its activity is so low. Just a few large solar erupts: flares, CMEs, solar proton event etc. Prediction showed that solar cycle 24 will end in 2019 to 2020 and the next cycle will begin. What about the solar cycle 25? Is it active than cycle 24 or more calm than cycle 24? Based on World Data Center SILSO’s new sunspot numbers, the correlation between various parameters of solar cycles 1-24 is investigated. The parameters include maximum, rising time and descending time. Two derived regression equations are given between maximum and rising time. Two derived regression equations are given between descending time and total of descending time and next rising time. Additionally, according to cycle periodicity of secular trend and the regularity of maximum between even cycles and following odd cycles, the beginning time and the sunspot number maximum of cycle 25 are predicted.
3	Ionospheric modelling to boost the PPP-RTK positioning and navigation in Australia	Arsov, K et al.	p-Poster
	Kirco Arsov, Michael Terkildsen, German Olivares
	Australian Bureau of Meteorology, Collaborative Reseach Centre for Spatial Information
	This paper deals with implementation of 3-D ionospheric model to support the GNSS positioning and navigation activities in Australia. We will introduce two strategies for Slant Total Electron Content (STEC) estimation from GNSS CORS sites in Australia. In the first scenario, the STEC is estimated in the PPP-RTK network processing. The ionosphere is estimated together with other GNSS network parameters, such as Satellite Clocks, Satellite Phase Biases, etc. Another approach is where STEC is estimated on a station by station basis by taking advantage of already known station position and different satellite ambiguities relations. Accuracy studies and considerations will be presented and discussed. Furthermore, based on this STEC, 3-D ionosphere modeling will be performed. We will present the simple interpolation, 3-D Tomography and bi-cubic splines as modeling techniques. In order to assess these models, a (user) PPP-RTK test bed is established and a sensitivity matrix will be introduced and analyzed based on time to first fix (TTFF) of ambiguities, positioning accuracy, PPP-RTK solution convergence time etc. Different spatial configurations and constellations will be presented and assessed.
4	Benchmarks for Space Weather Events	Caldwell, B et al.	p-Poster
	Becaja Caldwell, Seth Jonas
	Science and Technology Policy Institute
	A primary reference point to describe an extreme space weather event is the 1859 Carrington event. While useful, the identification of more rigorous baselines will help assess the decision makers in governments and industry better plan for extreme space weather events. Benchmarks for space weather must capture the most important features of an event in order to provide useful input for creating engineering standards, developing vulnerability assessments, establishing decision points and thresholds for action, understanding risk, developing more-effective mitigation procedures and practices, and enhancing response and recovery planning. This presentation will discuss U.S.-led efforts to develop benchmarks for multiple types of space weather phenomena. It will also discuss follow-on efforts to refine these benchmarks and explore opportunities for international engagement.
5	Solar Particle Radiation Storm Forecasting and Analysis: the real-time SEP prediction tools within the framework of the 'HESPERIA' HORIZON 2020 project	Malandraki, O et al.	p-Poster
	Olga E. Malandraki[1], Marlon Nunez[2], Bernd Heber[3], Johannes Labrenz[3], Patrick Kuehl[3], Arik Posner[4], Angelos Tzotzos[1], Nikos Milas[1], Georgia Tsiropoula[1], Evgenios Pavlos[1]
	[1] National Observatory of Athens, IAASARS, Athens, Greece, [2] Universidad de Málaga, Málaga, Spain, [3] Christian-Albrechts – Universitaet zu Kiel, Kiel, Germany, [4] Heliophysics, NASA Headquarters, Washington, DC, USA
	Solar Energetic Particles (SEPs), ranging in energy from tens of keV to a few GeV, constitute an important contributor to the characterization of the space environment. SEP radiation storms may have durations from a period of hours to days or even weeks and have a large range of energy spectrum profiles. They pose a threat to modern technology strongly relying on spacecraft and are a serious radiation hazard to humans in space, and are additionally of concern for avionics and commercial aviation in extreme cases. The High Energy Solar Particle Events forecasting and Analysis (HESPERIA) project, supported by the HORIZON 2020 programme of the European Union, has furthered our prediction capability of high-energy SEP events by developing new European capabilities for SEP forecasting and warning, while exploiting novel as well as already existing datasets. The HESPERIA UMASEP-500 tool makes real-time predictions of the occurrence of >500 MeV and Ground Level Enhancement (GLE) events from the analysis of soft X-ray flux and high-energy differential proton flux measured by the GOES satellite network. Regarding the prediction of GLE events for the period 2000-2016, this tool had a Probability of Detection (POD) of 53.8% and a False Alarm Ratio (FAR) of 30.0%. For this period, the tool obtained an Advanced Warning Time (AWT) of 8 min taking as reference the alert time from the first NM station; using the time of the warning issued by the GLE Alert Plus tool for the aforementioned period as reference, the tool obtained an AWT of 15 min (Núñez et al. 2017). Based on the Relativistic Electron Alert System for Exploration (REleASE) forecasting scheme (Posner, 2007), the HESPERIA REleASE tools generate real-time predictions of the proton flux (30-50 MeV) at the Lagrangian point L1, making use of relativistic electrons (v>0.9c) and near-relativistic (v<0.8c) electron measurements provided by the SOHO/EPHIN and ACE/EPAM experiments, respectively. Analysis of historic data from 2009 to 2016 has shown the HESPERIA REleASE tools have a low FAR (~30%) and a high POD (63%). Both HESPERIA tools are operational through the project’s website (http://www.hesperia.astro.noa.gr) at the National Observatory of Athens and presented in the recently published book on 'Solar Particle Radiation Storms Forecasting and Analysis, The HESPERIA HORIZON 2020 Project and Beyond', edited by Malandraki and Crosby, Springer, Astrophysics and Space Sciences Library, 2018, freely available at https://www.springer.com/de/book/9783319600505. The HESPERIA tools can help improve resilience to the effects of space weather events by improving mitigation of adverse effects both in space and in the air from significant solar radiation storms, providing valuable added minutes of forewarning to users of space weather services.
6	Space weather disruptions to satellite navigation and telecommunications in the case of interdependent services	Forte, B et al.	p-Poster
	Biagio Forte[1], Bruno Vani[2], Nathan Smith, Ivan Astin[1], Joao Francisco Galera Monico[3], Alexis Ruffenach[4], Ian Flintoft[5], Anthony Concannon[5], Les McCormack[5], Alexandra Koulouri[1]
	[1] Department of Electronic and Electrical Engineering, University of Bath (UK) [2] Federal Institute of Education, Science and Technology of São Paulo (Brazil) [3] Universidade Estadual Paulista (Brazil) [4] EDF Energy [5] SNC-Lavalin’s Atkins Business
	Ionospheric disturbances associated with adverse space weather events introduce perturbations on trans-ionospheric radio signals that translate into fluctuations of signal intensity and phase, known as scintillation. In general, the morphology of the background ionosphere is well understood. Large-scale ionisation structures in the ionosphere (typically associated with plasma instability mechanisms) cascade into smaller scale structures. It is the presence of these small-scale irregularities that introduces scintillation on radio signals. Scintillation occurs at high latitudes (both auroral and polar regions) due to geomagnetic storms and sub-storms during disturbed geomagnetic and solar conditions as well as at low latitudes due to plasma instabilities linked to the equatorial anomaly. Although the nature of individual ionospheric irregularities and their propagation effects are mostly understood on a case-by-case basis, the understanding of the real impact of space-weather on terrestrial and aerospace infrastructure still is a challenge. Scintillation can simultaneously affect both satellite based navigation and telecommunications on a daily basis and therefore can cause serious problems for infrastructure reliant on either, or both, technologies (e.g. safety-critical applications like autonomous navigation and civil aviation as well as applications such as management of power grids crises, rail services, maritime transport, financial operations). It is important to characterise the impact of adverse space weather vulnerabilities on present and emerging technologies relying upon satellite navigation and also telecommunications. Here, we will show how global space weather impacts vary both spatially and temporally. This has important consequences for the interdependencies between systems which are affected by space weather and give insights on how resilience of infrastructure to adverse space weather events can be developed.
7	En route to a global space weather forum: establishing the coordinated research initiative targeting improvements of global resilience to space weather events.	Kuznetsova, M et al.	p-Poster
	Masha Kuznetsova[1], Hermann Opgenoorth[2], Anna Belehaki[3], Mario Bisi[4], Sean Bruinsma[5], Alexi Glover[6], Manuel Grande[7], Daniel Heynderickx[8], Jon Linker[9], Ian Mann[10], Dibyendu Nandi[11], Manuela Temmer[12], Robert Wimmer-Schweingruber[13]
	[1]NASA GSFC, [2] Swedish Institute of Space Physics,[3]NOA, [4] UKRI STFC, [5]CNES, [6]ESA, [7] Aberystwyth University, [8]DH Consultancy, [9]PSI, [10]University of Alberta, [11] Center of Excellence in Space Sciences India, [12] University of Graz, [13]University of Kiel
	Space weather is broadly recognized as a potential global threat. Understanding and predicting space weather events is internationally acknowledged as a global challenge. The COSPAR/ILWS roadmap on space weather published in 2015 (Advances in Space Research, 2015: DOI: 10.1016/j.asr.2015.03.023) prioritizes steps to be taken to advance understanding of space environment phenomena and to improve global resilience to space weather. To facilitate progress towards roadmap goals there is a need to join forces and to maximize return on investments into advancing space weather capabilities. The COSPAR Panel on Space Weather is aiming to build upon the past successes and the roadmap recommendations and to facilitate establishment of a new international space weather research and development initiative. Keys to the success include creating flexible, collaborative, inclusive environment and engaging motivated groups and individuals committed to active participation in international space weather action teams (ISWAT) focused on topics addressing emerging needs and challenges in the rapidly growing field of space weather.  The presentation will review recent progress that demonstrated a value of coordinated international team efforts and discuss challenges that threaten the collaborative forces that bring us together.
8	The Worldwide Interplanetary Scintillation (IPS) Stations (WIPSS) Network: Recent Campaign Results Including LOFAR and Steps Towards LOFAR For Space Weather (LOFAR4SW)	Bisi, M et al.	p-Poster
	Mario M. Bisi[1], Bernard V. Jackson[2], Richard A. Fallows[3], Oyuki Chang[1], Munetoshi Tokumaru[4], Ernesto Aguilar-Rodriguez[5][6][7], J. Americo Gonzalez-Esparza[5][6][7], Julio C. Mejia-Ambriz[5][6][7], Igor Chashei[8], Sergey Tyul’bashev[8], John Morgan[9], Periasamy K. Manoharan[10], Hsiu-Shan Yu[2], Dusan Odstrcil[11,12], David Barnes[1], Biagio Forte[13], Stuart Robertson[1], S. James Tappin[1], and Rene Vermeulen[3].
	[1]UKRI-STFC-RAL Space, UK, [2]CASS-UCSD, CA, USA, [3]ASTRON, NL, [4]ISEE, Nagoya University, Japan, [5]SCiESMEX, MX, [6]MEXART, MX, [7]UNAM, MX, [8]Pushchino Radio Observatory, Russia, [9]Curtin University, WA, Australia, [10]TIFR, Ooty, India, [11]GMU, VA, USA, [12]NASA GSFC, MD, USA, and [13]University of Bath, UK.
	Observations of interplanetary scintillation (IPS) are used to provide global determinations of velocity and density proxy as well as indications of changes in the plasma and magnetic-field rotations along each observational line of sight. There exists (since late-2014) a well-defined IPS Common Data Format (IPSCDFv1.0 – with IPSCDFv1.1 rollout expected soon) which has implemented by much of the global IPS space-weather community. The new Worldwide IPS Stations (WIPSS) Network aims to bring together the worldwide real-time-capable IPS observatories, as well as those used on a campaign-only basis, with well-developed and tested analyses techniques. If observations of IPS are formally inverted into a three-dimensional (3-D) tomographic reconstruction (such as using the University of California, San Diego – UCSD – kinematic model and reconstruction technique), then source-surface magnetic fields can be propagated out to the Earth (and beyond) as well as in-situ data also being incorporated into the reconstruction. Through the combination of different IPS data from multiple observing locations, we can increase both the spatial and temporal coverage across the whole of the inner heliosphere. The Low Frequency Array (LOFAR) is a radio astronomy array consisting of a dense core of 24 stations within an area of diameter ~4km, 14 stations spread further afield across the North-East of the Netherlands, and a further thirteen stations internationally (six across Germany, three in Poland, and one each in France, Ireland, Sweden and the UK). During October 2016, a unique opportunity arose whereby LOFAR and other WIPSS Network telescopes maximised observations of IPS to feed into the UCSD tomography and start to work on how and when different data effect the results of the tomographic reconstructions. We show the latest results from this and other LOFAR IPS campaigns, focussing on key CME detections and changes in the reconstructed volumes through the addition/combination of various WIPS data sets. We also point the way to LOFAR4SW and touch on how and where IPS comes into that design-study project to formulate an upgrade path to enable continues space-weather monitoring and further scientific discovery.
9	NSF Support of National and Global Resilience Through Fundamental Research	Black, C et al.	p-Poster
	Michael Wiltberger[1], Carrie Black[1]
	[1]National Science Foundation
	Space Weather is priority for many nations and has a growing profile in the public eye. NSF's primary role in enhancing resilience to space weather events is through the support of basic research that advances fundamental understanding of space weather and related processes. This includes the generation of solar storms, their propagation through the interplanetary medium, and their impact on the near-Earth space environment. Given increasing global awareness, now is an opportune time to collaborate across nations and science specializations. At NSF the new emphasis on the "10 Big Ideas", which include "Harnessing the Data Revolution" and "Growing Convergence Research at NSF", provide excellent opportunities for collaborative research in space weather. In addition to these new programs the Geospace Sciences section has several mechanisms to support space weather research.