Environmental e-Science in the UK

1. NERC Environmental e-Science in the UK Keith Haines BMT Marine Informatics Chair: Reading University Expertise: Ocean/Atmosphere Data Assimilation Reading e-Science Centre www.resc.rdg.ac.uk China Workshops December 2005

2. NERC’s Scientific Strategy Science Priorities Earth’s life-support systems (water, biogeochemical cycles, biodiversity, carbon cycle) Climate Change (prediction, mitigation, quantifying the carbon cycle, atmospheric composition, ocean circulation, ice caps) Sustainable economies (sustainable solutions for - energy, land use, climate change, hazard mitigation, agriculture) • e-Science is Multidisciplinary • Promotes Collaborative Research Methods University Research (including Computer Science) NERC Research Institutes: British Antarctic Survey, Proudman Ocean Lab… UK Met Office and Hadley Centre, Environment Agency... China Workshops December 2005

3. Applications Projects Comp./ Data Projects Rounds Round 3 1 & 2 Comp Climateprediction.net £434k £284k Grid for Ocean Diagnostics, Interactive Data £858k Visualisation and Analysis (GODIVA) Environment from the molecular level (e- Comp £1,679k £1,336k Minerals) Grid ENabled Integrated Earth systems Comp £1,483k £1,130k model (GENIE) Data The NERC DataGrid £826k £722k Grid for Coupled Ensemble Prediction £723k Comp Studies (GCEPS) Comp Global coastal ocean modelling £736k Data Creating a taxonomic e-Science £533k £5,280k £5,464k China Workshops December 2005

4. NERC’s e-Science programme • 2 Centres of e-Science expertise • 8 Collaborative Application projects • e-Science Coordinator : Ned Garnett Nedg@nerc.ac.uk China Workshops December 2005

5. National Institute for Environmental e-Science • Focus on promotion and supports the use of e-science and grid technologies within the UK environmental science community. • Holds workshops, courses, training events, visitor programmes, demonstration projects. • Also attendance from non governmentagencies and private sector. • To date has run 38 events with over 1,800 attendees. • Recent delegation from China Martin Dove: martin@esc.cam.ac.uk www.niees.ac.uk China Workshops December 2005

6. Reading e-Science Centre • Regional Centre of Excellence in e-Science • Building on Reading’s Environmental connections • Met Office, ECMWF, Environment Agency, ESA • Companies: BMT, Vita Nuova, Barrodale Computing Services • Contributing to e-Science Middleware • Styx Grid Services • CoLinux for Campus Grids • Ongoing Projects include: • Web Services for National Centre for Ocean Forecasting Products www.ncof.gov.uk • Search and Rescue at SEA (Decision Support Tool) • Geospatial Database Technology (4D Gridded data in databases) • Climate Data Analysis Toolbox (CDAT) development • Enabling technology demostrators Jon Blower: jdb@mail.nerc-essc.ac.uk www.resc.rdg.ac.uk China Workshops December 2005

7. 5 COMPUTATIONAL GRID PROJECTSEnsemble Climate Modelling China Workshops December 2005

8. Distributed Global Collaborations • Hadley climate model cut down to run on single PC (cf. Seti@home) • 105,000 people from 150 countries have donated 10,000 years of computing time to undertake climate change experiments. • China >384 participants www.climateprediction.net China Workshops December 2005

9. Over 2,500 simulations over a 45 year period showed a possible temperature increase of 2 - 11°C by 2050. • Results from 2,579 15 year runs by climateprediction.net • Results from 127 30 year runs of the Hadley model on the Met Office supercomputer China Workshops December 2005

10. Unpublished analysis from climateprediction.net Regional Behaviour – European Rain and Snowfall Mediterranean Basin Northern Europe Winter Winter Summer Summer Annual Annual China Workshops December 2005

11. GENIE • Grid-Enabled Integrated Earth System model • Build fast Earth System model with distributed components • Study long-term climate change and palaeoclimate • Components for atmosphere, ocean, land, ice, ocean/land biogeochemistry, ocean sediments • Explore model parameter space and forcings • Novel techniques for model framework, integration, data management, visualization Response of Atlantic circulation to freshwater forcing www.genie.ac.uk China Workshops December 2005

12. Matlab Jython Oxford Leeds .m files .py files RAL Manchester Geodise Java API Java Client Java CoG OMII API Flocked Condor Pools Condor Web Service Globus GT2 OMII_1 Services Condor Native Imperial Condor Pool Southampton Condor Pool GENIE Computing Resources Institutional Resources (GT2) National Grid Service (GT2) www.genie.ac.uk China Workshops December 2005

13. Grid for Coupled Ensemble Prediction (GCEP) • Full Hadley Climate models run on PC Clusters (not HPC) • Initial condition (Ocean, Ice, Land) Ensemble prediction ~10yrs • =>Assimilation<= • eg. Initialised ensemble forecasts of global mean temperature • Other useful • predictions • Thermohaline strength • Poleward Ht. transport • Sea Ice extent • Nino3, NAO… • Precipitation • Snow Cover • Storm Statistics. Hadley Centre Results China Workshops December 2005

14. Global Coastal Ocean Modelling (GCOM) • Coastal seas are 7% of the ocean surface area but contribute 30% of biological production. • Develop model for the coastal seas to improve the understanding of their contribution to the global carbon budget. • Integrate into larger Earth System models. Red = depth < 1000m www.pol.ac.uk/gcom China Workshops December 2005

15. e-Minerals • Model atomic processes involved in environmental issues (radioactive waste disposal, pollution, weathering). • Collaboration with British Nuclear Fuels studying resistance of materials to radioactive decay events. • High level briefings given to: • Foundation of Science & Technologywhich briefs MPs and Lords • World Technology Leaders Conferencein Seoul • Science and Technology in Society forumin Kyoto in September 2005 Simulation of radiation damage in the mineral zircon. www.eminerals.org China Workshops December 2005

16. 3 DATA GRID PROJECTSEnvironmental Data Services China Workshops December 2005

17. GODIVA Data Portal • Grid for Ocean Diagnostics, Interactive Visualisation and Analysis • Daily Met Office Marine Forecasts and gridded research datasets • National Centre for Ocean Forecasting • ~3Tb climate model datastore via Web Services • Interactive Visualisations inc. Movies • ~ 30 accesses a day worldwide • Other GODIVA software produces 3D/4D Visualisations reading data remotely via Web Services Online Movies www.nerc-essc.ac.uk/godiva China Workshops December 2005

18. GODIVA Visualisations • Unstructured Meshes • Grid Rotation/Interpolation • GeoSpatial Databases v. Files • (Postgres, IBM, Oracle) • Perspective 3D Visualisation • Google maps viewer China Workshops December 2005

19. Spin-Offs:Decision Support Tools and Live Data • BMTs Search and Rescue at Sea decision tool linked to Met Office data with GODIVA Web Services • Demonstration for UK CoastGuard • New £2.2m DEWS project: Extend Marine and Health applications of Met data BMTs SARIS system BMTs OSIS system China Workshops December 2005

20. daily_means means.nc snapshot*.nc –output-refs makegif means.nc means.gif daily_means makegif snapshot*.nc means.gif Spin-Offs:Styx Grid Services • Easy-to-use, lightweight middleware for e-Science • 5-minute installation • Expose existing executables as services • Run them from the command line exactly as if they were local programs • Create workflows with simple shell scripts (above right) • Perform computational steering and collaborative visualization (below right) • http://jstyx.sf.net China Workshops December 2005

21. NERC Data Grid • The DataGrid focuses on federation of NERC Data Centres • Grid for data discovery, delivery and use across sites • Data can be stored in many different ways (flat files, databases…) • Strong focus on Metadata and Ontologies • Clear separation between discovery and use of data. • Prototype focussing on Atmospheric and Oceanographic data www.ndg.nerc.ac.uk China Workshops December 2005

22. Creating a Taxonomic e-Science • Literature scattered over 250 years of paper publications. • Data inaccessible other than to specialist users • Aim to transfer in toto the taxonomy of two groups of organisms to the web(Hawkmoths and Aroids). • Broad aim: to encourage migration of taxonomy to the web. • Provide data for those studying biodiversity. • Encourage quality control, peer-review and the development of “consensus” taxonomies in the web environment. • Develop means of citation for web-based revisions The Hawkmoth Sphinx caligineus sinicus from Beijing, China. Photo: Tony Pittaway Arisaema candidissimum Photo : RBG Kew China Workshops December 2005

23. Environmental e-Science needs • Geospatial Data Grids • Large data (Tb Model output – Pb Satellite) • Good Geospatial tools (GIS) and standards for extension to 4D atmosphere/ocean data • Advanced remote visualisation (movies; perspective 3D) • Computational Grids • Ensemble modelling increasingly important (Climate/Earth system) => HPC not critical: distributed resources OK (large data volumes) • Statistical prediction tools (averaging over atmospheric chaos) • Legacy model codes need to run multi-platform • Distributed Data/Modelling Expertise • Taxonomy • Earth System modelling (Atmos. Ocean, Land, Ice, Biology, Chemistry…) China Workshops December 2005

24. Summary • NERC e-Science projects are “application-oriented” – i.e. close to end users • Good opportunities to engage Government Agencies and Commercial Community • Live Environmental Data • Extreme event warnings; Disaster management tools (eg. oil spills) • Commercial Decision Support tools : Tailored products and services • Software companies for databases and GIS • Environmental Middleware/Software tools Globally Applicable • International Collaborations, (eg. GIS, Metadata Standards,…) • Met Office; ECMWF; Environment Agency, Maritime Companies; Seasonal Forecasting, ESA….. China Workshops December 2005