Ground Enterprise Transformation at NESDIS

Abstract

This paper describes major changes in the architecture and capability of the Ground Enterprise that operates and sustains the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA’s)weather satellites. Operated byNOAA’s National Environmental Satellite Data and Information Service (NESDIS), the Ground Enterprise supports satellite systems in both polar and geosynchronous orbits. These include the legacy Polar Operational Environmental Satellite (POES) and Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES) systems as well as the new Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite Series R (GOES-R) and Joint Polar Satellite System (JPSS) systems. Additionally, NESDIS participates with domestic and international partners in satellite operations, product generation, and distribution involving a variety of platforms. Analysis over the last three years defined an evolved architecture for the Ground Enterprise that integrates its elements together for greater effectiveness and efficiency. Based on common services, the evolved architecture complements the strengths of the new GOES-R and JPSS ground systems with investments to modernize the remainder of the existing infrastructure and exploit new technologies. These changes will enable the Ground Enterprise to process and distribute new sources of data with greater agility, flexibility, and efficiency at reduced cost. They also provide economies of scale across the entire enterprise and enable more straightforward implementation of security measures. This paper describes the translation of the architecture analysis into time-phased investment plans. These plans address the migration to a set of enterprise algorithms based on common physics implementations, a modernized data archive potentially leveraging the cloud, shared product generation, and distribution services for more efficient operations, and a mission science network to promote greater collaboration across the science community. The paper also describes the status of initial investments in mission support tools.