Weather forecasting services want more satellites.
Russia's weather forecasting services are testing new equipment worth billions of roubles and will be able to forecast weather accurately in a few years, scientists told Vladimir Putin on Tuesday. However, weather forecasting will only see a leap in accuracy if they have satellites. The prime minister promised to allocate the necessary funds.
A total of 972 natural anomalies were recorded in Russia last year, the head of the Meteorological Office, Roman Vilfand, told Putin. Direct economic damage has been estimated at 41 billion roubles, another 11 billion roubles were allocated to build housing for the victims of the wild fires and 50 billion to purchase fire fighting equipment.
Vilfand showed the prime minister a new Doppler radar system, which is being tested at Valdai. Modern equipment can make weather forecasts more reliable and thus reduce the consequences of natural disasters. For example, traditional equipment failed to forecast the ice rains in Moscow in December 2010, whereas the Doppler radar system could have predicted it.
"The frequency of adverse weather conditions in Russia grows by 6%-8% annually," Putin said. "We certainly need an effective system of pre-emptive measures against natural catastrophes and emergencies."
By 2015, a network of 140 weather radar stations like this across the entire country will become an integrated system spanning from Kaliningrad to Vladivostok.
"Do you remember the guessing game we played as kids? I hope it will not be like that," Putin said.
"There will always be some uncertainty. Forecasting is a complicated system of equations," said Alexander Frolov, head of the Federal Service for Hydrometeorology and Environmental Monitoring. "By 2020 the forecasting system must become 95% reliable."
The necessary equipment is quite expensive: the radar systems will cost 15 billion roubles. The government can so far allocate only 14 billion, which will be spent in 2011-2013 on the modernisation of the Federal Service for Hydrometeorology and Environmental Monitoring, rather than just new radar systems.
"We need to improve the weather satellite group," the prime minister said.
The country needs 13 such satellites, but there are only two in orbit, and their equipment is not at all what the weather specialists want, Frolov said. Unless at least two satellites are launched over the northern latitudes, the safety of the Northern Sea Route can not be ensured.
Paradoxically, allocations for the space industry are quite sufficient, but they are invested mostly in the Space Agency, whereas the weather service gets only what little is left. Putin has changed the balance by appointing the Federal Service for Hydrometeorology and Environmental Monitoring as the customer, on the condition that contracts must not be given to foreign companies.
Scientists will work to improve weather forecasts, but local authorities will no longer be able to explain their inertness and inefficient work by inadequate forecasts, Putin warned. They do this now. In particular, the authorities in four regions of the Central and North-Western Federal Districts have not yet mobilised the necessary equipment or made plans to protect settlements and infrastructure during the wildfire season, said Emergencies Minister Sergei Shoigu.
Putin said the data for the entire country must be prepared by April 15.
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Russia without weather satellites
The first Soviet weather satellite, Meteor, was launched in 1969. The last satellite of that series was decommissioned in 2004, and for five years after that the country had no weather satellites in orbit. A Meteor-M satellite was orbited only in 2009 but it is not working to capacity. An Electro-L satellite was launched in January 2011.
One more satellite is to be orbited in 2012, but there are no further plans, although the satellite coverage of Russia's total area is only half of the standard recommended by the World Meteorological Organisation.
Before 1991, the Soviet Union had 455 stations that monitored weather, processed information and controlled the operation of smaller stations; Russia has barely 150 such stations now. In all, weather is monitored by 1,300 stations and for 3,200 population centres. Unfortunately, the number of weather stations in the Arctic, "a global weather kitchen," as well as in Siberia and the Far East has declined, which is why the quality of weather forecasts, especially long-term ones, has deteriorated.
For example, Russia learned about the huge ozone hole over the Arctic from Western weather services. Satellites could help resolve the problem in these regions, which determine weather in the rest of Russia.
Anastasia Savinykh