WeatherRisk Explore Inc has become the first private weather service provider authorized to access data collected by the Central Weather Bureau as it develops customized weather services, the state-run meteorology agency said yesterday.
The company and the bureau yesterday signed the contract at the bureau’s headquarters in Taipei.
The partnership was made possible through the agency’s launch of a plan earlier this year to develop innovative applications of meteorological resources, the bureau said.
Photo: Chen Hsin-yu, Taipei Times
Bureau Deputy Director-General Cheng Jia-ping (程家平) said in his presentation at the ceremony that innovative uses of meteorological data would help reduce financial losses caused by weather-related disasters.
Data collected in the past 10 years showed that Taiwan annually sustains about NT$18 billion (US$565.72 million) in financial losses and NT$10 billion in agricultural losses because of weather-related disasters, he said.
“However, the World Meteorology Organization has estimated that the availability and use of weather and climate forecasts can reduce the impacts of weather variability by 10 to 30 percent, with the value of potential benefits generated by reducing financial losses reaching NT$1.8 billion and NT$5.7 billion per year,” he said.
“To reduce weather-induced economic damage and create benefits, it is necessary to translate weather and climate data into information that can be understood by users and be used to create value-added applications for various disciplines,” he said.
WeatherRisk is the first private weather service provider with authorization to use bureau data and offer customized weather services, Cheng said.
The bureau is reviewing two other requests to use its data — one by a society studying issues related to climate changes, and another from manufacturers of devices for offshore exploration.
WeatherRisk in April filed an application to receive 41 gigabytes of weather data daily, the bureau said, adding that its application was approved earlier this month following multiple rounds of technical exchanges.
A list of government data with high application values is also to be announced by December, said Minister of Digital Development Audrey Tang (唐鳳), who attended the event yesterday.
The government should increase investment in resources to collect data that are in high demand by the private sector, she said.
WeatherRisk Explore general manager Peng Chi-ming (彭啟明) said that private weather service firms are well established in the US, Japan and China.
“The weather bureau is owned by the public, but requests for customized weather services can only be met through service providers in the private sector,” he said.
The output value created by global weather enterprises reached approximately NT$500 billion to NT$1 trillion per year, while that of Taiwanese weather services is about NT$2 billion to NT$3 billion per year, he said.
Global demands for customized weather forecasts have risen in recent years due to increasing development of wind and solar energy, which requires different weather data from those presented in daily weather forecasts, Peng said.
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