Climate researchers gain high capacity network via Stimulus Act

Internet2, NOAA join forces on multi-10G weather research network dubbed NWave

Climate researchers have scored a big win, as Internet2 and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) are joining forces on a nationwide network expected to handle up to 80TB of weather-related data per day.

Hot enough for ya?

It should be, with multiple 10G dedicated waves being carved from the Internet2 network to support the new climate research-specific network, dubbed NWave. The network will link climate researchers to NOAA's high performance computing sites across the U.S.

"This new high speed research network will greatly increase our ability to transparently access large volumes of higher resolution and more complex climate and weather analyses, predictions and projections," said Joe Klimavicz, CIO and director of high performance computing and communications at NOAA, in a statement.

Also read: Internet2 taps Georgetown U CIO as its chief

The project is being funded via the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

The network will have enough capacity to handle the sort of models used to make climate predictions that go out weeks, months and even centuries.

NWave will be supported by the Indiana University Global Research Network Operations Center, which also provides network support for Internet2 and other research networks.

(Now if only NOAA could splice off a few of those 10G links to help in its efforts to contain the BP mess...)

• LANs / WANs
• climate research
• Internet2
• NOAA
• NWave
• Stimulus Act