Assimilation of In Situ Meteorological Data to Optimize a Weather Service for Mosquito Control

Abstract

This study investigates the impact of data assimilation to the weather forecasts produced within the project “MOSQUITO VISION”, concerning the development of a digital application for mosquito nuisance prediction. The in situ meteorological data used for the assimilation are retrieved from the Region of Central Macedonia (RCM) climate data hub, currently including 49 meteorological stations compliant with WMO requirements. Here, we assess the numerical system’s performance by ingesting available observations over the RCM through two different data assimilation techniques using the Weather Research and Forecasting model. The results indicate that there is no significant added value to the assimilated weather forecasted fields over the area of interest (RCM), and the assimilated signal is diminishing relative quickly due to non-linear processes. This study is funded under the Greek Research and Innovation Strategies for Smart Specialization call (RIS 3, project code: ΚΜΡ6_077890).

Keywords

• data assimilation
• numerical weather prediction
• WRF
• mosquito
• West Nile virus