Towards more effective visualisations in climate services: good practices and recommendations

Visualisations are often the entry point to information that supports stakeholders’ decision- and policy-making processes. Visual displays can employ either static, dynamic or interactive formats as well as various types of representations and visual encodings, which differently affect the attention, recognition and working memory of users. Despite being well-suited for expert audiences, current climate data visualisations need to be further improved to make communication of climate information more inclusive for broader audiences, including people with disabilities. However, the lack of evidence-based guidelines and tools makes the creation of accessible visualisations challenging, potentially leading to misunderstanding and misuse of climate information by users. Taking stock of visualisation challenges identified in a workshop by climate service providers, we review good practices commonly applied by other visualisation-related disciplines strongly based on users’ needs that could be applied to the climate services context. We show how lessons learned in the fields of user experience, data visualisation, graphic design and psychology make useful recommendations for the development of more effective climate service visualisations. This includes applying a user-centred design approach, using interaction in a suitable way in visualisations, paying attention to information architecture or selecting the right type of representation and visual encoding. The recommendations proposed here can help climate service providers reduce users’ cognitive load and improve their overall experience when using a service. These recommendations can be useful for the development of the next generation of climate services, increasing their usability while ensuring that their visual components are inclusive and do not leave anyone behind.The research leading to these results received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreements no. 689029 (Climateurope), 776787 (S2S4E), 776467 (MED-GOLD) and 869565 (VitiGEOSS).Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version

Current practice in climate service visualization: taking the pulse of the providers’ community

Climateurope Workshop on the Visualization of Climate Services Barcelona Supercomputing Center’s (BSC) Earth Sciences Department organized the workshop in the framework of the Horizon 2020–funded Coordination and Support Action Climateurope. The workshop aimed to discuss different aspects of the state-of-the-art of visualizations used in climate services and produce a publication on the synthesis and recommendations. We invited participants from different projects linked to the Climateurope network, including EU Horizon 2020 (H2020) and European Research Area for Climate Services (ERA4CS) projects as well as a few national projects and private contracts. The workshop was attended by representatives of 22 projects.The research leading to these results has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under Grant Agreements 689029 (Climateurope) and 776467 (MED-GOLD). The authors want to acknowledge the different climate services projects that participated in the workshop, including Climate-fit.city (73004), Digital-Water.city (20954), IMPREX (641811), PRIMAVERA (641727), RECEIPT (820712), S2S4E (776787), SECLI-FIRM (776868), VISCA (730253), CIREG, Clim2power, CoCliME, EVOKED, ISIpedia, MEDSCOPE, SENSES, WATExR, C3S_429g_BSC, and the inDust COST Action (16202). We would also like to thank the participation of the projects Seasonal Hurricane Predictions, KNMI climate scenarios, and eClimViz. We also acknowledge BSC colleagues Diana Urquiza, Andria Nicodemou, and Sara Octenjak for helping to run the workshop.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version

Users’ Cognitive Load: A Key Aspect to Successfully Communicate Visual Climate Information

The visual communication of climate information is one of the cornerstones of climate services. It often requires the translation of multidimensional data to visual channels by combining colors, distances, angles, and glyph sizes. However, visualizations including too many layers of complexity can hinder decision-making processes by limiting the cognitive capacity of users, therefore affecting their attention, recognition, and working memory. Methodologies grounded on the fields of user-centered design, user interaction, and cognitive psychology, which are based on the needs of the users, have a lot to contribute to the climate data visualization field. Here, we apply these methodologies to the redesign of an existing climate service tool tailored to the wind energy sector. We quantify the effect of the redesign on the users’ experience performing typical daily tasks, using both quantitative and qualitative indicators that include response time, success ratios, eye-tracking measures, user perceived effort, and comments, among others. Changes in the visual encoding of uncertainty and the use of interactive elements in the redesigned tool reduced the users’ response time by half, significantly improved success ratios, and eased decision-making by filtering nonrelevant information. Our results show that the application of user-centered design, interaction, and cognitive aspects to the design of climate information visualizations reduces the cognitive load of users during tasks performance, thus improving user experience. These aspects are key to successfully communicating climate information in a clearer and more accessible way, making it more understandable for both technical and nontechnical audiences.The research leading to these results has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under Grant Agreements 776787 (S2S4E), 776613 (EUCP), and (ClimatEurope). This work was also supported by the MEDSCOPE project. MEDSCOPE is part of ERA4CS, an ERA-NET initiated by JPI Climate, and funded by AEMET (ES), ANR (FR), BSC (ES), CMCC (IT), CNR (IT), IMR (BE), and Météo-France (FR), with co-funding by the European Union (Grant 690462). The research team would like to thank the participants of the test who generously shared their time and opinions for the purposes of this research. This study is a part of the PhD of the corresponding author, Luz Calvo.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version

Co-production pathway of an end-to-end climate service for improved decision-making in the wine sector

Climate services are one of the tools that can support the agriculture sector to address the impacts of climate change on agricultural production systems, not only considering climatic aspects but also social needs. This work describes the knowledge co-production journey of the EU-funded project MED-GOLD to create an end-to-end climate service for wine sector users. In this work, co-production is understood as an iterative, interactive and collaborative process among an interdisciplinary group of scientists and users that were engaged, involved, and empowered. The co-production process included activities to raise awareness on the vulnerability of grape and wine production to climate change, exchange knowledge between climate service providers and users, and co-develop customised climate services, such as the MED-GOLD Dashboard. Lessons learned are that repeated interaction between scientists and users allow to better frame research questions, jointly decide how to address these questions, and test the outcomes with feedback from real-world decision-makers. Furthermore, having a user who co-developed the service and helped assess its added value was key to ensure that it could truly inform decision-making needs and to promote its broader uptake by the wine sector community. Although the MED-GOLD Dashboard constitutes the most tangible result of this collaboration, the outcomes of co-production also encompass the joint learning process, the shared sense of ownership, and the co-creation of new knowledge between scientists and stakeholders. Nevertheless, further research will be needed to understand how the knowledge coproduced with a single user can be scaled up to users with other profiles and requirements.The research leading to these results has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement no. 776467 (MED-GOLD) and 869565 (VitiGEOSS)."Article signat per 15 autors/es: Marta Terrado, Raül Marcos, Nube González-Reviriego, Ilaria Vigo, Andria Nicodemou, Antonio Graça, Marta Teixeira, Natacha Fontes, Sara Silva, Alessandro Dell'Aquila, Luigi Ponti, Sandro Calmanti, Marta Bruno Soares, Mehri Khosravi, Federico Caboni "Postprint (published version

Monitoring climate related risk and opportunities for the wine sector: The MED-GOLD pilot service

MED-GOLD was a 54-months research and innovation project, whose main aim was to co-develop climate services for three staples of the Mediterranean food system, namely grapes, olives and durum wheat. This paper describes the methodology adopted for the co-development of the pilot climate service for the wine sector, focusing on the Douro Wine Region in northern Portugal. In the first step, the MED-GOLD industrial partner SOGRAPE identified key decisions and users’ needs for the wine sector in the Douro region by involving managers from their own vineyards in that region. From this information, the relevant bioclimatic indicators (and associated essential climate variables) were selected. Afterwards, two compound risk indices, the Sanitary and Heat Risk indices, were introduced as a combination of some of the aforementioned bioclimatic indicators. This methodological work was validated against the empirical climate characterization for the region of interest, of several ‘bad’ and ‘good’ years chosen by users according to their recollections of grape and wine production outcomes, namely quality and yields. In this paper, the overall strategy for selection of these years is presented. The components of the service based on historical climate, seasonal predictions and longer-term climate projections are described along with the visual interface developed: the MED-GOLD Dashboard, an interactive tool that displays detailed historical climate data, seasonal predictions and climate projections. The Dashboard consists of an ICT platform with a map-based user-focused front end to aid easy access to and manipulation of the data. The Dashboard was iteratively co-designed with the users to ensure their needs were met.The authors acknowledge project MED-GOLD (Turning climate-related information into added value for traditional MEDiterranean Grape, Olive and Durum Wheat food systems, agreement no. 776467) funded by the European Union. Raul Marcos-Matamoros is a Serra Húnter fellow.Peer Reviewed"Article signat per 17 autors/es: Alessandro Dell'Aquila , António Graça, Marta Teixeira, Natacha Fontes, Nube Gonzalez-Reviriego, Raul Marcos-Matamoros, Chihchung Chou, Marta Terrado, Christos Giannakopoulos, Konstantinos V. Varotsos, Federico Caboni, Riccardo Locci, Martina Nanu, Sara Porru, Giulia Argiola, Marta Bruno Soares, Michael Sanderson"Postprint (published version

Understanding temporal and spatial changes of O3 or NO2 concentrations combining multivariate data analysis methods and air quality transport models

The application of the multivariate curve resolution method to the analysis of temporal and spatial data variability of hourly measured O3 and NO2 concentrations at nineteen air quality monitoring stations across Catalonia, Spain, during 2015 is shown. Data analyzed included ground-based experimental measurements and predicted concentrations by the CALIOPE air quality modelling system at three horizontal resolutions (Europe at 12 × 12 km2, Iberian Peninsula at 4 × 4 km2 and Catalonia at 1 × 1 km2). Results obtained in the analysis of these different data sets allowed a better understanding of O3 and NO2 concentration changes as a sum of a small number of different contributions related to daily sunlight radiation, seasonal dynamics, traffic emission patterns, and local station environments (urban, suburban and rural). The evaluation of O3 and NO2 concentrations predicted by the CALIOPE system revealed some differences among data sets at different spatial resolutions. NO2 predictions, showed in general a better performance than O3 predictions for the three model resolutions, specially at urban stations. Our results confirmed that the application of the trilinearity constraint during the multivariate curve resolution factor analysis decomposition of the analyzed data sets is a useful tool to facilitate the understanding of the resolved variability sources

Climateurope Festival: An innovative way of linking science and society

The Climateurope Festivals were designed to create synergies between different European, national and international initiatives in the fields of Earth-system modelling & Climate Services and enhance the transfer of information between suppliers and users. It gave an opportunity to display best in class outcomes and engage in world class networking in a less rigid environment than a scientific conference. A number of formats were adopted in the Festival, from traditional impulse talks to innovative interactive sessions, and the thought-provoking discussions allowed the participants to share their experiences and knowledge around the advantages and challenges that Climate Services face within different sectors. Three Climateurope Festivals were originally planned to be held across Europe. Two Festivals were successfully organised, the first in Valencia in 2017, and the second in Belgrade in 2018. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic and associated lockdowns and travel restrictions, the third and final Festival was held online as a series of virtual web-based Festivals in 2020/2021. The Festivals were highly valued by participants. There was a strong desire by the Climateurope network to continue a science-stakeholder dialogue and make the Climateurope Festivals a regular event.}The organization team of the Climateurope Festivals wishes to acknowledge and sincerely thank the entire consortium of Climateurope for their valuable support. Climateurope is funded by the European Commission through the Horizon 2020 Programme for Research and Innovation: Grant Agreement 689029.Peer Reviewed"Article signat per 14 autors/es: Lola Kotova, Maria Máñez Costa, Daniela Jacob, Chris Hewitt, Paula Newton, Natalie Garrett, Stacey New, Rebecca Parfitt, Tyrone Dunbar, Janette Bessembinder, Ralf Toumi, Mauro Buonocore, Aleksandra Krzic, Marta Terrado"Postprint (published version

CALIOPE: supercomputing for air quality improvement

CALIOPE és un sistema de predicció de la qualitat de l’aire desenvolupat pel Departament de Ciències de la Terra del Barcelona Supercomputing Center - Centre Nacional de Supercomputació (BSC-CNS). Gràcies al potencial quant a tractament i anàlisi de dades que proporciona la supercomputació, CALIOPE ofereix pronòstics de la qualitat de l’aire per a Catalunya, la península Ibèrica i Europa, amb informació detallada sobre els principals contaminants regulats per les autoritats europees. A més, els propers mesos el sistema inclourà la simulació de Barcelona a escala urbana (CALIOPE Urban). Aquesta informació és fàcilment accessible des d’un web dirigit tant a gestors públics com a la ciutadania.Paraules clau: qualitat de l’aire, contaminació atmosfèrica, meteorologia, sistema de pronòstic, emissions, supercomputació.CALIOPE is the air quality forecast system developed by the Earth Sciences Department of Barcelona Supercomputing Center - Centre Nacional de Supercomputació (BSC-CNS). Thanks to the data processing and analysis potential that supercomputing provides, CALIOPE offers air quality forecasts for Catalonia, the Iberian Peninsula and Europe at large, with detailed information on the main pollutants regulated by the European authorities. In the next few months, the system will include Barcelona’s simulation on an urban scale (CALIOPE Urban). This information is easily accessible on a website so that both public administrations and citizens can consult it.Keywords: air quality, air pollution, meteorology, forecast system, emissions, supercomputing

Coordination of Europe’s climate-related knowledge base: Networking and collaborating through interactive events, social media and focussed groups

Knowledge of the climate is essential to manage climate-related risks. Underpinning this knowledge is a huge range of climate research and climate service activities. There has been a marked expansion of such activities and while the numerous and diverse funding streams, activities and organizations involved means that climate service development is relatively well resourced in places, there is a risk that the landscape becomes fragmented, duplicative, confusing, and inefficient. To mitigate this, the European Commission established the Climateurope project to bring coordination to Europe’s climate-related knowledge base. Climateurope created a managed network to share knowledge, improve synergies and reduce fragmentation among the stakeholders. As the network evolved, we proactively strove for equality, diversity and inclusion, for example for gender, under-represented regions, and under-represented stakeholder groups. Climateurope explored and adopted innovative approaches to engaging the network members, including face-to-face networking events (Festivals), virtual networking events (Webstivals and webinars), use of arts, social media, expert groups, publications, and an active website. The mix and integration of the traditional communications, such as website, publications and expert groups, with more innovative and varied approaches, such as the Festivals, Webstivals, social media and arts, proved popular and successful in making the network active and attractive. We describe how the network and collaboration was established and managed, and we offer some recommendations for others based on our experiences, including consideration of equality, diversity and inclusion, consider strategies for growing, managing and sustaining the network, and consider a mix of virtual and physical networking events.This work was funded by the Horizon 2020 Framework Programme of the European Union: Climateurope - Linking science and society, Project ref. 689029. The views expressed are purely those of the authors who were all involved in the project and may not under any circumstances be regarded as stating an official position of the European Commission. Thank you to Rob Groenland and two anonymous reviewers for helpful comments on the paperPeer Reviewed"Article signat per 18 autors/es: Chris Hewitt, Janette Bessembinder, Mauro Buonocore, Tyrone Dunbar, Natalie Garrett, Lola Kotova, Stacey New, Paula Newton, Rebecca Parfitt, Carlo Buontempo, Francisco Doblas-Reyes, Francesca Guglielmo, Daniela Jacob, Erik Kjellström, Aleksandra Krzic, Helena Martins, Alessia Pietrosanti, Marta Terrado"Postprint (published version

How decadal predictions entered the climate services arena: an example from the agriculture sector

Predicting the variations in climate for the coming 1–10 years is of great interest for decision makers, as this time horizon coincides with the strategic planning of stakeholders from climate-vulnerable sectors such as agriculture. This study attempts to illustrate the potential value of decadal predictions in the development of climate services by establishing interactions and collaboration with stakeholders concerned with food production and security. Building on our experience from interacting with users and the increased understanding of their needs gathered over the years through our participation in various European activities and initiatives, we developed a decadal forecast product that provides tailored and user-friendly information about multi-year dry conditions for the coming five years over global wheat harvesting regions. This study revealed that the coproduction approach, where the interaction between the user and climate service provider is established at an early stage of forecast product development, is a fundamental step to successfully provide useful and ultimately actionable information to the interested stakeholders. The study also provides insights that shed light on the reasons for the delayed entry of decadal predictions in the climate services discourse and practice, obtained from surveying climate scientists and discussing with decadal prediction experts. Finally, it shows the key challenges that this new source of climate information still faces.We would like to acknowledge financial support from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation programme (MED-GOLD; Grant No. 776467, EUCP; Grant No. 776613 and FOCUS-Africa; Grant No. 869575). This study has also received support from C3S_34c (contract number: ECMWF/COPERNICUS/2019/ C3S_34c_DWD) of the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) operated by ECMWF. We thank Angel G. Muñoz and an anonymous reviewer for their invaluable comments on the manuscript. BSM acknowledges additional financial support from the Marie Sklodowska-Curie fellowship (Grant No. 713673) and from a fellowship of ’la Caixa’ Foundation (ID 100010434). The fellowship code is LCF/BQ/IN17/11620038.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version