PROGRAM
13.30-13.40 -- Welcome / GEIA Overview -- Jos Olivier
SESSION 1: FUTURE DIRECTIONS OF GEIA STUDY GROUPS
13.40-14.00 -- Introduction to issues: example of SOx/NOx group -- Trevor Scholtz
14.00-15.30 -- Discussion of issues
15.30-16.00 -- Conclusions on strategy for the issues discussed
16.00-16.15 TEA BREAK
SESSION 2: GEIA WEB SITE, OTHER COMMUNICATION AND DATA MANAGEMENT
16.15-16.30 -- Review of present GEIA Web Site content and traffic -- Henry Lansford
16.30-17.00 -- Discussion of issues
1700-1715 -- Recommendations on communication and data management.
17.15 CLOSURE
The Tenth International Workshop of the Global Emissions Inventory Activity (GEIA) was held in Bologna, Italy, on 13 September 1999 in conjunction with the Sixth Scientific Conference of the International Global Atmospheric Chemistry Project (IGAC). The objective of the GEIA Workshop was to provide an opportunity for informal exchange of information about updated inventories and the future direction of the GEIA Web Site between GEIA participants and others interested in global/regional emissions inventories who were attending the IGAC Conference.
The workshop was attended by 12 participants, six of whom are modelers. Because of the good mix of GEIA participants and modelers, the workshop program was refocused to discuss how to improve interaction between GEIA and users of GEIA data, both through the GEIA study groups and the GEIA Data Management and Communication Center.
As an introduction to GEIA, Jos Olivier presented an overview of the GEIA objectives. He reviewed:
Topics for discussion were:
Trevor Scholtz introduced the work of the study groups by summarizing some experiences during the recent development of the 1990 update of the SOx/NOx inventories of anthropogenic emissions. He made the following observations:
After a lively discussion the following recommendations were drawn:
Expanding contacts. Interest in the study groups could be revived by a much stronger interaction with users (modelers, policy makers, and others), by establishing regional contacts or contacts with relevant international organizations, and by communication with users and other interested people, e.g., through a newsletter.
Feedback. Users should be asked for input on:
In addition, users could be asked if they are willing to review datasets or inventories or contribute in other ways to GEIA Study Group activities. Input from modelers is essential for biogenic sources in particular. The modelers participating in the workshop provided examples of contact points in Argentina and Egypt.
Representation of GEIA. At conferences such as those of IGAC, AGU, EGS, more feedback should be solicited and more promotion of GEIA results should be made by the co-convenors and by members of the GEIA Coordinating Committee. In the early years of GEIA this was done to a great extent by Tom Graedel, the first Convenor of GEIA.
Uncertainty. More information on uncertainty (more than a qualification into regional low, medium or high for the total inventory) could be provided:
In addition, it was recommended that for use by modelers an associated quantitative uncertainty interpretation (GEIA's expert opinion estimate) should be provided instead of simply providing qualifications such as low, medium or high. As a start to this process, we recommend that a paragraph be added to each database as soon as possible describing the expected sources of the largest errors in the emission database and at least a qualitative description of the magnitude of the possible errors.
Time profiles. Depending on the compound, it is important to atmospheric modelers for the monthly and diurnal variation in the emissions to be included.
Flexible data format. The new flexible data format as proposed by Trevor Scholtz was agreed upon, including the continuation of using grid cell numbers instead of x and y coordinates. This format includes more emissions columns, e.g., for division into source categories or seasonal emissions.
Country totals. Since country totals may be provided with the GEIA gridded inventories as supporting information although they were not necessarily used in producing individual 1x1 degree databases, we propose to add the following comment as a part of an overall comment on the GEIA databases: "Countries and territorial entities used by GEIA are used for information purposes only. They do not imply any position on national territorial boundaries or on official country emissions information."
The topics for discussion in this session were:
Henry Lansford of the GEIA Data Management and Communication Center provided an overview of recent activities on this topic and the proposal for inclusion of a page on the GEIA Web Site with links to other sites. The following observations were made:
At present, the GEIA web traffic is about 60 to 70 different users per quarter who download inventories. This excludes downloading of GEIA inventories residing at the CGEIC and EDGAR sites. The GEIA Web Site is visited much more frequently.
Not much feedback is received from users, except for the information form filled in by most users and the survey that was sent to registered users last year.
Several users have expressed a desire to have the formats stay the same. If new formats are introduced, it may be desirable to keep the old format as well.
Improved visualization (currently only one grid map of the total inventory) would allow users to examining databases by grid and by country and compare different inventories.
A dialogue would provide an opportunity for GEIA to request more detailed input from users regarding the data used and to obtain more timely response from study groups on user findings with respect to the data bases.
Funds for the continued operation of the GEIA Data Center have recently been received from the National Science Foundation.
Again, after an intensive discussion among the participants the following recommendations were made with respect to communication and data management.
Communication
GEIA participants list and mailing list. The GEIA workshop announcement went out to the GEIA e-mail network (now over 300) in late spring. Given the small turnout for the Bologna workshop, several suggestions were made for enhancing participation in future workshops. Improvement of the participant list and expansion of the mailing list (including convenors of other IGAC activities and a wide range of modelers) was considered essential. In addition, it was recommended that printed flyers should be sent in addition to e-mail announcements. This is expected to result in increased exposure because the person who receives the flyer may show it to other interested colleagues. Also, requests for progress reports, etc., should be sent out not only shortly before a meeting, but at more frequent intervals.
Newsletter. Feedback from users and thus the interest of GEIA Study Groups are expected to greatly benefit from a newsletter (e.g. quarterly). Also active enquiries should be made, e.g. quarterly, from all recent registered users on subjects discussed in the first session.
Brochure. It was recommended that the new GEIA brochure should be easy to read and understand with informative content based on the current plans with respect to science, data management and communication. The glossy booklet should be illustrated.
Feedback. At regular intervals, e.g., quarterly, information should be provided to the study groups on who downloaded their specific inventories.
Discussion group. For cross-fertilization among study groups and to reach consensus on common aspects (e.g. seeking new members, regional contacts, statistics, changes in formats, minimum additional textual information on the site, dealing with and reporting on uncertainties, maps sought, etc.) it was proposed that a discussion group be organized for GEIA participants (and other IGAC convenors). The GEIA Center was asked to evaluate options for to structuring, technically organizing and leading these discussions.
Logging downloads at other sites. To get a complete picture of the interest in GEIA data, the logging of users of GEIA data residing at other sites should be improved (those site managers of CGEIC, EDGAR and NASA to be contacted).
Web links. The present proposal for addition of web links was felt to be not well-balanced. Before putting a link on the GEIA Web Site, it should be reviewed by the GEIA Coordinating Committee, with possible later additions based on comments received by GEIA groups and users. It was proposed that the additional links should be divided into a number of categories, such as (a) current emissions (e.g. regional, global, official), (b) historical emissions, (c) future emission scenarios, (d) activity data (available on the web), (e) grid maps (e.g. land-use, population, temperature, precipitation), (e) participating, related and funding organizations, (g) miscellaneous (e.g. international organizations such as WRI, IIASA, IISD, UNEP etc.). In addition, study groups may wish to add links that are specifically relevant for their subject. Some modelers have suggested that links to databases consisting of atmospheric measurements of trace gas concentrations be considered.
Data Management
Data format. The present data formats (current and new extended one) are appropriate. Additional information, such as providing a graph, is very useful for modelers, e.g. in checking the correctness of grid cell conversions.
Flexibility for users. Users should be able to download data in a single step in various levels of detail, e.g. total, sectoral, seasonal or per country. Preferably, this should be done by a special user-friendly interface for choosing the levels.
Missing inventories. Large data gaps should be filled in as soon as possible, particularly inventories for CO and CH4. It was recommended that the EDGAR CO and CH4 inventories be used as the first GEIA inventories for anthropogenic sources for these compounds (final or preliminary), if no better inventory is available. They appear to be widely used and are now published or about to published in the scientific literature.
Missing sources. Other data gaps that urgently need to be filled are source inventories for biomass burning, international transport and missing natural sources.
For biomass burning, the preliminary inventories presently included by various study groups in their emissions inventory (N2O, NH3, NMVOC, carbon black and reactive chlorine) should be reviewed on their constituent parts by the GEIA groups as soon as possible. After the IGAC BIBEX convenors are consulted for their advice and possible immediate improvement of part or all of this set, one set will be recommended as the preliminary dataset to be used in new or updated GEIA inventories.
For international transport, if the datasets of NASA (aircraft) and of Corbett and Fishbeck (shipping) do not appear to be immediately available, it was recommended that the EDGAR datasets should be used as preliminary datasets.
For natural sources that are presently missing, in particular DMS, the (anthropogenic) study groups should be asked to evaluate and select from the presently available datasets, possible by checking with inventory users.
QA/QC. Quality assurance/quality control should be improved by common checking procedures (minimum and recommended ones) by the study groups or by external QC qualified persons at a special data management center. This issue should be discussed further and agreed upon in the GEIA Data Management Committee.
Data conversion. The conversion into GEIA format (default or extended new one) appears to be a difficult task for some groups, resulting in delays before the data are actually on the web and available for GEIA users. A special data management center could perform this task.
The GEIA Workshop was followed by the 6th Scientific Conference of the International Global Atmospheric Chemistry Project (IGAC), during which discussion on some subjects of the workshop was continued and finalized. Prior to the IGAC Conference, the first IGBP/GAIM Workshop of the Global Atmospheric Methane Synthesis (GAMeS) was held. Part of this workshop was attended by GEIA Co-convenors Derek Cunnold and Jos Olivier.
About 370 scientists attended the IGAC Conference. About 10 individual GEIA Study Group members represented GEIA. In addition, there was a poster presentation on GEIA and EDGAR by co-convenor Jos Olivier. As a result, about 35 modelers expressed interest in receiving information on updates of GEIA (and EDGAR). Some of them also offered to become members of GEIA Study Groups or to contribute specific inventories. Eight of these 35 are working in developing countries.
With respect to the usage of GEIA (or EDGAR) inventories, we observed that about 20 percent of the 55 oral presentations referred to GEIA (or EDGAR) inventories, starting with the keynote presentation by Paul Crutzen. In addition to the 35 persons showing interest in GEIA products, GEIA members contacted about 30 other modelers at the conference on the subject of emissions. Thus it can be concluded that at least about 20% of the modelers are using, or intending to use GEIA inventories (or may contribute to improving them). Most of those modelers not using GEIA inventories did not do so because there was not a GEIA inventory available for the species they were modeling