NOAA boosts weather data collection capabilities with new Mesonet contract
NOAA awarded a new contract starting September 1 to expand its National Mesonet Program, enhancing weather data collection through partnerships with private industry partners.
The National Weather Service, part of NOAA, will broaden its National Mesonet Program—a collaborative weather observation network—under a contract awarded to KBR Wyle Services, LLC. The agreement, effective September 1, extends an existing partnership while significantly increasing its scope to improve weather prediction and warnings nationwide. The program integrates data from diverse sources, including radars, weather balloons, and ocean buoys, to support NOAA’s forecasting models. NOAA’s director, Ken Graham, emphasized the importance of these partnerships in transforming raw data into reliable forecasts for public use.
Under the new contract, KBR will serve as the primary contractor, collaborating with approximately 70 private industry partners to collect, process, and format weather data for NOAA’s models. Curtis Marshall, Ph.D., director of the National Weather Service’s Commercial Observations Program, highlighted the contract’s role in modernizing weather observation systems by incorporating commercial data from land, air, and water sources. The initiative aims to reduce NOAA’s reliance on its own equipment while integrating emerging technologies to enhance forecasting accuracy and efficiency.
The expanded Mesonet Program now includes a broader range of environmental data, such as upper atmospheric conditions, soil moisture, wave heights, and ocean currents, in addition to surface observations. This growth reflects NOAA’s efforts to streamline access to high-quality data from multiple commercial sources for mission-critical functions like short-term weather prediction and situational awareness. The program’s evolution underscores the need for a dense, reliable network of observations to improve forecast models and warning systems.
By consolidating data procurement under KBR as the centralized contractor, NOAA aims to eliminate redundancy and improve efficiency in processing weather observations. The contract facilitates easier access to datasets derived from ground-based stations, commercial balloons, drones, ocean buoys, aircraft, and radars. This approach supports NOAA’s broader goal of modernizing its weather data systems and ensuring timely, accurate forecasts for the public.