Joint APARC/WCRP Workshop and Training School on AI for Climate and Weather Forecast.

A 5-day joint workshop and training school (AI4Climate) to adapt capacity building to the needs of the Global South countries, using a bottom-up approach.

The joint Workshop and Training School will include lecture series on specific themes during the morning sessions; a group field experiment centered around the launch of a balloon sounding; and hands-on training applying Software and Data Analysis Tools (ML/AI) in python to selected datasets covered in the lectures in the afternoon. The balloon sounding will measure ozone, water vapor, temperatures and air pollutants, which are within the scope of the workshop/training school goals and relevant for improving regional predictions and climate services. 

During the first four days of the training school, mini-projects tailored to specific regional needs will be proposed by small groups of 3 to 4 participants, aiming to stimulate creative and innovative approaches for addressing these needs. Each project will be mentored by one or more lecturers, with ideas and preliminary results to be presented on the final day of the training school. As extra motivation for the participants and their mentors, we will aim to publish selected mini-projects in the APARC newsletter.

• Morning Lectures & Discussion: Daily thematic lectures on In-situ and Satellite Observations for Societal Benefits and Decision Making; Reanalysis Products and Data Assimilation; Global and Regional Climate and Weather Modeling; Weather and Climate Prediction; Climate Change and Variability; Hazards and Extreme Events; ML  and AI for Weather and Climate Research; Causal Inference; Interactions of Atmospheric Composition and Climate; Production and Dissemination of Weather and Climate Products; Climate Storylines for Actionable Regional Climate Information; and Green Energy Systems for Climate Resilience.   

• Field Experiment: Balloon sounding launch to measure ozone, water vapor, temperatures and air pollutants. 

• Afternoon Computer-based Exercises: Application-oriented AI/ML sessions on Jupyter notebooks using methods and datasets discussed during the lectures to learn new software (such as ESMValTool, Pangeo and Google Earth Engine) and data analysis tools (Causal Inference, ML & AI) for weather and climate research.

• Soft Skills: Personal development sessions focusing on essential academic and professional skills, including communication with different audiences and participatory research.

• Social Events: Networking opportunities and informal exchanges during coffee breaks and the social dinner.

• Presentations: Self-introduction and presentation of the mini-project results by the early-career attendees to foster discourse and feedback. 

The African Institute for Mathematical Sciences (AIMS) is a pan-African network of Centres of Excellence for post-graduate training in mathematical sciences, research and public engagement in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM). AIMS is enabling Africa’s talented students to become innovators driving the continent’s scientific, educational and economic self-sufficiency.

We gratefully acknowledge the WCRP/APARC; Ecole Supérieure Polytechnique;  Jülich Research Centre; IRD; IAMAS/ICMA & WWRP for their financial support of this workshop and training school. 

We gratefully acknowledge these colleagues for their support: