1. GEO Secretariat Geneva, Switzerland 3rd June 2013
GEO Cold Regions Meeting
WA-01-C3 : Information for Cold Regions ----A attempt to go (GEO Cold Regions?)
GEO Secretariat
Geneva, Switzerland
3rd June 2013

2. Forward –
As part of the Water SBA, the “Cold Region” is an observation target area which relates strongly to frozen water in its various forms -- Cryosphere (and therefore relates to many other national, regional and international programs and efforts).
But, many of the issues are also relevant to other SBAs – Biodiversity, Climate, Disasters, Ecosystems, Energy, Health and Weather, and therefore many of the 26 Tasks in the Work Plan.

3. WA-01-C3: Information Service for Cold Region
Developing through a number of activities, which can be divided into three categories :
General Descriptions
Archive, manage, and provide access to in-situ and remotely-sensed metadata and data sets for monitoring Cryosphere through appropriate national, regional and global systems and centres.
Archive, manage, and provide access to in-situ and remotely sensed data sets and associated data for monitoring Cold Regions (especially, the Ecosystem and Biodiversity) through appropriate national, regional, and global systems and centres.

4. Observations and Information
Conduct a distributed cyber(e)-infrastructure to collect, manage, publish and share polar research results and implement multi-disciplinary interoperability following a Brokering approach, supporting SCAR data policy and in accordance with European and international standards, including GEO/GEOSS, INSPIRE.
Awareness on the cryosphere projects applied to at 20 of INTERACT's > 50 research stations, within the INTERACT infrastructure project based in northern Europe, Russia, US, Canada, Greenland, Iceland, the Faroe Islands and Scotland. To build capacity for research and monitoring in the European Arctic and beyond via access to numerous research stations through the Transnational Access program. The INTERACT is also offering metadata and some datasets and possibilities for additional observations required by GEO. INTERACT would be prepared to try to validate remotely sensed data.
Provide the parameter data product and tools/systems/models to the GEO DataCORE. Implement the information service for Cold Regions, for example, the CryoClim cryospheric climate monitoring.
Provide the polar station observation and satellite data coordination through appropriate national, regional and global systems and centres.
Promote the integration with integrated atmospheric and climatic observation and modeling data from a network of high-altitude mountain stations in the Alps, Himalaya-Karakoram, Rwenzori and Andes in the framework of the Ev-K2-CNR SHARE program and the national Italian project NextData.

5. Coordination and Programs
Build a polar data catalogue through integrated observation and modeling data from the broad range of “International Polar Year” research activities. The CAFF/CBMP – Polar data catalogue is on services : .
As a component of the Global Cryosphere Watch (GCW) portal, establish a Cryosphere Constellation of Portals by linking existing and proposed portals of Cryospheric information.
Support the development of sustained and coordinated pan‐Arctic observing and data sharing systems that serve societal needs. Improve the networking among existing observing systems and sites to create pan‐Arctic observing networks. Promote the implementation of the Sustainable Arctic Observation Network (SAON).
Integrate the Svalbard Integrated Arctic Earth Observing System (SIOS) and the CryoClim cryospheric climate monitoring service into GEOSS
Implementation the Third Pole Environment program and Alpine Mountain ecosystem observations.
And other individuals (with GEO volunteer mechanism) who are interested in this Cold Region efforts.

6. The Group - WA-01-C3: Information services for GEO Cold Region
Cold Region Group 35
The main participants (with a list of 68 people) are
-Canada, China, Denmark, EC, Finland, Germany, India, Italy, Japan, Norway, Spain, UK, USA, SAON, ICIMOD, WMO
-CliC/WCRP, PSTG/WMO, SOOS/SCAR, CAFF, IASC and AMAP for information
-Other Task Contribution from Ecosystem, Biodiversity, Water and Climate SBAs
Cryosphere
Ecosystem
Biodiversity
Water
Climate
Agriculture …
International Program
Member Country efforts
PO efforts – CEOS/WMO/
GEO SBAs
Research Teams
Individuals … 70

7. The main participants are
Canada, China, Denmark, EC, Finland, Germany, India, Italy, Japan, Norway, Spain, UK, USA, ICIMOD, WMO, INTERACT, CAFF, SAON, TPE, PSTG/WMO
CliC/WCRP, SOOS/SCAR, IASC and AMAP, SCAR for information
Other Task Contribution from Ecosystem, Biodiversity, Water and Climate SBAs and etc.

8. GEO Cold Region - Conception
The GEO Cold Region idea keeps the “Cold Region” as the observation target area, which relates strongly to frozen water in its various forms, associated with influence of Water (Cryosphere), Ecosystem, Biodiversity, Health, Energy, Disaster, Climate, Weather and even Agriculture issues. Most of these issues are relevant to the GEOSS nine Societal Benefit Areas and therein the implementation of 26 associated tasks. Cold Region has its cross cutting nature in the GEOSS framework.

9. GEO nine Societal Benefit Areas
Cold Region
Its CORE are the Cryospheric Components (solid water)
Three Poles - cross continents
It includes snow, sea ice, lake and river ice, glaciers, ice caps, ice sheets, permafrost and seasonally frozen ground, and solid precipitation
Disaster
GEO nine Societal Benefit Areas
Health
Agriculture
Water
Climate
Energy
Weather
Ecosystem
Biodiversity 9

10. Motivations and Vision
Recognize that Cold Region is the most fragile ecosystem in the world, which not only includes the South and North Poles, but also the Third Pole (Tibetan Plateau);
Provide spatially Cross Continent Observation Coordination and Cross Cutting Application Domain Observation Synergy based on the scientific oriented driving; To fulfil the observation gap in the far and hard-to-reach cold region by satellite and in-situ data through the global platform of GEO;
Implement the observation strategy and provide a proactive framework for the development of information and related services for the “Future Earth” research initiative and to assess the sustainable development ability addressed in Rio+20;
Strengthen the partnerships with policy-makers, stakeholders, and funders over the cold region ecological and engineering fields;
Facilitate the national infrastructure and capacity building as a whole effort in Cold Region from GEO Members and POs, especially over the nine Societal Benefit Areas.

11. The GEO Cold Region builds on the GEOSS Broker system and work with the exiting efforts, fully leverage the GEOSS Common Interface (GCI) infrastructure,
The recent strategy action plans for GEO Cold Region monitoring are,
-To form the Terms of Reference (ToR) for GEO Cold Region activities
-To create a Coordination Mechanism with the three poles concept for one Global Cold Region observation network/broker
-To clarify the linkage with the other GEOSS buildings tasks and to solidify the contribution to the whole GEOSS building locally and globally.
-To identify Cold Region gaps and priorities for satellite, in-situ observation systems.
-To foster Capacity and Infrastructure building
-To strengthen the importance of the whole Cold Region, especially its three-pole coordination, bring it to the GEO X Plenary and Ministerial Summit.

12. The Coordination Regime and Composition of GEO Cold Region
Basically, a GEO Cold Region Task would be a combination of,
Global Cryosphere Observations
Cold Region Ecosystems and Biodiversity Observations (EC-01, BI-01)
Information Service for Cold Region (Infrastructure, Data sharing, WA-01-C3)
Global Change-Cold Region perspective (EC-01, SB-01 and Climate)

13. How to work. Need Framework
How to work? Need Framework? Or Community Of Practice (COP) A COMMUNITY OF PRACTICE (COP) IS, A GROUP OF PEOPLE WHO SHARE A CRAFT AND/OR A PROFESSION As Advisory Function?

14. There are 26 tasks, including 60 components, Information Service for Cold Region is now under the WA-01-C3 component.

15. Thoughts GEO Cold Region a draft to address the coordination
Ministerial Summit
Plenary
(Decision Makers)
GEO Cold Region Cross Cutting Task
The Third Part Organization
(ICSU, UNDP…)
Partnerships (Systems)
GEO Cold Region
(Panel/Board/System?)
GEOSS
Communities
(Users and Stakeholders)
Projects
Programs
Panel/Board/System: include all the program or board chairman or PI for the big projects, so that is to say GEO Cold Region is more like a advisory panel or Board, all other system linkages with the GCI.
9 SBAs
Networks/Coordinations
Data Sharing Principle
(Support)
Infrastructure
(Broker/GCI)
Short/ Long Term Activates/ Individuals
a draft to address the coordination

16. Would be next…
Workshop? Regional or National? To push and pull on this way to future development
GEO Work Plan Symposium, at June, 2013, some of the program would join in, and it is better to have a talk on this Cold Region specifically
GEO Plenary, January, 2014
GEO Ministerial Summit, January, 2014

17. Thank you!
GEO Cold Region: