ForecastWatch March Wrap-up and News

A look back at ForecastWatch blog posts and ClimateWatch newsletters over the last month.

April 02, 2025

March Wrap-Up

The National Weather Service Provides Vital Information and Services

With all the recent talks about which federal agencies may see reductions in funding and staff with the new presidential administration, the National Weather Service (NWS) has been at the forefront of conversations.

For starters, the NWS costs the average tax-paying American $3-4 per year. That’s about the cost of one cup of coffee. As of now, the NWS has a budget of around $1.38 billion, with around $102.1 billion returned in estimated public value. That’s a whopping 73:1 return on investment.

So what exactly does the National Weather Service do? We don’t have time to name everything, but here is the big picture.

AccuWeather to Create Advanced Global Lightning Detection Network

At the end of 2024, AccuWeather closed a deal to acquire TOA Systems, Inc. TOA Systems, Inc. is a premier provider of lightning detection hardware and one of the few global lightning networks in existence.

“The integration of AccuWeather’s expertise in machine learning and weather forecasting with TOA’s advanced hardware will dramatically enhance decision-making processes for industries and individuals at risk from lightning strikes.” says Steven R. Smith, AccuWeather CEO.

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Check out the newsletters from March:

NOAA’s Warn-on-Forecast Project Could Increase Lead Time For Severe Weather

As we enter spring and severe weather begins to ramp up, NOAA’s research project Warn-on-Forecast aims to increase the lead time for tornado, severe thunderstorm, and flash flood warnings

Traditionally, warnings have been based on detection or indicators of severe weather hazards using Doppler radars, but this “warn-on-detection” approach has reached a plateau.

Now, NOAA compiles satellite, radar, and surface observations and puts that data into a high-resolution model that updates every half hour and makes probabilistic predictions of individual thunderstorms out to six hours in advance, with the goal of issuing warnings up to an hour ahead of time.

The Weather Company Implements JEDI System to Improve Forecasts

On March 20, 2025, The Weather Company (TWC) announced it is now the first operational user of the Joint Effort for Data Assimilation Integration (JEDI), a groundbreaking weather forecasting framework.

The Weather Company’s adoption of JEDI affirms their commitment to pushing the boundaries of weather science and technology to help improve weather-based decision making. TWC is implementing JEDI with its global high-resolution atmospheric forecasting system (GRAF), which updates 6 times more frequently and has up to 3 times the resolution compared to other global models. Internal tests indicate up to a 15% improvement in forecast accuracy when JEDI is implemented into GRAF.

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