Guide to the WMO Integrated Global Observing System. 2019 edition.

Abstract

This is the second edition of the Guide to the WMO Integrated Global Observing System (WMO-No. 1165). The Guide was developed following the decision of the Seventeenth World Meteorological Congress for the WMO Integrated Global Observing System (WIGOS) to proceed to a preoperational phase (2016–2019), as well as the approval by the Seventeenth Congress of the Technical Regulations (WMO-No. 49), Volume I, Part I, and the Manual on the WMO Integrated Global Observing System (WMO-No. 1160), with effect from 1 July 2016. In essence, these two publications specify what is to be observed, as well as where, when and how, in order for Members to meet the relevant observational requirements.To complement these activities, the Seventeenth Congress requested the Secretariat of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) to publish a set of guidelines incorporated in an initial Guide, which would be progressively revised and enhanced through the WIGOS preoperational phase. This was formalized in a decision of the WMO Executive Council at its sixty-seventh session to re-establish the Intercommission Coordination Group on the WMO Integrated Global Observing System (ICG-WIGOS), which has as one of its terms of reference to complement WIGOS regulatory material with the necessary guidance information and technical guidelines incorporated in the Guide to the WMO Integrated Global Observing System (WMO-No. 1165). The first edition of the Guide was approved by the Executive Council at its sixty-ninth session via Resolution 2 (EC-69) – Initial version of the Guide to the WMO Integrated Global Observing System.The initial Guide aimed to assist Members in complying with a number of new regulations that came into effect on 1 July 2016. It was developed by the Secretariat, in particular the WIGOS Project Office, with input from technical experts of the Inter-Commission Coordination Group on WIGOS (ICG-WIGOS) task teams and the lead technical commissions (Commission for Basic Systems and Commission for Instruments and Methods of Observation)