Powering self-service access to climate data for meteorological services and climate scientists

EUMETSAT, an intergovernmental organization that operates an extensive system of meteorological satellites, recognized changes in users expectations, needs, and behavior in relation to the use of its data. More users wanted to benefit from self-service provisioning and hosted services on a common data lake ideally in conjunction with their own local IT environments. These new demands, combined with EUMETSAT’s internal IT needs, resulted in the definition of two fundamental domains: mission-critical and general purpose. Both of these required external elasticity as well as an architecture that would allow a seamless user experience and access to hosted software and data services. To achieve this, EUMETSAT needed the flexibility to bridge a wide range of clouds, tools, vendors, and platforms.

EUMETSAT is an intergovernmental organization founded in 1986. The organization operates an extensive system of meteorological satellites that observe the atmosphere, ocean and land surfaces around the globe. EUMETSAT's mission is to supply weather and climate-related satellite data, images and products – 24 hours a day, 365 days a year – to the National Meteorological Services of its Member and Cooperating States in Europe, as well as other users worldwide. These services help to enhance and safeguard the daily lives of European citizens. They aid meteorologists in identifying and monitoring potentially dangerous weather situations and in issuing timely forecasts and warnings to emergency services and local authorities, helping to mitigate the effects of severe weather and protecting human life and property. This information is also critical to the safety of air travel, shipping and road traffic, and to the daily business of farming, construction and many other industries.