AI for short term forecasts (nowcasting) at DWD, status and perspectives.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is nowadays a central key for the improvement of methods in many modern applications and research areas, e.g. autonomous driving, image / face recognition as well as system simulation and optimization. The AI success stories are increasing quite rapidly. However, AI is still largely underrepresented in weather services.

DWD was among the first European weather services who used modern AI methods within the scope of short term weather forecast. The respective research activities and applications are currently performed in close cooperation with the University of Saarbrücken and Mainz as well as the German Aerospace Center, whereby DWD acts mainly on implementation and steering of the research. Further, on an international level, DWD agreed recently on a closer cooperation with the new AI section of the South-Korean Meteorological Agency as well.

This presentation will provide an overview about the AI applications at DWD covering the following topics:

- The application of computer vision for the short term forecasting (nowcasting) of radiation, fronts, thunderstorms and precipitation based on satellite data.

- The development and application of machine learning for the early detection of thunderstorms as well as for the improvement of short term forecasts of mature Cbs.

- The operational usage of neuronal networks for the detection of volcanic ash (satellite data).

- AI concepts for a seamless integrated forecasting system.

However, AI, in particular machine learning, is also linked with handicaps. Thus the pros and cons of AI, will be discussed in comparison to classical methods. Within this scope, recent validation results will be considered as well.