Spire to Deliver Commercial RO Data for NOAA’s Weather Prediction Models

Spire Global, a space data analytics company, has announced a contract to deliver commercial radio occultation weather data to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Spire said the data will be used to support NOAA’s numerical weather prediction models, which are used to forecast the weather based on current weather conditions.

Peter Platzer, CEO of Spire, said that reliable weather prediction capabilities can save millions of lives as the effects of global warming continue to impact weather patterns.

“By providing data and analytics to NOAA’s weather prediction models, we know we can strengthen those models, ultimately saving lives and millions of dollars,” Platzer added. 

Spire said the contract represents the largest order for commercial weather data that NOAA has purchased under the Commercial Weather Data Buy Program. 

Under the terms of the deal, Spire will provide 3,000 Level 0 and Level 1 radio occultation profiles per day for six months. The data will taken out of Spire’s constellation capacity of more than 10,000 profiles per day.

Platzer called NOAA’s high-volume order the “most cost-efficient investment for taxpayers.”

Spire said it can simultaneously deliver data to both NOAA and the European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites

The data provided to NOAA is also expected to be made available to international meteorological organizations and other U.S. federal agencies. 

Spire is a space-to-cloud analytics company headquartered in San Francisco, California. The company said in its LinkedIn profile that its data is also used for advanced maritime and aviation use cases.