Loren Data Corp.

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COMMERCE BUSINESS DAILY ISSUE OF MAY 24,1999 PSA#2352

Department of Commerce, NOAA, 200 World Trade Center, Room 209, Norfolk, VA 23510-1624

66 -- CLIMATE REFERENCE NETWORK INSTRUMENTATION AND DATA SYSTEM DUE 062599 POC Lynne Phipps, Contract Specialist (757) 441-6881, Melvyn DesJarlais, Contracting Officer, (757) 441-6647 WEB: Request for Information, http://www.easc.noaa.gov. E-MAIL: Lynne Phipps, Lynn.B.Phipps@noaa.gov. The purpose of this Request for Information (RFI) is to determine the current state-of-the-art and availability of technologies which industry can offer to accomplish the design and implementation of a near real-time climate monitoring system. This RFI is not a Request for Proposals (RFP) but rather is a request to determine the availability of approaches to (1) measure and record temperature, precipitation, solar radiation, wind speed, and wind direction at approximately 250 sites within and across the United States, (2) transmit observations to central locations in near real-time (i.e., hourly), and (3) train individuals for on-site instrument recalibration and general station inspection and maintenance. The system should be off-the-shelf, rugged, require minimum maintenance, and store 60 days worth of data. Options for data transmission should include line of sight RF, telephone, internet, and satellite uplink. The goal of this effort is to monitor long-term climate variability and climate change and to put current climate anomalies into an historical (decade to century) perspective. This RFI is not to be construed as a commitment by the Government to issue a solicitation or ultimately award a contract. Responses will not be considered as proposals nor will any award be made as a direct result of the RFI response. Any costs incurred in reply to the RFI shall be borne by the respondent and cannot be charged to the Government for reimbursement. All information in the RFI represents an overview of the anticipated project, which is subject to change, and is in no way binding on the Government. The Government will acknowledge receipt of submissions but will not provide any feedback. A reference network of approximately 250 of our best existing long-term stations will be identified and upgraded to long-term climate monitoring standards in order to virtually eliminate time-dependent biases. A nearby backup site for each of these stations also will be identified to provide redundancy in the network. Each site will have extensive metadata regarding station operation and surrounding environment. New instrumentation will be put in place at the 250 primary sites, while maintaining existing observations for a period of at least two years (24 consecutive months). The two data sets will be used to develop transfer functions that will preserve the integrity of the long-term record. Optionally, the new instrumentation may be installed at the 250 backup sites. New instruments will include digital recording of temperature, precipitation amount, solar radiation, wind speed and wind direction measurements with automated data transfer to collection sites. The system must be expandable, having the capability to accommodate additional automated sensors in the future as the need for new measurements arises. Manually-observed data, including snowfall amount, will be keyed into the data logger or spoken into a voice recognition system to accomplish near real-time transmission. The National Climatic Data Center (NCDC) will routinely monitor the quality and long-term integrity of the data from these sites, and provide reports back for on-site inspection as warranted. The automated data from these sites will be transmitted near real-time (i.e., hourly), with daily summaries of means, extremes, and variability. The manually-observed data will be transmitted daily. The observation time for the manually-observed daily data will vary. The system must be robust and durable, able to make and transmit observations under all weather conditions in the United States. The data will be a critical element in the Government's operational monitoring of current climate anomalies as well as official assessments of long-term climate change. They will also be used in near term weather forecasts, warnings, and watches, particularly updating flood forecasts, as well as in other economic business enterprises. This usage will require: (1) reporting of the observational data on an hourly basis, (2) transmission of the daily summary information once-daily, (3) electronic data access, (4) the ability to electronically port the data from a file into the NCDC's highly automated QC processing system, and (5) the updating of the list of sites and metadata must be easily performed by the data base manager. Responses should include a description of the firm's background, history, and capability in developing meteorological monitoring systems, and a discussion of the available systems and technology. Respondents are requested to provide information using WordPerfect 6/7/8 or MS WORD files forwarded to Richard Heim at the NCDC via the Internet, rheim@ncdc.noaa.gov, or via a 3.5 inch diskette, or by mail. Faxing is also acceptable: (828) 271-4022. To be considered, submissions must be received at the National Climatic Data Center, 151 Patton Ave., Room 120, Asheville, NC 28801-5001 not later than 4:00 PM, June 25, 1999. Administrative questions concerning this announcement may be directed to one of the following: Lynne Phipps, e-mail, Lynn.B.Phipps@noaa.gov or Melvyn DesJarlais,Melvyn.A.DesJarlais@noaa.gov. Technical questions should be directed to Bruce Baker, (828) 271-4018, fax (828) 271-4022, e-mail, bbaker@ncdc.noaa.gov. Posted 05/20/99 (W-SN333924). (0140)

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