Alberto Troccoli – författare

Originally formed around a set of lectures presented at a NATO Advanced Study Institute (ASI), this book has grown in scope and in aspiration to become organised and presented rather more as a textbook than as a standard “collection of proceedings”. The lack of a unified reference textbook covering both the science of seasonal to interannual predictions and real-world uses of the forecasts was the main driver for the effort placed into writing an amalgamated introductory book, each chapter of which has been thoroughly peer reviewed. Throughout, our objective has been to present a book accessible to people from diverse disciplines, both scientific and social, interested in this intriguing and fast emerging area.

The fascination of seasonal climate forecasting, for which El Niño forecasting provides the prime basis, derives from its multi-faceted character. Not only does it pose exciting new scientific challenges for the climate community, but it is linked naturally to a great variety of key practical concerns, from security related issues, such as water resource management, food security, and disaster prediction and prevention, to health planning, agriculture management, energy supply, and tourism, to name but a few. Seasonal to interannual climate forecasts are indeed becoming a most important element in certain policy/decision making systems, not least within the contexts of sustainable development and of climate change adaptation.

It is the purpose of this book to provide the meteorological knowledge and tools to improve the risk management of energy industry decisions, ranging from the long term finance and engineering planning assessments to the short term operational measures for scheduling and maintenance. Most of the chapters in this book are based on presentations given at the inaugural International Conference Energy & Meteorology (ICEM), held in the Gold Coast, Australia, 8-11 November 2011. The main aim of the conference was to strengthen the link between Energy and Meteorology, so as to make meteorological information more relevant to the planning and operations of the energy sector. The ultimate goal would be to make the best use of weather and climate data in order to achieve a more efficient use of energy sources. This book seeks to realise the same objective.