Learning from other sectors: The Met Office

The Met Office is a world leader in providing weather and climate services, employing more than 1,700 people at 60 locations throughout the world. The Met Office is recognised as one of the world’s most accurate forecasters, using more than 10 million weather observations each day, an advanced atmospheric model and a high-performance supercomputer to create 3,000 tailored forecasts and briefings daily. These are delivered to a huge range of customers from the government, to businesses, the general public, armed forces, and other organisations. The Met Office’s work goes beyond forecasting weather and climate; it also extends to assessing the impact of the weather on UK society and business.

There are 540 scientists in the Met Office, out of nearly 2,000 people, focused on improving the accuracy of the numerical models.