Global Energy and Water Cycle Experiment ENLARGING THE SCOPE OF BALTEX

After the successful Phase I of the GEWEX continental-scale Baltic Sea Experiment (BALTEX), which brought major results in both science (such as coupled regional models for the Baltic Sea basin with the first water budget estimates established and new data sets assimilated) and also infrastructure (e.g. four dedicated data centres for meteorological, hydrological, oceanographic and radar data of the entire Baltic Sea basin), the BALTEX Community will now enlarge the scientific scope and strengthen its outreach. The achievements obtained and new evidence established in BALTEX now call for an intensive application to other fields where knowledge on water and energy cycles is of fundamental importance: Climate variability and climate change studies including scenarios of potential future climate, and environmental investigations, in particular, on transport and deposition of nutrients and pollutants. Also, carbon exchanges will be addressed, thus integrating contributions from the Nordic Pilot Experiment (NOPEX) project and strengthening WCRP-IGBP linkages at the regional scale in northern Europe. For BALTEX Phase II, it is envisaged that: