NOAA moves weather forecasting to cloud supercomputing

NOAA is shifting high-performance computing for weather forecasting from its two 14.5-petaflop WCOSS supercomputers to the cloud, with Google Cloud as the primary provider. A full-scale system is targeted for the end of 2026 with go-live by the end of 2027, and the AWIPS system will move to the cloud by early 2028.

• Each of the two WCOSS supercomputers runs at 14.5 petaflops and lasts about five years
• Full-scale cloud HPC system targeted for end of 2026, go-live by end of 2027
• Google Cloud is the primary provider for the WCOSS modernization project
• AWIPS will move to the cloud by early 2028 for access outside offices