Finnish Meteorological Institute - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

The Finnish Meteorological Institute is the government

Government

Government refers to the legislators, administrators, and arbitrators in the administrative bureaucracy who control a state at a given time, and to the system of government by which they are organized...

agency responsible for gathering and reporting weather

Weather

Weather is the state of the atmosphere, to the degree that it is hot or cold, wet or dry, calm or stormy, clear or cloudy. Most weather phenomena occur in the troposphere, just below the stratosphere. Weather refers, generally, to day-to-day temperature and precipitation activity, whereas climate...

data

Data

The term data refers to qualitative or quantitative attributes of a variable or set of variables. Data are typically the results of measurements and can be the basis of graphs, images, or observations of a set of variables. Data are often viewed as the lowest level of abstraction from which...

and forecasts in Finland

Finland

Finland , officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country situated in the Fennoscandian region of Northern Europe. It is bordered by Sweden in the west, Norway in the north and Russia in the east, while Estonia lies to its south across the Gulf of Finland.Around 5.4 million people reside...

. It is a part of the Ministry of Transport and Communications but it operates semi-autonomously.

The Institute is an impartial research and service organisation with expertise covering a wide range of atmospheric science activities other than gathering and reporting weather data and forecasts. The headquarters of the Institute is in Kumpula Campus

Kumpula Campus

The Kumpula Campus is a science campus of University of Helsinki. The campus is located some four kilometres from the centre of Helsinki, in the Kumpula district...

, Helsinki, Finland.

Staff

The number of full-time staff of the Finnish Meteorological Institute is about 540. Permanent staff members account for about 2/3 of the Institute's personnel and those with contractual posts account for the remainder. The Institute operates in on a round-the-clock basis and about 30 percent of the full-time staff work in shifts.

54 percent of the staff have university degrees and 15 percent have a licentiate or PhD degree. The average age of the staff is 43 years.

Air quality activities

The Finnish Meteorological Institute has investigated air quality processes and air pollution

Air pollution

Air pollution is the introduction of chemicals, particulate matter, or biological materials that cause harm or discomfort to humans or other living organisms, or cause damage to the natural environment or built environment, into the atmosphere....

prevention techniques since the early 1970s. Their staff members have comprehensive competence within the areas of meteorology

Meteorology

Meteorology is the interdisciplinary scientific study of the atmosphere. Studies in the field stretch back millennia, though significant progress in meteorology did not occur until the 18th century. The 19th century saw breakthroughs occur after observing networks developed across several countries...

, physics

Physics

Physics is a natural science that involves the study of matter and its motion through spacetime, along with related concepts such as energy and force. More broadly, it is the general analysis of nature, conducted in order to understand how the universe behaves.Physics is one of the oldest academic...

, chemistry

Chemistry

Chemistry is the science of matter, especially its chemical reactions, but also its composition, structure and properties. Chemistry is concerned with atoms and their interactions with other atoms, and particularly with the properties of chemical bonds....

, biology

Biology

Biology is a natural science concerned with the study of life and living organisms, including their structure, function, growth, origin, evolution, distribution, and taxonomy. Biology is a vast subject containing many subdivisions, topics, and disciplines...

and engineering

Engineering

Engineering is the discipline, art, skill and profession of acquiring and applying scientific, mathematical, economic, social, and practical knowledge, in order to design and build structures, machines, devices, systems, materials and processes that safely realize improvements to the lives of...

. Integrated work is done in cooperation with many other European research institutes and universities.

The air quality activities conducted by the Institute include:

Research, testing and development of air quality measuring methods and equipment.
Development of air pollutant emission
Exhaust gas
Exhaust gas or flue gas is emitted as a result of the combustion of fuels such as natural gas, gasoline/petrol, diesel fuel, fuel oil or coal. According to the type of engine, it is discharged into the atmosphere through an exhaust pipe, flue gas stack or propelling nozzle.It often disperses...

inventories.
Development of air pollution dispersion models
Atmospheric dispersion modeling
Atmospheric dispersion modeling is the mathematical simulation of how air pollutants disperse in the ambient atmosphere. It is performed with computer programs that solve the mathematical equations and algorithms which simulate the pollutant dispersion...
Performing chemical analyses of air quality.
Study and development of air pollution
Air pollution
Air pollution is the introduction of chemicals, particulate matter, or biological materials that cause harm or discomfort to humans or other living organisms, or cause damage to the natural environment or built environment, into the atmosphere....

prevention techniques.

The suite of local-scale (0 - 30 km) dispersion models available at the Institute includes:

An urban area, multiple-source dispersion model.
Vehicular pollution line-source
Air pollution dispersion terminology
Air pollution dispersion terminology includes the words and technical terms that have a special meaning to those who work in the field of air pollution dispersion modeling...

dispersion models.
Dispersion models for hazardous materials.
Dispersion models for odorous compounds.

Dispersion models for larger scales (30 to 3000 km) are also available.

Space Research

The Finnish Meteorological Institute is one of the few places in Finland where space research takes place. The institute has been a part of several high-profile NASA

NASA

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration is the agency of the United States government that is responsible for the nation's civilian space program and for aeronautics and aerospace research...

and ESA missions, such as Phoenix, Mars Science Laboratory

Mars Science Laboratory

The Mars Science Laboratory is a National Aeronautics and Space Administration mission with the aim to land and operate a rover named Curiosity on the surface of Mars. The MSL was launched November 26, 2011, at 10:02 EST and is scheduled to land on Mars at Gale Crater between August 6 and 20, 2012...

, Rosetta

Rosetta (spacecraft)

Rosetta is a robotic spacecraft of the European Space Agency on a mission to study the comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko. Rosetta consists of two main elements: the Rosetta space probe and the Philae lander. The spacecraft was launched on 2 March 2004 on an Ariane 5 rocket and will reach the comet by...

and BepiColombo

BepiColombo

BepiColombo is a joint mission of the European Space Agency and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency to the planet Mercury, due to launch in 2014. The mission is still in the planning stages so changes to the current description are likely over the next few years...

, in addition to leading a lander mission of their own, MetNet

MetNet

MetNet is an atmospheric science mission to Mars, initiated and defined by the Finnish Meteorological Institute. The mission includes sending several tens of MetNet landers on the Martian surface. The objective is to establish a widespread surface observation network on Mars to investigate the...

External links

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Staff

Air quality activities

Space Research

See also

External links