A private sector-led organization has deployed nearly 800 automated weather stations across the Philippines to provide “localized” weather forecasts and help people make “wiser” decision.
“We are here to complement the government’s effort in disaster reduction. Our advocacy is #WeatherWiser Nation. Our role is to provide people more lead time to prepare,” says Dave Michael Valeriano, general manager of Weather Philippines Foundation Inc.
Valeriano says WPF complements the role of Philippine Atmospheric Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration or Pag-Asa in weather forecasting.
“Our forecasts are localized. That is our difference from Pag-Asa. For example, here in Taguig City, we have two weather stations—one at SM Aura and one in Bicutan. If you have ideal topographical condition, the range of weather station is 15 kilometers. But for an area with a lot of buildings, it could be as low as two km,” says Valeriano, who is based in Fort Bonifacio commercial business district in Taguig.
“There are times that within a city, there are varied weather conditions. That is what we try to capture with our forecasts and what you would see in the readings. That’s the gap that technically we would like to fill up by having these weather stations,” he says in an interview.
Valeriano, a civil engineering graduate from University of the Philippines-Diliman and a former investor relations officer at Aboitiz Equity Ventures Inc. and Manila Water, says WPF has a website and a mobile application that delivers accurate weather forecasts to the Filipino community, with the hope of improving nationwide disaster preparedness and timely response to variable weather conditions.
He says the Abotiz Group teamed up with other corporations to finance the operation of WPF as a credible weather information provider with a mid-term goal of operating 1,000 automated weather station/devices across the country.
Valeriano, who manages a team of 10 professionals at WPF, says 777 AWS and five lightning detection systems are currently operational, providing people localized readings in most provinces and cities. WPF has four meteorologists, three people on the operation side and three on the sustainability group.
He says data generated by WPF can help people make better decision, such as if travelers should bring an umbrella when going to a city, if local leaders should suspend classes in case of an extreme weather, where a cloud seeding team should conduct its operation, or what crops farmers should cultivate in an area.
Valeriano says companies decided to invest in weather forecasting after the onslaught of tropical storm Ondoy in September 2009. He says while the storm was not as strong as predicated in terms of wind intensity, it brought a lot of rain that submerged a wide swathe of Metro Manila.
“After Peping and Ondoy several years back, it kind of made people think within the Aboitiz group to put more resources in disaster prevention rather than recovery. As they say, an ounce of prevention is better than a pound of cure,” he says.
WPF was established in February 2012 by Aboitiz Foundation, UnionBank and MeteoGroup, a leading full-service weather business with operations in 15 countries.
Other companies eventually joined as platinum and gold sponsors, such as Ayala Corp., LBC Express, Vista Land, Nickel Asia Corp., ICTSI, SM Group, La Filipina Uy Gongco Corp., Sumitomo Metal Mining Corp., iAcademy, Hedcor Inc., Cebu Pacific, Visayan Electric Co., Davao Light & Power Co., Cemex Philippines, Aboitiz Power Corp., Syngenta, Philippine Airlines, PAL Express, Mountain Hardware, Marco Polo, Globe Telecom, Sarangani Energy Corp., The Net Group, Pilipinas Shell, Anvaya Cove, SN Aboitiz Power Group, Ocean Adventure and Pisig Worldwide.
WPF also has partnerships with non-government organizations, local government units, government agencies, the police and the military.
Alvin Tobias, operations manager of WPF, says the first weather station was installed on the resort island of Amanpulo in Palawan. WPF’s network of weather stations now stretches from Batanes to Sulu, he says. Of the 777 AWS currently deployed, 124 are located in Mindanao.
Tobias says an AWS measures the amount of sunlight, a location’s rainfall, temperature, pressure, humidity, wind speed and wind direction. The data are processed through weather specialist MeteoGroup’s systems and uploaded as accurate five-day weather forecasts on WPF’s website www.weather.com.ph and WeatherPhilippines mobile app for both Apple and Android devices.
“According to Pag-Asa, 1 mm of water is equivalent to 1 liter of rain in a one square-meter area,” Tobias says, referring to the amount of rain captured by an AWS. An AWS has a 15-watt solar panel that enables the SIM device to transmit data every 15 minutes, he says.
Tobias says an AWS costs about P60,000. Most AWS used by WPF were made in Germany and the United States, he says.
An AWS installed in Leyte province was able to capture the strength of Yolanda at 350 kph, before it was destroyed by the strongest typhoon that came out of the Pacific Ocean in November 2013.
Valeriano, a former varsity football player at La Salle Greenhills and now a father of two, says he decided to join WPF in 2015, because he missed working in the field. “There was a part of me that wanted to return to the operational side. When this opportunity opened and my predecessor [Celso Caballero] returned to Therma Mobile, I took the opportunity,” says Valeriano.
“One thing we really need to stress is the keyword ‘complementation.’ Truth of the matter is, there is no one with better mandate, resources and authorization to do certain things than the government [Pag-Asa]. We are here not to compete, but to complement. That’s basically our role,” he says.