Message-ID: <105133.1075856421196.JavaMail.evans@thyme>
Date: Thu, 12 Apr 2001 02:32:00 -0700 (PDT)
From: mike.roberts@enron.com
To: vince.kaminski@enron.com
Subject: London Status Report - Research Weather Effort
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X-From: Mike A Roberts
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Vince,

FYI to give you background for tomorrow's telephone conference

Steve is really a home-run hitter

Mike
---------------------- Forwarded by Mike A Roberts/HOU/ECT on 04/12/2001 
09:26 AM ---------------------------
   
	Enron North America Corp.
	
	From:  Stephen Bennett @ ENRON                           04/12/2001 09:02 AM
	

To: Mike A Roberts/HOU/ECT@ECT
cc:  
Subject: London Status Report

Hi Mike,

Before we meet with Vince tomorrow - I thought we should drop you a line and 
give you an idea as to what's been accomplished in the first week as well as 
some of the challenges and problems we've run into.  This way we can make the 
most effective use of Vince's time.

1) Current Products and Customers

In our first 3 days - we established 6 different customer groups - 
representing approximately 40 traders plus additional fundamentals and 
analytics folks.  The groups are:  UK Trading, Gas Fundamentals, Crude 
Trading, Weather Derivatives, Continental Power, and an internal trader 
newsletter.

We've built the following framework to address these customers - the key 
deadlines are noted:

0800: UK Trading/Weather Derivatives/Fundamentals: Prepare a 1 to 5 day UK 
specific forecast and assess the 12z runs of the ECMWF (and ensembles), the 
AVN as well as EarthSat's 1-5 day outlook.  The traders are particularly 
interested in the performance of the ECMWF as it feeds all of their demand 
models.  We prepare a 1 page summary and give an idea as to any particular 
forecast biases - whether we feel things may come in warmer or colder than 
the model.  We brief the traders and field questions then provide our report 
to the fundamentals group.  
** In the future we would like to be able to gather raw data from the AVN and 
MRF to provide a series of choices which could be input into their demand 
models or at least be able to give them our "best pick" of guidance and how 
we feel things may deviate from that pick.

1030AM:  Obtain the UK Met 6-10 and 1-5 day forecasts.  Provide comment for 
UK Trading.

1200:  UK Trading/Crude and Products/Weather Derivatives:  Prepare a full 
qualitative analysis of 0z models (MRF/NOGAPS/CANADIAN/Ensembles).  Produce a 
6 to 10 day Europe forecast and make any needed adjustments to the 1 to 5 day 
forecast.  Produce the Global Weather Report including a Global Executive 
Summary; Analysis of Teleconnections and their expected impact; 1 to 5 and 6 
to 10 day forecasts compared to EarthSat; A 10 day city forecast table for 
European Cities along with the expected effect on heating demand and finally 
A "port status report" describing weather and port conditions in 11 worldwide 
ports.  Update traders (UK and Wx Deriv) on changes or new trends in the 0z 
models.  Provide a quality assessment of the UK Met 6 to 10 and 1 to 5 day 
forecast for UK Trading.  

1330 (Mon-Wed):  Brief the Crude and Products groups in London and Houston.

1600:  Review 12z AVN for any major forecast changes and communicate changes 
to traders.

Weekly:  Produce a weather article for "Critical Mass" - internal trading 
newsletter.

Of course between 1000 and 1330 we are looking closely at the US weather for 
support to you guys in Houston.  I'm still writing the daily US Executive 
summary as well as producing a 6 to 10 day US forecast.

2) Requested Projects:

* Gas Fundamentals has asked us to provide weather information for their 
morning report and website.  They would like to be able to gather objective 
output from as many forecast models as we can get.
* Weather Derivatives has asked for week ahead, month ahead, and seasonal 
outlooks for temperature and precipitation.  They have also asked about 
creating a tradeable "NAO Index" and developing an in-house model for 
forecasting NAO.
* Continental Power has asked for temperature and precipitation outlooks for 
power generation and hydro.
* Gas Fundamentals, UK Trading, Continental Power, Weather Derivatives and 
Crude and Products have all asked for a European Summer Outlook for 
temperature and precipitation.  We expect to have this completed tomorrow.
* The research group has asked for assistance in gathering climate data 
across Spain for temperature and precipitation.

3) Leads to Follow Up On:

* Elsa in Houston asked us to contact some of the Softs traders here and let 
them know once we were up and running.
* Contact Chris Mahoney to determine if we can provide and additional support 
for Crude and Products.
* Follow up on a potential morning breifing for Continental Power

4) Challenges:

* We've been told that we will be moving locations next week - which might 
entail corrupting or loosing the software and hardware configurations that 
have taken almost a week to get fully established.  It seems that this office 
functions on a "hot desk" system where people are constantly moving around.  
This will make it very difficult to stay connected - as well as very 
difficult for our customers to identify us.
* Administrative detail take an inordinate amount of time.  Assembling 
reports both physical and electronic can take nearly as long as actually 
preparing the reports!

---
Mike,
 
OK - I think that brings you up to speed.  I've been amazed at the amount of 
feedback we've already gotten and we've only been here 3 days!  On that note 
I wanted to let you know that I am fully committed to this project.  It seems 
that we will not have a second meteorologist to assist Tony by my planned 
departure date on the 20th.  As such - I can continue in my current role 
through my planned vacation - keeping me in London until the 27th - which is 
my current reservation back to Houston.  I am also open to remaining in 
London beyond the 27th to ensure the success of this project.

Hopefully this gives you a good idea as to what's gone on in the first few 
days here.  We look forward to talking to you later today and with you and 
Vince tomorrow.

  

 
