It’s official: natESM will receive 4 more years of funding🥳

Celebration: After a successful first phase, we’re excited to build on what we’ve achieved – and to take our collaboration with the national ESM community to the next level.

What’s ahead?

More time, more capacity, more community.

In Phase 2, we’ll continue our sprint-based collaboration model, expand it to Machine Learning (ML) methods, and facilitate access to well-defined model configurations, developed and maintained by the community.

Our team is also growing: Two additional RSE positions are funded at DKRZ to strengthen our capacity in high-performance computing and AI-powered data analysis. This will allow us to better support model adaptation, streamline workflows, and deliver even more robust technical services to the ESM community.

With 48 months of funding, we now have the time and resources to think and act strategically: adapting models to future HPC systems, deepening collaboration, and building a modular, scalable, and sustainable national ESM framework for research, education, and operational use.

And just as important: A key task in Phase 2 will be to develop a long-term funding strategy for RSE support at DKRZ. We want to ensure that this critical service for the ESM community continues well beyond the project lifetime – reliably, visibly, and sustainably.

Developing a sustainable funding model will require broad community involvement and institutional commitment.

Thanks to everyone who helped get us here – and to all who will join us in this next phase:
Let’s shape the future of Earth system modeling together.