NOAA’s Comprehensive Large Array-data Stewardship System (CLASS) – an electronic library of NOAA environmental data – has undergone a significant transformation, evolving from aging, on‑premises systems into a fully cloud‑based architecture built for long‑term resilience, scalability, and innovation. CLASS provides long-term secure storage of NOAA-approved data, information, and metadata to enable non-real-time access through human and machine interfaces. ERT has been a vital partner to NOAA during this process.
“The work ERT’s team delivers under the OMS CLASS Project is nothing short of critical. Every dataset preserved and every workflow modernized directly strengthens NOAA’s ability to store data securely. Our staff’s work on their cloud‑migration achievements has not only ensured continuity but has set the foundation for CLASS to continue to evolve, while maintaining reliability.” Robert Haynes, VP, Satellite Mission Operations
By transitioning to AWS, CLASS eliminated costly hardware refresh cycles and now saves hundreds of dollars per terabyte in storage costs. Yet the shift to the cloud was far more than a lift‑and‑shift. ERT’s development team re‑engineered core components to take full advantage of AWS‑native services, strengthening durability, boosting efficiency, and unlocking the elasticity required to support NOAA’s fast‑growing data archive. Throughout the entire process, CLASS met every operational requirement without downtime, an achievement made possible by meticulous planning, careful execution, and constant coordination.
The benefits of this new architecture extend well beyond cost savings and resilience. Workflows that once took months on legacy infrastructure, such as large‑scale data reprocessing, can now be completed in weeks. Improved methods for data sharing, AI/ML integration, and the ability to ingest enhanced historical datasets, all position CLASS to accelerate scientific advancement and support the rapidly expanding demands of the environmental data community.
As part of the modernization, the team advanced critical dissemination and data‑processing capabilities. “ERT successfully enhanced the CLASS Dissemination architecture by transitioning file delivery from traditional on-premises methods to AWS Cloud–based services,” says Michael Hamilton of the OMS CLASS Project Team. “This transition was executed with no interruption to operational services and continued to reliably support a substantial monthly workload, averaging approximately 13 million files and 750 TB of data made available to users.”
ERT also enhanced the CLASS capabilities to ingest, process, and archive newly improved historical GOES/GVAR datasets provided by the Space Science and Engineering Center (SSEC) at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. This significant data modernization effort involved an estimated 700,000 files and approximately 90 TB of reprocessed data. To date, CLASS has successfully ingested and archived approximately 91% of this dataset, further expanding the value and completeness of the archive for the research and operational communities.
“Our team’s accomplishments on CLASS reflect years of determination, innovation, and meticulous execution. Moving more than 15 petabytes of data and transforming decades of legacy infrastructure into a cloud‑native system required collaboration and technical depth. My team rose to the challenge. They delivered ahead of schedule, under budget, and with a level of excellence that positions CLASS to serve NOAA’s mission for decades to come.” Christine M. Bradley, OMS CLASS Project Manager
Today, CLASS stands as a massive, cloud‑native archive, managing 1.36 billion objects and 27.07 petabytes of data, growing by roughly 3 PB each year. Through every phase of the migration, operations remained uninterrupted, with CLASS continuing to deliver approximately 16 million files and 280 TB of data each month. Cost management remains a standout success. AWS expenses continue to stay within funding limits, and ongoing optimizations, such as storage tiering and lifecycle policies, will further reduce long‑term costs. ERT was commended by NOAA for operationalizing this complex, multi‑site migration ahead of schedule, under budget, and without service disruption. The CLASS cloud migration stands as a model of disciplined execution, technical excellence, and mission‑driven innovation. ERT ensured CLASS is more resilient, more capable, and more prepared than ever to support NOAA’s mission.
For more information, reach out to gloria.schultz@ert.space.
