Aurora 1.5: Extending open foundation models for weather and Earth-system applications

Aurora 1.5 is a major extension of Microsoft’s Aurora Earth System foundation model that adds 22 more weather variables relevant to energy, agriculture, transport, and climate risk, along with hourly temporal resolution and probabilistic ensemble forecasting. Released as open source on GitHub with model checkpoints on Hugging Face, Aurora 1.5 enables researchers and developers to use, evaluate, and build on the model. Aurora 1.5 connects open research to Microsoft Weather services, linking the model with data, infrastructure, managed access, and operational use for weather and Earth-system applications. Aurora 1.5 is a major update to the open Aurora Earth-system foundation model, adding 22 new weather variables for a broader view of atmospheric conditions, hourly forecasts, and probabilistic ensemble forecasting. Developed by Microsoft Weather as an extension of the original model from Microsoft Research AI for Science, Aurora 1.5 shows how frontier research can move into broader use: open for researchers and developers to evaluate and extend, and designed to support customers where additional data, infrastructure, and operational assurance is needed. As climate and weather-related risks continue to affect communities, infrastructure, and economies worldwide, advances in Earth-system forecasting…