ECMWF service charge model

For the transition to the new ECMWF Service Charge model, there will be a distinct separation between the costs related to the volume of the data  requested and the services from ECMWF that the user wants to receive in association with the data.

 The Service Charge model will consist of two distinct cost components:

1. Volume Charge
2. Service Package

Note: the current EPU (ECOMET Product Unit) rate for Information Cost still applies and remains unchanged.

In the next paragraphs we will illustrate the components and the related fees of the new Service Charge Model.

The Service Charge  applies to users who want to get a licence for ECMWF Real Time data and:

• Choose ECMWF as the data Licensor.
• Choose a Member State as the Licensor but still want data to be delivered by ECMWF directly.

Notes for different categories of licensees when requesting/renewing a licence with ECMWF:

• Standard commercial users, Maximum Charge Users, Full NMHS Non-commercial users, and NMHS standard users will need to pick up the Service Package to get a quote.
• Standard Commercial users can still apply for Small Business Discount.
• Research users and Satellite Data Providers: it will be at ECMWF discretion whether to waive Volume Band fees and/or Service Package fee (Information Cost for this kind of licences remain set to zero). The services these licensees will get, will depend on the Service Package that will be assigned to them.

Note: the new ECMWF Service Charge model is valid for new/renewed licences starting from 01 July 2022. For licences created with the old system, the old rule that Handling Charge corresponds to the 20% of Information Cost still applies.

Volume bands charge

In order to calculate the cost per year based on the volume of data requested, the volume of data produced (calculated before any compression) is divided into bands, and a cost per year is associated to every band, as illustrated in the table below. 

Note: the Volume Band is calculated per licence.

Example: a quote requesting a total of 16,000 GiB per year,  will have a Volume Charge of 9,000 EUR.

Notes: 

• ECMWF will charge for all data produced, inclusive of monthly, seasonal, hindcast and reforecast data, where applicable.
• If a user wants to receive more than 3.0 TiB, a second licence will be required. For a second licence, there will be no information cost, only volume/service charges apply. 
• ECMWF will charge for the maximum possible volume within the year-long contract (a combination of all datasets purchased).
• For Maximum Charge users who can make unlimited changes to their data requirements, transitions between volume bands will be automatically adjusted pro rata and the Licensee/Licensor notified of the change. 

Service packages

In addition to the Volume Charge, licensees will be required to select a Service Package.

Each Service Package contains a selection of delivery services which will be provided together with the selected data.

At present, it is possible to choose between four levels of service, designed to increase the level of self-serve capabilities and flexibility to the licensee:

1. Basic
2. Bronze
3. Silver
4. Gold

The following table illustrates the characteristics of the different packages, like the fixed fee, the volume bands associated, and the available services.

	Basic	Bronze	Silver	Gold
Fixed fee	500 EUR	500 EUR + 15% of Volume Charge	500 EUR + 23% of Volume Charge	500 EUR + 30% of Volume Charge
Volume Bands allowed (GB)	All bands	All bands	For licencees with Volume Band 3 or higher	For licencees with Volume Band 4 or higher
Office hours support (08:00 - 17:00 UTC)
24/7 Operational Support
Maximum number of destinations allowed	Single destination	Single destination	Up to 2 destinations	Up to 4 destinations
Test data for cycle upgrades			(Delivery upon request)	(Delivery upon request)
User being able to access PREd and ECPDS
Max number of users under a licence allowed to access PREd and ECPDS			1	2
Changes to operational data requirements per year implemented by ECMWF Data Support Team	2	4	2	4
Changes to operational data requirements per year implemented by users themselves	0	0	4 (Maximum Charge users: Unlimited)	Unlimited
ECPDS + PREd maximum number of configuration changes	2	4	6	16
ECPDS - Back-up host
ECPDS - Maximum number of hosts	1	2	4	8
ECPDS - Set-up of an alias
ECPDS - Compression
ECPDS - Push delivery mechanism
ECPDS - Maximum number of parallel connections (per destination)	3	5	10	15
ECPDS -  Directory targeting allowed
ECPDS - FTP Pull (volume allowed proportionate to volume band)				(up to 100GiB)
MARS access
ecCharts access
ECPDS -  Key Rotation

Calculating the minimum fee: service charge costs (volume charge + service package)

The table below illustrates the minimum fee that user will get when requesting ECMWF data.

IMPORTANT: this table DOES NOT take into account the Information Cost (based on calculation of EPU)

Example: a user creating a quote requesting 25,000 GiB of data per year, will fall into the fourth Volume Band (up to 36,500). If the user wants the Gold Service Package, the total fee will be 20,000 EUR.