ACHIEVEMENTS IN REPORTING PERIOD:

Accumulated hours/observations/etc. in 2009-11 through 8 August 2011 (per year, columns = TNA eligible, then total EVN): 

                            2009              2010             2011
 Nr. hours              598.5  923.5      747.5  999         377  483
 Nr. observations        66     94         85    113          40   58
 from Nr. proposals      38     56         47     65          29   43

The 2010 eligible and total hours continue the trend from 2009 in which the demand well exceeds that from FP6 years, although 2011 seems to be falling back to the trend circa 2008: 

             2004    2005    2006    2007    2008   .   2009    2010    2011
 elig. hrs   338.0   253.5   368.0   492.0   489.5  .   598.5   747.5   337.0
 total hrs   667.5   646.0   541.5   670.5   746.0  .   923.5   999.0   483.0

where, at the time of writing this report, 2011 is essentially two-thirds of the way complete. The growing maturation of the e-VLBI observing capabilities accounts for a large amount of the increase in EVN hours over the past couple years. The contracted value per year in FP7 is 112, which we have easily met. 

 There were 6 data-reduction visits in 2009 (3 to JIVE, 1 to each of IRA,

MPIfR, JBO) for a total of 46 days. In 2010, there were 7 data-reduction visits (5 to JIVE, 1 to each of IRA, MPIfR), for a total of 51 days. So far in 2011, there have been 6 data-reduction visits (5 to JIVE, 1 to IRA), for a total of 47 days. 

 We now have 268.5 hours' worth of project summaries in from 2009 (from

15 proposals), 185.5 hours' worth from 2010 (12 proposals), and 46.5 hours' worth from 2011 (4 proposals). The total of 500.5 hours is well above the EVN TNA's number of reimbursable access hours of 336 for the whole programme.

PROBLEMS/ISSUES: The issue of the distinction between EVN access hours being accounted for as a “communal” good rather than individually by each station has not come up recently, but may once institutes start to fill out their form C's at the end of the programme. I continue to treat the EVN access-hour is something the network as a whole observes, which may not entail all stations in every observation because of various limitations (frequency, mutual sky-visibility, PI network-design choice). If an observation appears on an EVN block-schedule of any kind, or runs as a target-of-opportunity observation, then EVN access hours accrue for eligible projects regardless of the explicit array composition per experiment. However, the knife can cut both ways – if attaining the scientific goals of an observation is prevented by a sub-set of stations, then the access hours may be lost to the EVN as a whole. In session 2/2011, we had such a case where the PI abandoned 2 cross-pol observations because Ef recorded RCP into both polarizations, removing 28 eligible access hours from the running total.

FORWARD LOOK: The EVN TNA has easily made its contracted hours each year. Collection of further project summaries is expected (some new data-reduction visits are being planned), although the current set of project summaries already received is about 50% higher than the total number of contracted access hours.


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