The Standing International Road Weather Commission (SIRWEC) operates as a forum for the exchange of information relevant to the field of road meteorology. This includes management, maintenance, road safety, meteorology, environmental protection and any other area of interest considered relevant by the Commission. 

From the information collected it seeks to identify those areas where increased and/or new research and development may yield improvements in practices, techniques, systems and methodology, to the general benefits of the art. 

In February 1984 an International Road Weather Conference was held in Delft and The Hague, Netherlands. The conference was arranged by the committee responsible for COST 30 BIS Theme 2- Detection of weather conditions. This conference was attended by over 50 people from 13 countries. In discussions about concluding COST 30 BIS, the meeting appointed a voluntary steering committee of seven people, on an ad-hoc basis, to draw up an agenda for future co-operation. The results from the demonstration, the research work and the conference proved that there was an urgent need for further research and international co-operation in the field of weather conditions on the roads. 

The steering committee met at Birmingham University in September 1984 and a constitution for the Standing European Road Weather Commission (SERWEC) was agreed. The constitution was approved by the Second European Road Weather Conference, which was held in Copenhagen from 26th February to 1st March 1985. 

SERWEC truly became International in 1992 with the hosting of the conference in Minneapolis, USA. The name thus changed to SIRWEC accordingly.