Editor: Jim Elliott
Contributor: Stephanie Kenitzer
Copy Editor: Marcie Bernstein
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For 10 days this June, 37 emerging leaders in the atmospheric science community learned the intricacies of scientific policy making straight from top-level government advisors, managers, and representatives who are intimately involved in the Capitols scientific policy-making scene.
The first AMS–UCAR Summer Policy Colloquium presented the scientists with forums on topics ranging from global climate change and international data exchange to private sector development and the workings of government.
The colloquium, part of the AMS’s Atmospheric Policy Program, gave the midcareer scientists a chance to meet with people like former science advisor D. Allen Bromley, former NOAA Administrator Robert White, and top executives in the weather business. The participants tackled case studies, attended panel discussions, and visited the White House for briefings from President Bush’s staff.
Bill Hooke, AMS senior policy fellow who coordinated the event, told the attendees that he hoped the colloquium would stimulate their interest in policy positions and functions and strengthen the sense of responsibility that motivated them to attend. Each attendee was selected for his or her leadership potential and current responsibilities.
The colloquium provided atmospheric scientists with an intensive introduction to societal needs for weather, climate, and related information and to the policy-making process for these sometimes controversial scientific issues.
“I think we got off to a good start,” Hooke said, “and I hope to make it even better next year. We are grateful, of course, for the participation of the presenters. All of them hold high-level positions and have busy schedules, and it was nice of them to find the time to participate.
“I was particularly impressed with the attendees, also. They certainly demonstrated the leadership potential we hoped to find, and I’m sure we’ll be seeing and hearing a lot about them and their accomplishments in the future.”
Dick Greenfield, director, Atmospheric Policy Program at AMS, also praised the group. In remarks at the conclusion of the colloquium, he said, “it [the colloquium] was a great success. It far exceeded our expectations, and you were a very important reason for that success. The goals of the policy program we set out at the beginning of the colloquium were met.
“We all were impressed with the interaction of the group with the speakers and the quality of the questions you asked.”
Some of the colloquium highlights included
The colloquium attracted 37 attendees representing a wide variety of academic, government and public sector communities.
More details on the colloquium, including remarks by Allan Bromley and Robert P. Crease, professor in the Department of Philosophy at the State University of New York, Stony Brook, and historian at the Brookhaven National Laboratory, are available at the AMS Web site (see Atmospheric Policy Program).
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On 14 June, leaders of a number of scientific and academic organizations held a breakfast to brief House Science Committee Chairman Sherwood Boehlert and committee member, Congressman Mark Udall, as well as the committee’s staff director, David Goldston, and Udall’s legislative assistant, Jennifer Barrett. The AMS, along with UCAR , the American Geological Institute, the American Geophysical Union, the Geological Society of America, and the National Association of State Universities and Land Grant Colleges sponsored the event to acquaint Boehlert with geosciences’ activities and to hear from him about Science Committee priorities in this area.
The chairman made an informal statement about anticipated committee efforts in this Session of Congress, while each of the sponsoring organizations made short presentations on activities that would be of special interest to the Science Committee.
Executive Director Ron McPherson and Richard Greenfield, the Director of the Atmospheric Policy Program (APP), represented the AMS. Greenfield’s presentation summarized APP’s activities to provide education and conduct studies on policies that shape atmospheric research and services in both the public and private sectors. He noted that AMS is endeavoring to bring more scientists into the public policy arena through such efforts as sponsorship, with UCAR, of a congressional fellowship, as well as the recent AMS Summer Policy Colloquium. He also informed the group of APP plans to hold a series of policy studies directed at improving the application of weather and climate services and information to various national sectors of the economy, beginning this fall with a forum on weather, climate, and energy.
The breakfast was one of a number of contacts AMS has had with members and staff of the House Science Committee as the Society works to communicate the priorities of the atmospheric and related sciences communities in the policy realm.
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Twenty years from now, we probably can expect local and regional weather forecasts out to 10 days, reliable seasonal forecasting that will permit operational business planning and increasing applications of weather and climate information to more activities, according to Elbert W. “Joe” Friday Jr., director of the Board on Atmospheric Sciences and Climate with the National Research Council.
Friday forecast those improvements at a meeting of the D.C. AMS Chapter on 6 June when he was principal speaker at the chapter’s Annual Science Fair Banquet in McLean, Virginia.
Living up to his speech topic, “Friday’s Fearless Forecast: Meteorology in 20 Years,” Friday told award winning students, their families, and chapter members, “it is important to look at the past to look at the future. We terribly underestimate what we can do in the next decades.”
“Let’s go back to the PC,” he explained. “Moore’s Law predicts a doubling of capability every 18 months or so. Every time it looks as if Moore’s Law has reached its limit, a new technology breakthrough occurs, and we are back on the path. The 1-gigahertz machine of today will become a 10-terahertz machine in a little over 2 decades; it will be far faster than the largest supercomputer today.”
“In his book, The Age of the Spiritual Machine, Ray Kurtzwell projects that in a little over 2 decades, the PC will be at the point that it has the ‘intellectual’ capacity of the human brain, operating thousands of times faster. This strange new world will have consequences far beyond weather forecasting, but the implications for the modeling of environmental phenomena are profound.
“The sophisticated model we run today will look as primitive as the ones we ran 2 to 3 decades ago seem to us now. The atmosphere can be represented down to scales now only dreamed of, and the chemical and physical properties can be directly calculated instead of relying on the parameterizations of today. This will permit forecasts of precipitation the and amounts, pollution, chemical composition, etc., with increasing accuracy.
One of the most difficult areas to project is the “observational capability that we will have in 20 years,” he said. “We are fairly certain of the remotely sensed satellite data: those systems are being specified now, and the length of time to place a system in operation significantly reduces the responsiveness to new capabilities.
“The surface and balloon-borne systems are deteriorating around the globe. On the other hand, some measurements are becoming more plentiful—aircraft temperature, wind, and moisture, for example. Even though these are limited to high altitudes or specific locations, the tens of thousands of observations received daily from the aircraft provide input to models which virtually insure that there will be no surprises in the aviation wind forecasts.
“The advances in computer capability and artificial intelligence over the next two decades will permit the deployment of Automated Surface Observing Systems that replicate what the human observer can do with respect to the determination of cloud amount and type, visibility, visual discontinuities, and so forth. This would overcome one of the biggest criticisms to the recent modernization of the NWS.
“The Next Generation Weather Radar should improve its resolution, accuracy and update frequency over the present NEXRAD. Phased array technology, used by highly agile military systems, is coming down in costs and may soon be practical for weather radar applications. With that technology, it will be possible for an entire atmospheric volume scan, which now takes six minutes, to be completed in 30 seconds, greatly improving the ability to monitor the development and evolution of storm systems.”
One could envision, he said, a national radar system based on phased array technology that could provide both weather and air traffic control information at a substantial savings.
“Twenty years from now,” he continued, he sees
But what will be the role of the meteorological professional? Friday asked.
“Various scenarios exist,” he said, including
Explaining that he had been in the weather business for more than 40 years and had witnessed many of the advances that have been made, he said, “I have felt at each stage in the improvements that I was blessed to be living in the most exciting times in the weather business. I still feel that way today. I am convinced I will feel that way as long as I am given the privilege of living.”
Referring to the Science Fair winners, he said he hoped they felt the same way. “I would particularly encourage the Science Fair winners tonight to look to the future with enthusiasm. You can be a part of the continued improvements in our science, and you can witness the advances in science and the applications of that science.”
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Richard Greenfield has decided to step down as Director of the AMS Atmospheric Policy Program (APP), effective 1 July, handing over the reigns to AMS Senior Policy Fellow William Hooke. Greenfield relinquished his administrative role to concentrate on policy study activities and is now Senior Policy Fellow and Associate Director of the Program.
Greenfield launched the AMS APP in October 1999. Under his management, the APP has developed a special policy forum on hurricanes in June 2000, the first Presidential Policy Forum and the 2001 Annual Meeting, the first AMS–UCAR Summer Policy Colloquium in June 2001 , and undertaken massive education efforts on atmospheric and disaster reduction policy recommendations for the transition to the new administration. On a personal side, Greenfield recruited Senior Policy Fellows Bob Corell in January 2000 and Hooke in June 2000.
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The House Appropriations Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development drafted the FY02 Department of Energy (DOE) spending bill on 19 June, a measure that contains proposed funding for DOE’s Office of Science.
The full committee will take up the bill in the future, after which it will go to the House floor. The Senate bill is still being drafted. The House subcommittee numbers are the following:
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The House Appropriations Committee recently completed work on the Interior Appropriations Bill. The committee statement read, “The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) is funded at $900 million, restoring a $90 million cut in the President’s request and providing an $18 million increase over FY01.” The current year budget is $882.8 million.
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New Jersey Democratic Congressman Rush Holt, former assistant director of the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory and an American Physical Society Congressional Science Fellow, has called for the reestablishment of the Congressional Office of Technology Assessment (OTA).
OTA was established in 1971 to provide Congress with reports on a wide variety of subjects. It had a staff of approximately 200 with a budget of almost $22 million when it was put out of business. The office produced about 50 reports a year. When Republicans took control of the House and Senate in 1995, OTA was marked for elimination as a component of a $200 million reduction package for the FY96 appropriations bill.
During appropriations hearings, critics charged that OTA studies could be performed elsewhere, and termination of its functions came later that year when the final legislative branch appropriations bill failed to include money for its operations. The Senate voted 54 to 45 against a plan to retain OTA’s functions under a new Office of Congressional Services.
The Holt bill, H.R. 2148, reestablishes OTA by authorizing an appropriation of $20 million a year for the period FY02 through FY07. The bill has 32 cosponsors, including House Science Committee Chairman Sherwood Boehlert (R-New York).
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Over the years, various federal and nonfederal committees have issued reports on making the federal research funding process more methodical. The National Science Board recently held a symposium recently to discuss the topic and to review its draft report, “The Scientific Allocation of Scientific Resources.”
At the symposium, according to a report in the 7 June issue of the American Institute of Physics Bulletin of Science Policy News, National Science Board Chairman Eamon Kelly described the allocation process as “difficult and controversial.” The issuance of the draft report, he explained, followed 2 years of literature review and discussion and was only a “framework for discussion.”
“Today’s environment demands more effective management of the federal portfolio for research, including a sustained advisory process that incorporates systematic participation by the science and engineering communities,” the report noted in its introduction. That is particularly true for investments in long-term, high-risk research, it read.
“Critics and supporters alike note the need for a clearly articulated and compelling rationale for federal investments in science and technology equivalent in persuasive power to the rationale of the Cold War,” the report noted.
The authors concluded that “Ultimately, the federal budget for research rests on the aggregated political decisions in 13 Congressional appropriations committees. To achieve the long-term goals for research, “a regular, credible process that relies on expert input from the science and engineering communities is essential for priority setting among competing investment choices,” the report noted.
“The federal government, including the White House, federal departments and agencies, and Congress should cooperate in developing and supporting a more productive process for allocating and coordinating federal research funding.
“The process must place a priority on investments in areas that advance important national goals, identify areas ready to benefit from greater investment, address long-term needs and opportunities for federal missions and responsibilities, and ensure world class fundamental science and engineering capabilities across the frontiers of knowledge.”
The draft report may be viewed at http://nsf.gov/nsb/.
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While the leadership of the Senate VA, HUD and Independent Agencies appropriations subcommittee has changed because of the majority change brought about by the defection from the Republican ranks by Sen. Jim Jeffords of Vermont, the support for doubling the National Science Foundation (NSF) budget over the next 5 years has not.
Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-Maryland) took the subcommittee reins from Sen. Christopher “Kit” Bond (R-Missouri) on 6 June during a hearing on the NSF budget and told NSF Director Rita Colwell, “We want to double the NSF budget over the next 5 years.” Bond, now ranking minority member, joined Mikulski in support, saying the FY02 budget request should be increased over the 1.3% requested by the Bush Administration.
Putting the NSF budget on a doubling track would require an increase of about 15%, or $600 million, in the new year, an amount Mikulski admitted would be “very hard” to attain, according to a report in the 8 June issue of the American Institute of Physics Bulletin of Science Policy News.
“This is the first time in the NSF’s 50-year history that an administration has requested Congress to cut NSF’s research budget below the previous year’s level,” Mikulski explained, adding that she was “disappointed.” “I can’t believe this administration really thinks this R&D budget is the right one for the country,” she added.
While Mikulski and Bond may have traded chairs on the subcommittee, they share a common concern about the importance of R&D, according to the publication.
The senators lauded NSF’s role in areas of nanotechnology, plant genome research, education, and information technology. Bond indicated he had talked with physicians in his home state as well as with former National Institute of Health Director Harold Varmus and had been told “for NIH to do its job, NSF must be funded,” the story read.
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The House Science Committee has passed two bills that create programs at the National Science Foundation (NSF) to strengthen K–12 science and math education. Under the bills—H.R. 1858, National Mathematics and Science Partnerships Act, and H.R. 100, National Science Education Act—colleges, universities, and businesses will be encouraged to bring their extensive resources and expertise to bear in public schools. The legislation also seeks to ensure that the nation’s classrooms have the brightest and best-prepared teachers.
Committee Chairman Sherwood Boehlert (R-New York) introduced H.R. 1858, which would provide math and science partnerships, create scholarships to attract top college junior and senior math and science majors into teaching and establish four new university centers for research into teaching and learning. The committee adopted an amendment to the bill, which incorporated proposals from members of both sides of the aisle.
H.R. 100 was introduced by Rep. Vernon Ehlers (R-Michigan) and was passed without amendment. The bill provides the opportunity and funding for a master teacher program that also will help improve math and science education to all school systems in the United States.
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House Science Subcommittee on Energy Chairman Roscoe Bartlett has called on Congress to take a close look at the potential benefits of extending daylight saving time and going to a double daylight saving time for months of peak energy use.
The legislation, introduced by Rep. Brad Sherman (D-California), would authorize California and other western states to adjust their time to help combat energy shortages by allowing states to adopt year-round daylight saving time or double daylight saving time during summer months. The time change would reduce energy needed during peak hours, Sherman said.
During a subcommittee hearing on the bill, Sherman was joined by Linda Larson, acting deputy assistant secretary for transportation policy, Department of Transportation, and James C. Benfield, founder of the Daylight Saving Time Coalition. They explained that in addition to increased energy savings, extended sunlight in the evenings also could reduce traffic accidents and fatalities.
Both cautioned, however, that there is not need to rush to enact extended daylight saving time and agreed that further studies of the effects of such a move are needed. Bartlett (R-Maryland), a scientist by profession, said, “The outcome of today’s hearing was a consensus conclusion that the pros of either year-round or double daylight savings far outweigh the cons.”
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The long awaited nomination of a Presidential science advisor came on 25 June, when President Bush named John H. Marsburger, director of Brookhaven National Laboratory, to the post. Marsburger, a laser physicist and life-long Democrat, has led the Department of Energy’s Brookhaven facility since 1998 and is credited with helping to restore the laboratory’s public image following concerns about its environmental record.
As science advisor, Marsburger would join an administration that has been criticized for some of its science-related policies, some of which has been based on the fact that the President had not had science advisor. Some of the issues Marsburger will face in his new role will include global warming, energy policy, and whether the federal government should fund biomedical research involving embryonic stem cells.
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The House Appropriations Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, State and the Judiciary passed a spending bill on 27 June to appropriate $3.08 billion for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in FY02, according to the 28 June Environment & Energy Daily.
According to the subcommittee, the figure is $42 million above the FY01 enacted level, and $29 million above the president’s request.
However, the administration’s figures are slightly different. According to the administration’s numbers, the president requested $3.15 billion, $70 million more than the subcommittee recommended and $60 million below the FY01 enacted level. As of press time, the discrepancy was irresolvable, but complete numbers should be available late this week or early next week.
The subcommittee recommended $729 million for the National Weather Service, “which is $12 million more than FY01 [and] $4 million below the president’s request,” according to the panel. The president actually requested $727 million for NWS, and according to an off-Hill source the subcommittee appropriated $723 million, with the addition of $6 million for two member-requested projects, to total $729 million.
The source suggested that earmarks for other projects would eventually resolve the apparent discrepancies in funding for NOAA overall.
Chairman Frank Wolf (R-Virginia) highlighted $440 million for the Ocean, Coastal and Waterway conservation programs, a $20 million increase from last year, all of which goes to Pacific salmon. Last year’s $420 million in coastal money was a carryover from the failed Conservation and Reinvestment Act, and this year the agreement worked out to $440 million. The $420 million “coastal and ocean activities” line item was abolished and distributed among other accounts for 2002.
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Researchers in Bergen, Norway, have proposed a large-scale demonstration project, in which carbon dioxide (CO2) would be pumped directly from offshore oil and gas fields to the deep waters of the Norwegian Sea. The project would test the conclusions of a theoretical study, using computer models, that suggests the Norwegian Sea, through transport to the Atlantic Ocean, would provide safe, long-term storage of this greenhouse gas, which would otherwise enter the atmosphere and contribute to global warming.
Drs. Helge Drange and Guttorm Alendal and Prof. Ola M. Johannessen at the Nansen Environmental and Remote Sensing Center in Bergen published their study in the 1 July issue of Geophysical Research Letters, published by the American Geophysical Union.
They note that the oceans already absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, but the process of mixing the gas at deep levels can take up to 1000 years. Purposeful storage could, they say, be viewed as an acceleration of a natural process. This option would be successful only if certain environmental and economic considerations can be satisfied, they note.
The Norwegian Sea is a deep basin off Norway’s northwestern coast, beyond Haltenbanken, a region on the continental shelf where oil and gas fields produce carbon dioxide as a by-product. The modeling study assumes the annual carbon dioxide emissions from various size gas power plants over a ten year period. Drange and his colleagues considered the effect of releasing carbon dioxide, collected at the source, at various depths from 1150 to 3120 feet (350 to 950 meters). They conclude that if the initial size of the carbon dioxide particles is 0.2 inches (4 millimeters) or less, the plume would rise no more than 330 feet (100 meters) from the point it enters the ocean.
Once the injected carbon dioxide has dissolved in the seawater, it tends to sink lower and eventually transport to the Atlantic Ocean through passages between Iceland and Scotland. Its acidity, higher than that of the ambient seawater, could affect deep sea organisms, which are used to a relatively constant chemical environment. This is an area the researchers say needs further study. They say the level of acidity can be reduced by not pumping all of the carbon dioxide to one point but rather by using an array of ports located 16–33 feet (5–10 meters) apart in the cross stream of the prevailing current.
The model predicts how much carbon dioxide would rapidly reach the surface and enter the atmosphere, based on the depth at which it was originally released. The researchers say that 2000 feet (600 meters) is the minimal safe depth, and 2600 feet (800 meters) still safer. At the depth of 3100 feet (950 meters), virtually no “outgassing” occurs, and the carbon dioxide–enriched water stays well below the level at which it might mix with upper ocean water. Following normal flows from the Norwegian Sea, this water will enter the northern Atlantic Ocean as bottom water and remain isolated from the atmosphere for centuries.
Aside from the question of possible effects on deep ocean organisms, the process of sequestering carbon dioxide in the Norwegian Sea would have to be economically viable, the researchers say. They find that the technology is presently available, and the cost of implementing the project might actually be lower than the tax the Norwegian government now imposes on emissions of carbon dioxide from offshore oil and gas fields.
Drange and colleagues emphasize that their theoretical conclusions must be tested in real world conditions, including the cumulative effects of instituting many such sequestration projects, rather than just one. Among the issues to be addressed are the impact on marine organisms and the independent effect of increasing acidification of ocean surface waters, due to higher atmospheric carbon dioxide levels.
The study was funded by Saga Petroleum AS, the Norwegian Research Council, the Nordic Council of Ministers, and the EC Environmental and Climate Programme.
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More than 130 scientists from Australia, Canada, China, Chinese Taipei, England, France, India, Japan, Korea, Netherlands, Russia, and the United States have collected the first detailed measurements of the dust and pollution aerosols peculiar to Asia.
From March through mid-May, the international team pointed all instruments they could muster at the pollution and dust plumes blowing off the Asian continent into the North Pacific under the project Aerosol Characterization Experiment-Asia (ACE-Asia).
Two U.S. aircraft (a C-130 and a Twin Otter), an Australian King Air, a U.S. research vessel (R/V Ron Brown), and a Japanese research vessel (R/V Mirai) operated out of several locations in the area, and data also were collected from lidar networks in China and Japan and from standard meteorological and air quality networks.
“The developing Asian countries have got a unique fuel mix, but the dust is what makes it really interesting,” said Huebert in an article in the spring issue of UCAR Quarterly. That dust arises off the Mongolian and western Chinese deserts in great spring storms, he explained. The dust clouds can travel on amazing distance; haze from a storm this spring was noticed at least as far away as Colorado.
Huebert pointed out that Asian dust is not the only globe-trotting pollution. “In some parts of China you can see deposition of sulfate that came from North America. Every country has the same problem; we’re all sending stuff downstream.”
The particles drifting out across the Pacific—called multicomponent aerosols by scientist Irina Sokolik (University of Colorado)—have been studied much less than aerosols over the United States and Europe. The goal of ACE-Asia is to characterize these particles, understand how they evolve as they travel, and use these data as ground truth for chemical transport models.
“As scientists of many nationalities, our job is to provide our own policy-makers with responsible estimates of impacts,” according to the program’s implementation plan. To do that, realistic regional models of Asian aerosols are necessary. Until ACE-Asia, the only data available have been individual observations of a few aerosol characteristics at scattered locations around the continent. ACE-Asia will offer the first chance to understand the full chemical and radiative effects across the region.
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A major new report funded in part by the National Science Foundation has found that the remoteness of one of the world’s largest ecosystems does not leave it immune from global environmental problems.
The study, with contributions from more than 150 specialists and experts throughout the Arctic, was conducted by the Arctic Council’s working group for the Conservation of Arctic Flora and Fauna (CAFF).
“Many scientists or groups of scientists have looked at parts of the Arctic or at different species,” said Sune Sohlberg of Sweden, who chairs the working group, “but until now no one has taken a comprehensive look at the state of the entire Arctic. Thanks to this report, we now have a better idea of conservation needs around the circumpolar region.”
The report, “Arctic Flora and Fauna: Status and Conservation” was released in Finland on 11 June.
At the local level, the report argues, there is clear evidence that several economically important species have been exploited, and habitat has been fragmented due to development activities. It maintains that climate change is already having measurable effects on Arctic species, permafrost and sea ice; alien invasive species are increasingly penetrating the region, and contaminants released thousands of kilometers away are appearing at high levels in human and wildlife communities.
Population figures for plants and animals may be uncertain, and the scientific understanding of the ways the Arctic ecosystem functions in changing environment is changing, the report noted. However, the report’s population figures provide a baseline for later research and monitoring data.
Based on the latest scientific information, the book-length report provides a better understanding of the importance of one of the earth’s largest ecoregions and its status in a rapidly changing world, according to officials of the working group.
Using plain language and numerous maps, diagrams, and photographs, the report is designed to be accessible both to scientists and nonscientists. By bringing together local and regional information, it paints a circumpolar picture of the status and trends in Arctic flora and fauna, including information on population sizes and changes and a list of globally threatened species in the Arctic.
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In response to a White House request, a committee of the National Academies’ National Research Council issued a report on 7 June summing up science’s current understanding of global climate change, reviewing what the trend has been over the past 100 years, and examining what may be in store for the twenty-first century.
Composed of 11 of the nation’s top climate scientists, including 7 members of the National Academy of Science, one of whom is a Nobel-prize winner, the committee noted that while global warming is taking place, there are uncertainties about the extent to which human activity may be attributable. The 26-page report also emphasized that much more systematic research is needed to reduce current uncertainties.
“We know that greenhouse gases are accumulating in Earth’s atmosphere, causing surface temperatures to rise,” noted Committee Chair Ralph Cicerone, chancellor, University of California, Irvine. “We don’t know precisely how much of the rise to date is from human activities, but based on physical principles and highly sophisticated computer models, we expect the warming to continue because of greenhouse gas emissions.”
Based on assumptions that emissions of greenhouse gases will accelerate and conservative assumptions about how the climate will react to that, computer models suggest that average global surface temperatures will rise between 2.5° and 10.4°F (1.4° and 5.8°C) by the end of the century.
With regard to the basic question of whether climate change is occurring, the report noted that measurements at the earth’s surface rose about 1°F (about 0.6°C) during the twentieth century and that the process had intensified in the past 20 years, accompanied by retreating glaciers, thinning arctic ice, rising sea levels, lengthening of growing seasons in many areas, and earlier arrival of migratory birds.
The committee reported that the conclusion of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) that the global warming that has occurred in the past 50 years is likely the result of increases in greenhouse gases accurately reflects the current thinking of the scientific community. However, it also cautioned that uncertainties about this conclusion remain because of the level of natural variability inherent in the climate on time scales from decades to centuries, the questionable ability of models to simulate natural variability on such long time scales, and the degree of confidence that can be placed on estimates of temperatures going back thousands of years based on evidence from tree rings and ice cores.
The best information about past climate variability comes from ice cores drilled miles deep in Antarctica and Greenland, which reveal that temperatures changed substantially over the past 400 000 years. Although most of these changes occurred over thousands of years, some rapid warmings took place over a period of decades, the report noted.
The ice cores also trapped carbon dioxide and methane, showing that the gases were present in the atmosphere at their lowest levels during cold eras and at higher levels during warm eras. Carbon dioxide did not rise much above 280 parts per million by volume (ppmv) until the industrial revolution. By the end of the twentieth century, it had reached 370 ppmv, with an average increase in the last two decades of 1.5 ppmv a year. Both carbon dioxide and methane are more abundant in the atmosphere now than at any time during the 400 000-year ice core record, according to the report.
The report noted that the IPCC had examined a range of scenarios concerning future greenhouse gas emissions. The committee called the scenarios valuable because they can provide a warning of the magnitude of climate change that may occur if emission rates continue to climb at a rate similar to last century, but it also noted that alternative scenarios are needed to illustrate the sensitivity to underlying assumptions, particularly with regard to future technological advances and energy policy.
The committee reported that the IPCC Working Group 1 report does an admirable job of reflecting research activities in climate science and is adequately summarized in the technical summary. The corresponding summary for policymakers, it noted, placed less emphasis on the scientific uncertainties and caveats. It suggested that in the future the IPCC process may need to be made to ensure the best scientific representation possible and to keep the process from being seen as too heavily influenced by governments “which have specific postures with regard to treaties, emissions controls and other policy instruments.”
To reduce some of the uncertainties, the committee noted, a strong commitment must be made to basic research as well as to improving climate models and building a global climate observing system. More comprehensive measurements of greenhouse gases and increased computational power also will be needed, according to the report.
Although potential impacts from global warming were examined in the report, the committee was not asked to make policy recommendations for dealing with them.
In addition to Cicerone, other committee members were Eric J. Barron, Director, Earth and Mineral Sciences Environmental Institute and Distinguished Professor of Geosciences, The Pennsylvania State University; Robert E. Dickinson, Professor of Dynamics and Climate, School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, Georgia Institute of Technology; Inez Y. Fung, Richard and Rhonda Goldman Distinguished Professor for the Physical Sciences and director, Center for Atmospheric Sciences, University of California, Berkeley; James E. Hansen, NASA Goddard Institute of Space Studies; Thomas R. Karl, director, National Climatic Data Center, NOAA; Richard S. Lindzen, Alfred P. Sloan Professor of Meteorology, Massachusetts Institute of Technology; James C. McWilliams, Slichter Professor of Earth Sciences, University of California, Los Angeles; F. Sherwood Rowland, Donald Bren Research Professor of Chemistry and Earth System Science, University of California, Irvine; Edward S. Sarachik, director, S.P. Hayes Center of the Joint Institute for the Study of the Atmosphere and Ocean, University of Washington, and John M. Wallace, Professor of Atmospheric Sciences, University of Washington.
The White House requested the fast-track review of the state of climate science in preparation for international discussions on global warming due to take place later in the year.
The full text of the report, Climate Change Science: An Analysis of Some Key Questions, is available in print from the National Academy Press Web site or by calling (202) 334-3313 or 1-800-624-6242.
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How much rain is required to end droughts in the Pacific Northwest and the Southeast? Scientists at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, North Carolina, have the answer. The scientists have calculated the statistical probability that a given area would receive the needed rainfall.
“The severity of the drought, as defined by the Palmer Hydrological Drought Index, is the essential starting point for determining the needed precipitation,” said Jay Lawrimore, who heads the center’s Climate Monitoring Branch. “Knowing the typical conditions that a region experiences during each month and season of the year—what we call that region’s climatology— is also essential. A normally wetter region requires more precipitation than a drier region to end the drought.” The season in which the precipitation falls can also greatly influence the amount of precipitation required to end a drought.
The quantity of rain needed to end a drought says nothing about the probability that a region will actually receive that amount of precipitation. A region, such as the West Coast, that seldom experiences excessively heavy precipitation during the summer, may be less likely to receive a quantity sufficient for ending a drought than a region that has a record of extreme precipitation events during the same season.
The Asheville center has developed a Web site that takes these and other factors into account to answer the questions in a given area. The Web site provides information on the amount of rain needed to end drought in a given area, the percentage of normal precipitation that would end the drought, and the statistical probability that the area will receive the precipitation.
The Web address for the new site is http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/ol/climate/research/drought/drought.html.
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Twenty-five years ago, on 27 June, a NOAA crew flew the first P-3 “hurricane hunter” aircraft into Hurricane Bonny in the eastern Pacific. After 646 runs into 67 hurricanes, that same P-3 is considered such a workhorse that it’s still in the air today.
Because of its greater power, speed and range, the P-3 was acquired to replace a DC-6 that NOAA had been using for hurricane research. P-3s, however, had never been used for this purpose before.
“The early season Pacific hurricane was less intense than most Atlantic hurricanes, so Hurricane Bonny was a relatively safe testing ground for the new P-3,” said Jim DuGranrut, deputy director of NOAA’s Aircraft Operations Center in Tampa, Florida, where the P-3 is based. DuGranrut, an electronics engineer on the 1976 flight, is the only member of the original crew still working for NOAA.
“We had been working around the clock to get the P-3 equipped with its meteorological instrumentation and ready to fly by the beginning of hurricane season. Then during the flight we were so busy making sure the equipment worked, we didn’t have time to get nervous,” DuGranrut said. “Nevertheless, we were all pretty relieved by the end of the first flight that the P-3 handled so well. It takes a lot of nerve to fly into a hurricane in an unproven aircraft.”
That 1976 season gave more opportunities for the NOAA P-3 to prove its mettle. The aircraft flew into Atlantic-spawned Hurricanes Francis and Gloria, and was again up to the task. Though sparsely equipped by today’s standards, the P-3 carried temperature probes and pressure sensors on its fuselage, and a single radar in its nose that gave meteorologists on board an up-close view of storm dynamics.
In 1977 NOAA’s first P-3 was joined by a second, and over the next 2 years both turboprop aircraft were outfitted with three weather radars specially designed for them: in the nose, underneath the fuselage, and in the tail section. These gave scientists a three-dimensional look at hurricanes for the first time. The system in the tail section was upgraded 2 years later to a Doppler radar, the first weather Doppler radar to be flown on an aircraft.
During the past 25 years, significant progress was made in hurricane forecasting, largely due to advances in technology used aboard the P-3s as well as in computer models used in hurricane research. The quantity and quality of data transmitted from the aircraft to NOAA’s National Hurricane Center dramatically increased with the introduction of satellite communications, which replaced high-frequency radio.
In the 1980s, the two P-3s were dubbed Kermit and Miss Piggy after the beloved Muppet characters. This came about when an Aircraft Operations Center mechanic decided to spruce up a bedraggled P-3 nicknamed “the pig.” After renaming the aircraft Miss Piggy, the center contacted Jim Henson Productions to see if the company would be interested in designing logos for both aircraft in an effort to better educate children about NOAA’s hurricane research mission. Jim Henson Productions designed the logos—Kermit and Miss Piggy wearing flight suits and goggles—that now adorn the aircraft.
Despite flying into nature’s worst storms, the P-3s remain in remarkably good condition, a testament to the quality of maintenance performed by the Aircraft Operations Center’s skilled personnel. In addition to regular maintenance, the aircraft are rigorously inspected every 300 flight hours and undergo a complete overhaul every three and a half years.
NOAA added a Gulfstream-IV high altitude surveillance jet to its hurricane aircraft fleet in 1997. Called Gonzo after another Muppets character, the G-IV flies around hurricanes into the steering currents, helping forecasters increase the accuracy of their landfall predictions.
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The National Weather Service (NWS) and the National Sea Grant College Program are teaming up to help educate the public about the dangers of rip currents. The currents account for 80%—or 36 000—beach rescues annually.
Last year, 10 deaths were associated with rip currents in the surf along the North Carolina coast. This year, beach goers will be able to check several sources of rip current information before they head to the shore.
Using local area Web sites, the NWS in North Carolina now provides rip current forecasts for most North Carolina beaches. The sites provide twice daily updates from the Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, area to Dare County, North Carolina.
Rip current forecasts for Pender, North Carolina, New Hanover, and Brunswick counties of North Carolina, and the Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, area, are on the Web at http://nwsilm.wilmington.net (follow the rip currents link).
For information on Dare, Hyde, Carteret, and Onslow Counties, go to http://tgsv5.nws.noaa.gov/er/mhx/.
The Wakefield, Virginia, NWS office expects to offer rip current information for its region, which includes Currituck County, North Carolina, and the Virginia Beach area in the future.
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The National Weather Service (NWS) and pro golfer Rocco Mediate have teamed up to launch a campaign “Lightning Kills, Play It Safe” to alert the nation about lightning risks. The campaign is designed to lower lightning death and injury rates and America’s vulnerability to one of nature’s deadliest hazards.
The campaign was announced on 20 June at a news conference at the Buick Classic Golf Tournament in Harrison, New York. It marked the kickoff of the first-ever nationwide Lightning Awareness Week, which was held 18–22 June.
The Professional Golfers Association (PGA) Tour teamed up with meteorologists and The Weather Channel to help ensure immediate detection of lightning and hazardous conditions that would threaten the safety of players and fans.
During the past 30 years, lightning strikes have killed an average of 73 persons a year—more than the annual number of fatalities caused by tornadoes and hurricanes. In 2000, 51 were fatally struck by lightning, compared to 37 flood casualties and 29 tornado deaths.
Florida leads the nation in lightning strikes, with a daily average of more than 3500 and ranks first in lightning-related deaths. Overall, 25 million cloud-to-ground lightning strikes occur in the United States each year, according to the latest research.
The Weather Channel is the “official forecaster” of the PGA Tour and has an on-site meteorologist at all events. The forecaster provides crucial up-to-the-minute weather information to the tournament staff. Armed with a sophisticated on-site lightning detection system and computer weather data, which pinpoints conditions directly over the golf course, The Weather Channel meteorologists help ensure the safety of the competitors, tournament staff and volunteers and thousands of golf fans.
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Scientists marked the 10th anniversary of the Mt. Pinatubo eruption of 15 June 1991, the largest volcanic eruption the world had seen in nearly a century, with remembrances of the widespread destruction it wrought on the Philippine island of Luzon and the impact it had around the world.
Global average temperatures cooled for more than a year after the eruption from the massive injection of dust and gases into the upper atmosphere, and the global effects of volcanoes on climate were captured in detail for the first time by earth-observing satellites. Normal levels of atmospheric aerosols increased by more than 20 times, global warming was halted and ozone levels dropped worldwide, among other things.
E-mail contacts for scientist specialists involved with the data are
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Scientists studying atmospheric CO2 in the Antarctic have found a rise in the annual averages between 1994 and 2000, according to a report released by the Department of Energy’s Carbon Dioxide Information Analysis Center (CDIAC).
The data were contributed by Luigi Ciattaglia and Claudio Rafanelli of Rome, Italy, and Marcelo Lombardo and Jorge Araujo of Buenos Aires, Argentina. The data were collected at Jubany Station (62°,14’S, 58°,40’W), situated on King George Island in the South Shetland Archipelago north of the Antarctic Peninsula.
The data extend from March 1994 through December 2000. Annual averages have risen from 356.75 parts per million by volume (ppmv) in 1994 to 366.59 ppmv in 2000, the report noted. The general deceleration of the CO2 growth observed during 1997/98 at Jubany and other Antarctic stations appears to be related to the 1997/98 El Niño and subsequent La Niña episodes, according to the report.
The data from Jubany Station can by found on the Web at http://cdiac.esd.ornl.gov/trends/co2/jubany.htm.
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Spring 2001 was the 13th warmest in the United States since national records began in 1895, according to the National Weather Service (NWS).
At the same time, the global temperature averaged across land and ocean surfaces was 0.95°F above the 1880–2000 long-term mean.
Based on preliminary calculations, the nationally averaged March through May temperature in the contiguous United States was 53.5°F, 1.7°F warmer than the 1895–2000 average. The western two-thirds of the nation generally were warmer than average with near-average temperatures in much of the eastern third, the NWS noted. Spring temperatures in four western states—Utah, Nevada, Arizona, and New Mexico—were much above average while only two states—Alabama and Georgia—had cooler than average temperatures. Alaska enjoyed warmer than average temperatures.
The onset of spring was marked by much warmer than average temperatures in the West and cooler and wetter than average in the South and East. Much of the Northeast remained snow covered through March with record snowfall totals in some northeastern cities. Snow depth at the end of March in parts of the region ranged from one to well over three feet and was maintained by cold temperatures and a series of storms that swept across the area during the month.
Abnormally warm temperatures covered much of the country in April, NWS reported, with record or near-record temperatures in the Midwest. Melting of above average snowpack coupled with heavy rains caused severe flooding in the Upper Mississippi Valley. Areas of Minnesota received more than 400% of their average rainfall. Record April rainfall totals exceeding eight inches were measured in St. Cloud and Duluth. Above average warmth continued in May for much of the country, except Alaska, which was significantly cooler than average. The east and west coasts were dry in May with above average precipitation occurring in the Upper Midwest and Great Lakes states.
Averaged nationally, precipitation was near normal for spring. Wetter than average conditions stretched from New Mexico to the Upper Midwest, with much wetter than average conditions in Minnesota and Wisconsin. Average to drier than average conditions were experienced elsewhere. Maine had its second driest spring since statewide records began in 1895.
Drought conditions continued in the Pacific Northwest and parts of the Southeast. Although spring precipitation was near average to slightly below average across the northwestern states, much below average winter precipitation totals led to low spring snowpack with much of the western mountain snowpack melting several weeks earlier than usual.
Drought declarations and water use restrictions were established in Oregon, Washington, and Idaho. More than 3 years of below average precipitation in the southeastern United States brought about by persistent La Niña conditions led to continued drought concerns, particularly in Florida and the southern Appalachian mountains. Three-year precipitation deficits exceeded 50 inches in parts of Florida and 30 inches in western North Carolina. A 1-month rainfall total of more than 12 inches is needed in many of the drought-stricken areas of the Southeast to end existing drought conditions, according to the NWS.
With continuing weakening of La Niña conditions in the equatorial Pacific, temperatures in the Tropics and across a large part of the globe were much warmer than average during the Northern Hemisphere spring, the report noted. The averaged global temperature rise of 0.95°F above the long-term mean was the second warmest March–May period on record, 0.29°F cooler than the warmest such season near the end of the 1997/98 El Niño episode. The NWS reported that this continues the trend to warmer-than-average conditions during the past century. March–May temperatures have increased at a rate of 1.1°F per century since 1900 with the rate increasing 0.3°F per decade since 1976.
Anomalous warmth dominated much of the Northern Hemisphere land areas during this spring with the warmest anomalies in eastern Canada and Asia. Temperatures more than 5°F above the 1961–90 average covered many land areas from North Africa to central Asia. Cooler than normal temperatures were most notable in Scandinavia and parts of Siberia. Drier than normal conditions during the March–May period affected northern South America and much of China. Wet weather, with seasonal departures exceeding 100% of the 1961–90 average, occurred across parts of Argentina, Southeast Asia, and western Europe.
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GOES-M, the first of the NOAA satellites equipped with a new solar storm detection system, is scheduled to be launched from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida, on 15 July, according to NOAA officials.
The satellite will carry a solar X-ray Imager (SXI) instrument, which officials said will “provide the kind of improvements in space weather forecasting that satellite imagery did for tracking hurricanes.”
The instrument will take a full-disk image of the sun’s atmosphere once every minute. NOAA and the U.S. Air Force will use the images to monitor and forecast the sources of space weather disturbances that can damage satellite electronics, disrupt long distance radio communications, and surge power grids.
NOAA has GOES-8 operating over the East Coast and Atlantic Ocean and GOES-10 operating over the West Coast, the Pacific Ocean, and Hawaii. Both are in orbit over the equator at 22 300 miles altitude.
GOES-M will be stored in orbit, ready for operations when needed as a replacement for GOES-8 or GOES-10. NOAA assigns a letter to a satellite before it is launched and a number once it has achieved successful orbit. GOES-M will become GOES-12 once achieving orbit.
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The Clouds and Earth Radiant Energy System (CERES) instrument on NASA’s Terra spacecraft is capturing measurements that show just how much the sun influences the earth’s climate. The first observations, from March 2000 to May 2001, are the most accurate global radiation energy measurements ever and include the first complete year of such essential data since 1987.
“The new data will play a critical role in narrowing the uncertainties in predictions of future climate change, especially for the undefined role of the earth’s cloudiness,” said Bruce Wielicki, a CERES principal investigator. For scientists to understand climate, they must also determine what drives the changes within the earth’s radiation balance, and CERES measured some of these changes over the last year, producing new images that represent data collected twice a day over the whole planet.
Additional information is available on the Internet at http://asd-www.larc.nasa.gov/ceres/ASDceres.html and http://visibleearth.nasa.gov/Sensors/Terra/CERES.html.
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The TIMED (Thermosphere, Ionosphere, Mesophere, Energetics and Dynamics) spacecraft has been shipped from the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Maryland, to Vandenberg Air Force Base, California, where it is scheduled to be launched on 10 August.
The 2-year TIMED mission will study the effects of the sun and human-induced activities on the least explored and understood portion of earth’s atmosphere, known as the mesophere and lower thermosphere/ionosphere approximately 40–110 miles (60–180 kilometers) above the earth’s surface.
For more information on TIMED, visit the mission Web site at http://www.timed.jhuapl.edu.
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Data from the U.S.–French TOPEX/Poseidon satellite mission show that while an El Niño may be on the way, the Pacific is still dominated by the Pacific Decadal oscillation (PDO).
The PDO pattern, which has continued over the past 3 years, signals more of the unusually dry conditions that have afflicted the North American west coast, according to Dr. William Patzert, oceanographer at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California, which manages the project. The new satellite image shows a pulse of warm water traveling toward South America, a reminder that another El Niño is due in the next year or so.
The last El Niño was in 1997, and that event occurs every 2 to 7 years. The pulse of warm water is headed toward South America at about 140°W longitude. In late July, when this arrives at the west coast of South America, there should be a modest warming of the eastern Pacific, officials explained.
The eastward traveling Kelvin wave (a bulge of warm water) is often seen before an El Niño develops, they reported. The Kelvin waves are triggered by westerly wind bursts in the western Pacific. The strength of El Niño’s next appearance could depend on how much the PDO dominates ocean circulation and temperature patterns over the next few years, officials explained.
The data were taken during a 10-day collection cycle ended 11 June 2001. They show that the near-equatorial ocean has slowly warmed in the past year, and sea levels and sea-surface temperatures are near normal. Above-normal sea surface heights and warmer ocean temperatures still blanket the far-western tropical Pacific and much of the north and south mid-Pacific, according to the data.
In the western Pacific, the build-up of heat, first noted by mission oceanographers more than 2 years ago, has outlasted the La Niña of the past few years, data indicates. This warmth contrasts with the Bering Sea, Gulf of Alaska, and U.S. west coast, where lower-than-normal sea surface levels and cool ocean temperatures continue.
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All instruments aboard Landsat 4 were turned off and the final burn to lower the satellite’s orbit was performed on 15 June, according to NASA officials. The spacecraft is expected to experience a slow deterioration of its orbit over the next 5 to 10 years, finally burning up in its plunge through the earth’s atmosphere.
Landsat 4 was launched in 1982 and stopped sending images in 1995 when its communications payload failed. Since then, it has been used for software testing.
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NASA’s Terra earth-observing satellite has produced the most complete view ever assembled of the world’s air pollution.
Making use of an instrument provided by the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) known as the Measurements of Pollution in the Troposphere, or MOPITT, the data give policymakers and scientists a way to identify the major sources of air pollution and can closely track where the pollution goes anywhere on earth.
The instrument was developed by scientists at the University of Toronto and built by COM DEV International of Cambridge, Ontario. As Terra circles the earth from Pole to Pole 16 times a day, MOPITT is making the first long-term global observations of the air pollutant carbon monoxide. The data are processed by NCAR in Boulder, Colorado.
MOPITT’s observations have included the immense clouds of carbon monoxide from grassland and forest fires in Africa and South America, where the plumes traveled across the Southern Hemisphere as far as Australia. The instrument also observed similar clouds of carbon monoxide from Southeast Asia where air pollution plumes move across the Pacific Ocean and reach North America and the extensive air pollution generated by the forest fires in the western United States last summer.
A major source of pollution during winter in the Northern Hemisphere is the burning of fossil fuels for home heating and transportation, which can be seen in the images as wafting across much of the hemisphere.
Although MOPITT cannot distinguish between individual industrial sources in the same city, it can map different sources that cover a few hundred square miles. This is accurate enough to differentiate air pollution from a major metropolitan area, for example, from a major fire in a national forest. About half of the global emissions of carbon monoxide are said to be caused by human activities.
Animations and images of the first results from MOPITT are available at http://www.gsfc.nasa.gov/gsfc/earth/terra/co.htm.
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Just as a sponge expands when absorbing water, so too does the earth bulge slightly where aquifers, underground areas of permeable materials, absorb unusually large amounts of water from stream runoff or heavy rains. Scientists using satellite data have been able to measure these bulges on the land surface and believe they can use the technique to study the location and size of aquifers in remote regions.
Writing in the 1 July issue of Geophysical Research Letters, published by the American Geophysical Union, Zhong Lu and Wesley R. Danskin of the U.S. Geological Survey describe their interferometric analysis of imagery from the synthetic aperture radar (SAR) instruments aboard the European Space Agency satellites, ERS-1 and ERS-2. This technique, known as InSAR, produces an image, called an interferogram, showing differences in land features between two SAR images taken at different times. Synthetic aperture radar is essentially a high-resolution radar.
Using the well-documented San Bernardino groundwater basin of southern California for their test case, Lu and Danskin detected an uplift of more than three inches (seven centimeters) during the first half of 1993. This period was marked by unusually high runoff from surrounding mountains and high levels of water in nearby wells.
The San Bernardino area is semiarid, and groundwater levels rise dramatically in response to recharge from intermittently flowing streams that originate in the San Bernardino and San Gabriel Mountains, which are composed mainly of granite and absorb little water. The area lies between the San Andreas and San Jacinto earthquake fault lines. From 1950 to 1970, groundwater levels in one area fell by about 50 meters (160 feet) and the land subsided by as much as 12 inches (30 centimeters). From then until 1980, natural and artificial recharge brought water levels in that area to within 3 feet (1 meter) of the surface.
With these and other available data, Lu and Danskin compared 13 InSAR images taken between 1992 and 1995 and produced a series of interferograms. They observed that the 3-inch (7 centimeter) uplift occurred between December 1992 and August 1993, with 2 inches (4 centimeters) occurring in only 3½ months, during the period of greatest runoff. Although significant land subsidence as a result of groundwater pumpage is a well-known scientific phenomenon, the magnitude of the observed uplift caused by recharge was unexpected.
The researchers were concerned that the observed land deformation might have been caused by movement of tectonic plates deep below the land surface or by earthquakes, rather than by recharging of the aquifer. They concluded, however, that this was not the case, based on the interferometric patterns acquired from the satellites.
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The Air Force’s Defense Meteorological Satellite Program F-16 weather satellite, grounded in January, has now been repaired and is scheduled or launch in November.
Originally planned for liftoff from Vandenberg Air Force Base, California, on 20 January atop a refurbished Titan 2 missile, the countdown was halted at T minus 3 minutes due to a ground support equipment glitch.
The second countdown the next day reached T minus 28 seconds when computers detected that one of the rocket’s fuel valves failed to open as planned. The valve turned out to be OK, but did no operate to the liking of the computer. Then workers found faint traces of hydrazine in the air around the launch area. Following that, the spacecraft’s Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU)—the craft’s navigation brain—began acting erratically, which would have caused the $430 million mission to fail.
Due to the severity of the problem, the 3380-pound satellite was pulled off its launch vehicle and returned to payload processing on 27 February. Repairs on the spacecraft have cost $7.5 million, officials said, and retesting has gone well.
Once in orbit, DMSP F-16 will replace DMSP F-13, which was launched in 1995 and has survived well beyond its planned lifetime. The U.S. military relies on two primary DMSP weather satellites to orbit around the earth’s Poles to gather data meteorologists need to generate forecasts for strategic and tactical planning. They circle 458 nautical miles above earth to track clouds, hurricanes, and storm systems around the world. They also monitor ice and snow coverage, pollution, and fires.
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Three Wyoming middle-school students shared their love of science with Vice President Dick Cheney, also from Wyoming, early in June during a White House visit. The students, in Washington, D.C., as part of the Department of Commerce’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration program to promote women in science and technical fields, presented Cheney with a NOAA Weather Radio and a NOAA weather T-shirt.
The students—Amy Lenell, Amanda Martin, and Eddy Miller—were chosen for the trip by the Laramie County (Wyoming) School District based on their drive and energy in organizing the 3rd Annual Women in Science Forum in Cheyenne. The local Women in Science Forum is designed to mentor and encourage girls in grades K–12 to consider pursuing careers in science, math and technology.
“I think that NOAA and the Women in Science program is a great example of how women can do a lot more,” said Amanda Martin. “Sometimes I think we’re ranked by how we can do stuff compared to men. I think we can all be equal if we had a chance. And that’s what this program is trying to do—give women a chance to have that equal opportunity. I plan on going into a science career—marine biology or being a veterinarian. This trip has been a real experience.”
“NOAA and the Women in Science program has helped us meet all these amazing people and we’ve been able to do all these amazing things—even meeting the Vice President,” said Eddy Miller. “I have always been interested in astronomy, so the visit to the Naval Observatory and seeing the 100-year-old telescope was really cool.”
“I’ve been interested in science for a while, so NOAA’s trip and the Women in Science program helped me along,” said Amy Lenell. “I think it will help the balance between men and women in the sciences. In the long term it’ll be good for everybody because you have more ideas and a better range of thinking.”
The Women in Science is an outgrowth of the adopt-a-school project that NOAA’s Cheyenne National Weather Service staff started with Carey Junior High in 1998. The students assume major roles in helping plan and promote each year’s WIS Forum. This year, the Cheyenne Kiwanis Club and Frontier Refinery, Inc. helped organize the event.
During their 5-day expedition in Washington, D.C., the students toured NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Prediction, met with women scientists and technical experts from NOAA, and visited some of the nations top science-oriented attractions, including the Air and Space Museum, the National Zoo, and the U.S. Naval Observatory.
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The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) has awared its prestigious IMO Prize to Professor Mohammad Hassan Ganji for his admirable contributions to the science of meteorology. Another WMO prize, the Norbert Gerbier-Mumm International Award, was granted to Drs. C.L. Lu and Dr. S.H. Chen of China.
The IMO Prize originates from WMO’s predecessing body, the International Meteorological Organization (IMO), founded in 1873. Professor Ganji’s contributions to meteorology deserve admiration, said a paper on the scientists’ accomplishments. The Iranian scientist has written 15 volumes of books and several hundreds of articles in both English and Persian on human geography and meteorology including climatology. Furthermore, Ganji is the author and composer of the first-ever climatic atlas of Iran published in 1965. His masterwork is Geography in Iran from 1850 to the Islamic Revolution published in 1987.
Born in 1912 in the east-Iranian town of Birjand, close to the Afghanistan border, Ganji was sent to England in 1933 for further study due to excellent records during his Bachelor’s in Science studies at Iranian university institutes and due to his knowledge of the English language. He returned from the UK with a Masters in Science in 1938. Ganji left for the United States to Clark University where he obtained a Ph.D. degree in geography.
Prof. Ganji retired in 1975 with the title Professor Emeritus, having spent 37 years as the Head of the Faculty of Literature and Human Sciences at Tehran University. In those years, he held several other positions, of which the most important was the post of Director-General of the Iranian Meteorological Department that was founded by him. Ganji remained active for 5 years as a chancellor at the University of his hometown Birjand after his retirement from Tehran University.
The Norbert Gerbier-Mumm International Award 2001, named after the late Norbert Gerbier, former president of WMO’s Commission for Agricultural Meteorology, was won by the eminent Chinese scientists Drs. C.L. Lu and Dr. S. H. Chen for their joint paper entitled “Multiple Linear Interdependent Models (MLIM) Applied to Typhoon Data in China.” The study demonstrates that MLIMs provide better results in diagnosing the losses in typhoon disaster and forecasting the main parameters of typhoons, namely, their tracks, intensities, and wind speeds. This is a significant development in disaster mitigation for the typhoon-prone region of southeast China.
The purpose of the Norbert Gerbier-Mumm International Award is to encourage and reward an original scientific paper on the influence of meteorology in a particular field of the physical, natural, or human sciences or on the influence of one of these sciences on meteorology. The award aims at stimulating interest in such research, in support of WMO programs. The annual award consists of a diploma, a medal bearing a likeness of Mr. Norbert Gerbier and a prize of 50 000 French francs.
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The Weather Research Center has launched a $2 million fund-raising campaign for The Weather Museum at Weather Research Center. Weather Research Center was founded in December 1987 as a nonprofit educational and research organization under the direction of Dr. John C. Freeman and Jill F. Hasling (both AMS Certified Consulting Meteorologists).
The center provides educational programs and materials for students, teachers, and the public through tours, talks, weather day camps, seminars, conferences, and internships. In addition, the center provides professional services (forecasting and reporting) to clients in a diverse array of industries. In order to carry out the center’s educational activities the center will develop a Weather Museum. The mission of the museum will be to educate the public on weather safety focusing on the fact that knowledge and understanding about the weather is the best safety precaution. The museum will also be the perfect venue to introduce children of all ages to science and math.
To get involved in this project contact Weather Research Center at weathermuseum@houston.rr.com. For more information go to http://www.wxresearch.com/museum/default.html.
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The National Council of Industrial Meteorologists (NCIM) Annual Meeting was held in Billerica, Massachusetts, on 1–2 June 2001. In addition to presentations by Richard Rosen, President-Elect of AMS, and Gary Rasmussen, AMS Private Sector Coordinator, NCIM elected and installed as its officers and directors:
Jill F. Hasling, CCM President; James H. Block, CCM President-Elect; Wayne R. Sand, CCM Director; Matthew J. Parker, CCM Director; and Stanley L. Marsh Jr., CCM Director. The other continuing Director is Phillip D. Falconer, CCM.
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