June 2016 to May 2017 the Following Were Achieved Conference
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COOPERATIVE INSTITUTE FOR RESEARCH IN ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES 2017 Annual Report COOPERATIVE INSTITUTE FOR RESEARCH IN ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES University of Colorado Boulder 216 UCB Boulder, CO 80309-0216 303-492-1143 [email protected] http://cires.colorado.edu CIRES Director Waleed Abdalati Annual Report Staff Katie Weeman, Editor Katy Human, Director of Communications, Editor Robin L. Strelow and Allie Braun, Designers Agreement Nos. NA12OAR4320137 and NA15OAR4320137 Cover: Crevasse on the Greenland Ice Sheet. Photo: Jim Kastengren/CIRES Table of Contents Executive Summary & Research Highlights 2 Events 50 From the Director 2 Project Reports 54 CIRES: Science in Service to Society 3 Air Quality in a Changing Climate 55 This is CIRES 6 Climate Forcing, Feedbacks, and Analysis 58 Organization 7 Earth System Dynamics, Variability, and Change 65 Governance 8 Management and Exploitation of Geophysical Data 69 Finance 9 Regional Sciences and Applications 80 Scientific Outreach and Education 84 People & Programs 10 Space Weather Understanding and Prediction 86 Fellows 11 Stratospheric Processes and Trends 90 CIRES Centers 20 Systems and Prediction Models Development 95 Center for Limnology 20 Center for Science and Technology Policy Research 22 Appendices 103 Earth Science and Observation Center 24 Publications 103 National Snow and Ice Data Center 27 Active NOAA Awards 134 Institutional Programs & Teams 30 Personnel Demographics 135 Western Water Assessment 30 Project Goals for 2016–2017 136 CIRES Education and Outreach 32 International Global Atmospheric Chemistry 34 Visiting Fellows 36 Innovative Research Program 39 Graduate Student Research Awards 40 Integrated Instrument Design Facility 41 Communications 42 Diversity & Undergraduate 44 Research Selected 2016 Awards 46 2016 Annual Report 1 Executive Summary & Research Highlights From the Director CIRES turned 50 this September, marking five exploration on our planet’s atmosphere. We showcased Associate Director for Science. decades of excellent and dedicated service to NOAA CIRES involvement in international efforts to better It is also my great pleasure to welcome EarthLab to and its predecessor, the Environmental Science Service understand ozone pollution at the Earth’s surface, CIRES. This innovative new team of about 20 people, led Administration. CIRES’ founders focused on the and ozone hole recovery high in the stratosphere. We by Jennifer Balch (Dept. of Geography) moved under the importance of multidisciplinary research aimed at highlighted a team that developed the National Weather CIRES administrative umbrella July 1 this year. understanding the Earth system, and that value has not Service’s next-generation forecast model for severe weather This year, we grew the administrative team slightly, adding changed in 50 years. Our achievements and prominence, events such as tornadoes and blizzards. These were just one new positions in Finance and one in HR, to help deal however, have changed—growing with every decade. a few examples to highlight our outstanding work and with relentless proposal writing by CIRES scientists, and We had three great occasions in the last its direct relevance to people’s lives. We also used the the hiring of research scientists, staff, and students to meet year to highlight CIRES’ past opportunity to highlight the many accolades that our our expanding needs. accomplishments and envision our scientists earn for their work. This year’s awards and Finally, I’m gratified to report that CIRES’ scientific future: In the spring of 2017, recognitions are highlighted in the Awards section of this and administrative successes are reflected in our finances. we held a small celebration report, on page 46, and it’s worth calling out two here: In FY2017, our expenditures were nearly $88 million, of our 50th anniversary, CIRES researcher Anne Perring earned a Presidential Early which comprised roughly one-sixth of the University’s which included colleagues Career Award for Scientists and Engineers, or PECASE, research funding. About half of our support was from the from the University of from the White House, and CIRES Fellow Jennifer Kay cooperative agreement with NOAA, and we continued to Colorado Boulder and from won a National Science Foundation CAREER award. leverage this investment, and support from the university, NOAA, presentations from During this last year’s events, we also highlighted the work to secure more than $37 million in additional funding from a handful of past directors of our graduate students and postdocs, in Ignite-style talks. diverse other sources. and students, and excellent CIRES scientists mentor and advise the next generation We have had another excellent year at CIRES, and I want camaraderie. In the fall of of world-class scientists, and from what I saw in the to extend my deepest appreciation to every member of our 2016, we hosted a team of student talks, that mentorship is helping to create sharp, team, from our scientists, engineers and developers to our international Reviewers, convened focused, communicative, and wholly impressive early career staff and students, who continue to make CIRES the great by NOAA, to assess our performance researchers. success that it is and an organization of which we can all be during the first half of our current ten-year I was gratified that CIRES received a rating of very proud. award. And we had a similar review by the University Outstanding from the reviewers, who clearly recognized of Colorado’s Academic Review and Planning Advisory and appreciated CIRES’ contributions to science, Committee, which examines the effectiveness and success education, and people’s lives. In particular, I would like of departments and institutes on the CU Boulder campus. to thank Associate Director Bill Lewis and our former For me, what emerged from these three events was Associate Director for Science, Kristen Averyt, for their a powerful sense of CIRES scientists’ involvement tremendous efforts in making our reviews so successful. in questions of regional, national, and international I reported this spring that Dr. Averyt would be leaving us Waleed Abdalati importance, and the progress we continue to make in to take on the Directorship of the Desert Research Institute CIRES Director addressing these questions. We featured presentations in Nevada. While we miss her contributions to CIRES, about El Niño’s impacts on California and the West and we are delighted to welcome Dr. Christine Wiedinmyer, successful efforts to quantify the impact of oil and gas a highly accomplished atmospheric chemist, as our new 2 2017 Annual Report Photo: Glenn Asakawa/CU Boulder CIRES: Science in Service to Society The Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Weather-Ready Nation Goal local and regional emissions from various sources (e.g., Sciences is an international leader in research, addressing • During 2017, NOAA began using an improved “dynam- oil and gas exploration and the naturally ozone-rich some of the most pressing challenges facing the planet. ical core” weather model, the Finite Volume on a Cubed stratosphere) contribute to summertime ozone problems. Many of these challenges are priorities for NOAA, such as Sphere (FV3), to provide better forecast guidance. That Ozone pollution is regulated because of the harm it does to innovating new ways to better forecast severe weather events choice was made in large part due to work by CIRES scien- people’s lungs; it can also damage crops and other plants. that threaten lives and property and conducting climate re- tists and colleagues who evaluated all cores under consider- (CSD-04) search useful to decision makers, from local to international ation to improve a critical National Weather Service global • CIRES researchers helped develop and finesse several key levels. Since its inception as one of NOAA’S first coopera- weather forecast model. (PSD-26) products designed to help forecasters and managers in the tive institutes 50 years ago, CIRES has been helping NOAA • CIRES staff continued to support the Hurricane eatherW aviation industry make safety-related decisions. One exam- achieve strategic goals by hiring and supporting some of the Research and Forecasting model, testing code for public ple is the expansion, to new airports, of a forecast tool used best and brightest Earth scientists and leveraging NOAA releases, creating and updating documentation and instruc- to verify gate approach and departure gate forecasts, with a investments with partnerships and funding from other in- tional materials, conducting tutorials, and answering ques- focus on convection-related impacts. (GSD-06) stitutions around the world. Here we highlight a few of the tions from users. The team also developed a draft protocol • Experts in the Space Weather Forecast Center successfully past year’s activities and successes as they align with NOAA’s for incorporating forecast-improving innovations into the transitioned a research-based geospace model, developed at Next Generation Strategic Plan. NOAA operational global forecast system. (GSD-07) the University of Michigan, into operations at the National • A series of peer-reviewed studies directly quantified how Centers for Environmental Prediction. The Geospace Flood damage in east Boulder County, Colorado. Photo: Lornay Hansen/CIRES 2017 Annual Report 3 Model forecasts the geomagnetic impacts of space weather cific missions: in Alamosa, Colorado, for example, to make Division, as one of 102 young scientists and engineers to on Earth