Quarterly Activity Report
FY2014 Quarter 2
(January - March, 2014)
Contents
1. Training on the New
HYSPLIT/ALOHA Web Interface
2. Upgraded HYSPLIT Product to NCEP
3. International
Activities
4.
Best Aircraft Turbulence Probe: Post Alaska Study
5. Project Sagebrush
6. Birch Creek Valley Study
7. Wind Forecast Improvement
Project (WFIP)
8. ARL Convective Initiation Project
9. Improvements to Dispersion
Modeling and Meteorological Display
10. NOAA/INL Mesonet
11. ANSI/ANS 3.11 Standard
12. INL Dose Reconstruction
13. Compliance Data
14. Great Lakes Restoration
Initiative
15. HYSPLIT Back-trajectory
Analyses for Pesticides
16. Ammonia Air-Surface Exchange Study
17.
Global Climate Observing System Reference Upper Air Network
18. Climate-Weather Research and Forecast
Model
19. Changes in Cloudiness
21. Tornado and High Wind
Climatology- Idaho National Laboratory (INL)
ARL
2nd Quarter Publications
Conference Presentations &
Invited Talks
Awards, Honors, Recognition
Outreach
1. Training on the New HYSPLIT/ALOHA Web
Interface
ARL staff were involved in providing
training on the new HYSPLIT/ALOHA web interface to NWS forecasters through a
series of webinars to each NWS region.The training was led by NOAA's Office of Response and Restoration and focused
on providing a background of the HYSPLIT/ALOHA integration, the web interface,
and how to interpret the results.ARL
scientists were available at several webinars to answer HYSPLIT specific questions.Feedback provided by the NWS coordinators
indicated that the webinars were well attended and the interest was high. Glenn
Rolph also gave a webinar to NWS Southern Region
forecasters on February 20 that provided them with background material and a
demonstration of the HYSPLIT improvised nuclear device (IND) simulation.The IND simulation was added recently to the
modeling tools available to the forecasters on the HYSPLIT web server and will
be used by the forecasters during an upcoming Federal Emergency Management Agency
IND exercise.A research paper on the HYSPLIT
model and IND simulation was also submitted to the Journal of Environmental
Radioactivity.glenn.rolph@noaa.gov
2. Upgraded HYSPLIT Product to NCEP
Barbara Stunder submitted an
upgraded HYSPLIT transport and dispersion model package to the National Centers
for Environmental Prediction (NCEP) Environmental Modeling Center (EMC) for the
planned September 2014 implementation into NCEP operations.EMC will conduct further testing and
evaluation; then give the code to NCEP Central Operations for additional
testing, evaluation, and implementation.The significant upgrades in this package were:
- upgraded
HYSPLIT main source code, library, and pre- and post-processing programs to ARL
HYSPLIT revision number 560 (January 2014),
- new
application to support the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization,
developed by ARL colleague Tianfeng Chai and
others,
- the
addition of relatively high vertical- and horizontal-resolution Global Forecast
System (GFS) meteorological model output for NCEP volcanic ash and
radiological applications, with the potential for use in other NCEP
applications.
The main improvements to the dispersion code are 1) the
option to differentiate the vertical Lagrangian
time scale for stable and unstable conditions, and 2) to use pre-computed
random numbers to speed up run time for some run configurations.The GFS data are on a half-degree
latitude-longitude grid and on the GFS native hybrid
levels. HYSPLIT, developed at ARL, is run at NCEP to create
dispersion (plume) predictions of smoke, dust, volcanic ash, radionuclides, and
for other smaller HAZMAT-type incidents.These applications at NCEP have unique pre- and post-processing details,
but all run the same dispersion program.barbara.stunder@noaa.gov
3. International Activities
Ariel Stein
taught a graduate course entitled "Contaminacion Atmosferica: Origen, Tratamiento
y Control", at the Universidad Internacional de Andalucia in Huelva, Spain. This graduate course is
considered one of the top courses in Spain regarding environmental pollution
and air quality. While there, he met with his postdoc Dr.
Celia Milford, who is developing a modeling capability to simulate heavy metal
dispersion from a power plant using HYSPLIT. Ariel is also collaborating with Dr. Diego Gaiero from the University of Cordoba, Argentina to run
HYSPLIT dispersion simulations of volcanic ash in South America. ariel.stein@noaa.gov
4. Best Aircraft
Turbulence Probe: Post Alaska Study
It was discovered that the OpSens fiber-optic temperature (FOT) sensor, a key
component in the heat flux measurement system of the Best Aircraft Turbulence
(BAT) probe, had an "adaptive" filter enabled by default. This issue may have
affected measurements collected during the Alaska study last August because the
response of the FOT sensor to high-frequency fluctuations in temperature was
more strongly damped than we had expected from the unit's specifications.With the adaptive filter removed, there was
significant improvement in the frequency response of the FOT sensor during
testing both on the bench and in ambient air.Further testing of the sensor mounted on a vehicle, which is expected to
better approach flight conditions, is planned.ed.dumas@noaa.gov, R. Dobosy, B. Baker
5. Project Sagebrush
Quality control and assurance
analyses of the bag sampling and fast response tracer gas analyzer (TGA) tracer
data sets for all tests was completed. All of the data have been incorporated
into the master database and flagged as appropriate. Comprehensive draft
reports describing all sampling activities and QC procedures have been prepared
for the bag sampling and TGA data for eventual inclusion as chapters in a
formal report on Project Sagebrush. Analysis of tracer plume dispersion will be
conducted in conjunction with the analysis of the measured turbulence and other
meteorological data.
The Grid 3 tall tower, located
near the tracer sampling array, was heavily instrumented with additional sonic
anemometers provided by FRD; an
extensive package of turbulence and energy balance instrumentation provided by
Washington State University (WSU), as well as with the routine suite of
instrumentation used for mesonet purposes. Together these data will provide a detailed look
at the vertical profiles of turbulence. All of the tower instrumentation will
remain in place until June in an ongoing study of the structure of vertical
turbulence in a wide range of meteorological conditions, which began in late
September 2013. Ultimately the Grid 3 tower measurements will provide data for
the Project Sagebrush tracer tests, as well as a rich database for a separate
comprehensive analysis of vertical turbulence structures over a broad range of
conditions. Receipt of the WSU portion of the data is pending.
A preliminary consolidation and
review of the Project Sagebrush meteorological measurements for the actual test
days has been completed utilizing the data collected by FRD. A much more
detailed and complete analysis of the meteorological data is pending
acquisition of the data collected by WSU. kirk.clawson@noaa.gov
6. Birch Creek Valley Study
Analysis of the Birch Creek
dataset during the previous reporting quarter focused on the monthly/seasonal
changes in diurnal flow patterns, especially with respect to the interaction
between mountain valley flows and flows on the Snake River Plain. A draft
manuscript is currently in preparation that will describe these interactions
and other effects of complex terrain. Preliminary results have provided several
insights into the factors that affect the timing, duration, wind direction
shifts, and potential disruptions to routine diurnal wind patterns across
southeast Idaho. The current effort is focused on the summer season but later
work could expand into the winter and spring months. A second analysis of
individual wind events featuring unusual flow patterns and abrupt temporal
and/or spatial changes within a mountain valley (Birch Creek) is on hold
pending availability of the higher spatial resolution datasets acquired by our
partner, the USFS Fire Sciences Laboratory.It is anticipated that their data will be available within the next
couple of months. Several potentially very interesting cases have been
identified in the data presently available to us. dennis.finn@noaa.gov, Jason Rich
7. Wind Forecast Improvement Project (WFIP)
NOAA and the Department of Energy
are planning a WFIP2 project that will extend the research into complex
terrain. The final location of the main field study for WFIP2 is still
undecided. However, ARL's Field Research Division (FRD) has pointed out that
over 200 wind turbines are located roughly 10 km east of Idaho Falls in complex
terrain. FRD's existing Mesonet covers a large region
just west of the turbines, and the observations could easily be extended
eastward to cover the wind farms at relatively low cost. NOAA has accepted this
concept as a potentially useful activity related to the WFIP2 program. FRD is
developing plans to install research grade measurements---including flux
systems, sodars, and a radar wind profiler---in the
wind farms starting this summer. Discussions are already under way with the
company operating one of the four wind farms in the region. The research plans
are being closely coordinated with researchers at the Earth System Research
Laboratory who are leading the WFIP2 activities within NOAA/OAR. richard.eckman@noaa.gov, Kirk Clawson
8. ARL Convective Initiation Project
The position for a postdoctoral
associate, who will be assisting in numerical modeling for the Convective
Initiation Project, was advertised through the Cooperative Institute for
Climate & Satellites-Maryland. Eleven candidates applied for the position.
Candidate interviews will take place in the coming months. The associate will,
in all likelihood, be located with either the Field Research Division in Idaho
Falls, ID or the Atmospheric Turbulence and Diffusion Division in Oak Ridge, TN.
Sub-domains of the High
Resolution Rapid Refresh model output will be made available for both the Convective
Initiation Project's field study site in northern Alabama and a region around
Oak Ridge, Tennessee. The latter sub-domain will be used in instrument testing.
Software is also under development to extract information from the model output
that is relevant to convective initiation. richard.eckman@noaa.gov
9. Improvements to Dispersion Modeling and
Meteorological Display
On September 1, 2014, Google will
no longer allow the use of their mapping Application Programming Interface (API)
for Adobe Flash.Because of this
development, HyRAD (FRD's version of HYSPLIT for the
Idaho National Laboratory) has been rewritten to use the Google Javascript mapping API.Functionally this version is very similar to the Flash version, but is
now a desktop application instead of a browser-based application.This is the same approach used to develop Viz+, FRD's mesonet data
visualization tool.The new version of HyRAD can be downloaded and installed from http://www.noaa.inel.gov/hysplit/update.brad.reese@noaa.gov
10. NOAA/INL Mesonet
The NOAA/Idaho National
Laboratory (INL) Mesonet telemetry system continued
to have radio interference problems during the months of January and
February.On January 21, careful
observations were made with a communications system analyzer of an interfering
radio signal. A qualitative match was made with the signal and broadcasts from
the radio at the Dubois mesonet station.It appeared that the radio was broadcasting
outside of its time slot.The radio was
replaced on January 22 and the interference pattern ceased.On February 6, Idaho Falls City Power was
able to identify three potential sources of electric noise near the Field
Research Division's offices.They replaced
a lightning arrestor on the power pole directly in front of the building.Apparently, the lightning arrestor was arcing
and creating large amounts of radio frequency noise when air temperatures
approached 0 °F.No radio interference
has been observed since the replacement.shane.beard@noaa.gov, Tom
Strong, Roger Carter
11. ANSI/ANS 3.11 Standard
The American National Standards
Institute/American Nuclear Society standard entitled "Determining
Meteorological Information at Nuclear Facilities," first published in 2005,
will sunset in 2015. As a result, the standard is being revised for a planned
replacement at that time. The 3.11 standard has been adopted by the Department
of Energy and it guides FRD's meteorological activities in support of the
NOAA/INL Meteorological Research Partnership. Kirk Clawson serves on the
coauthor and reviewing teams. Kirk.Clawson@noaa.gov
12. INL Dose Reconstruction
INL asked FRD to track down old
records related to the Aircraft Nuclear Propulsion program that took place back
in the 1950s and 60s. This program focused on developing a jet engine that used
a nuclear reactor to generate thrust. Some of the engine tests that took place
at what is now the INL Site resulted in significant radiological releases.
These releases have been modeled as part of dose reconstruction projects
related to employee compensation. The new request was related to a specific
series of engine tests that took place in late 1957 and early 1958. It asked
for any meteorological data from that period together with electronic files
from dispersion model runs that were likely completed by FRD in the 1980s to
simulate the dispersion from the engine tests. Meteorological data from two
towers are still available in FRD's archives, but the old model runs were
likely performed on Perkin-Elmer microcomputers that used tape drives. No
electronic backups of the model runs were found. richard.eckman@noaa.gov, Kirk Clawson, Roger Carter
13. Compliance Data
Walt Schalk
completed processing the 2013 wind and stability joint frequency distribution
files for several mesonet sites that will be used in
annual National Emission Standards for Hazardous Air Pollutants environmental
compliance reporting.In addition, all mesonet station files for 2013 have been processed and the
data will be forwarded to the Western Regional Climate Data Center in Reno,
NV.walter.w..schalk@noaa.gov
14. Great Lakes Restoration Initiative
The 3rd year of the mercury modeling work
under the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative has continued, examining the
consequences of alternative future emissions
scenarios. IPCC-scenario-based emissions scenarios from Lei et al (Atmos.
Chem. Phys. 14, 783-795, 2014) were obtained, re-gridded, and
reformatted for use with HYSPLIT-Hg. Initial simulations with these
scenarios were conducted, as were numerous other simulations using a newly
developed HYSPLIT-Hg methodology in which the entire global mercury emissions
inventory is modeled simultaneously. These "all in one" simulations do not
produce detailed source-receptor results, but they do provide a
dramatically faster way (~100x) of developing overall
concentration and deposition results to investigate model sensitivities and
performance.
Previous model evaluation efforts have
focused on comparison of modeled and measured wet deposition results at Mercury
Deposition Network sites. In this quarter, new post-processing routines were
developed and comparisons were made of hour-by-hour speciated
mercury concentration modeling results against time-resolved measurements.
Based on these comparisons, the following improvements to the modeling
methodology were made: (1) atmospheric mercury chemical reaction
rates have been adjusted (oxidation by OH and O3 in earlier formulations appears to
have been too fast); and (2) model spin-up time has been lengthened (now ~2
years spin up). It is noted that there is independent scientific justification
for each of these changes. With these modifications, model estimates of ambient
mercury concentrations are encouragingly consistent with measurements. mark.cohen@noaa.gov
15. HYSPLIT Back-trajectory
Analyses for Pesticides
In collaboration with Mexican scientists (from the Oceanological Research Institute of the
Autonomous University of Baja California) and Swedish scientists(from Umeå University), a
back-trajectory analysis using HYSPLIT was carried out to support
interpretation of atmospheric pesticide samples at two sites in Mexico during
2011-2012. Over 3500 back-trajectories were simulated and subjected to a
sample-by-sample gridded-frequency analysis. Additional post-processing was
carried out and the results were imported into ArcGIS for more advanced display
features. Dramatic differences in geographical patterns of air-mass histories
were found between different samples. A
tutorial, designed in six -2 hour sessions and conducted over a two month
period, showed the Mexican investigators how to duplicate and extend the
analysis. In addition, in a comparable activity, extensive assistance was provided
to a USGS scientist in support of a back-trajectory analysis investigating
precipitation patterns in the U.S. Southwest. mark.cohen@noaa.gov
16. Ammonia Air-Surface Exchange Study
LaToya Myles, Mark Heuer, and
Simone Klemenz from ATDD, along with Jason Caldwell
and Daryl Sibble, interns from the NOAA Environmental
Cooperative Science Center, setup and tested a suite of meteorological
instruments and a real-time ammonia analyzer that will be deployed over maize
at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign Energy Farm. The preparation is
for a study, funded by the National Science Foundation, which focuses on
measuring ammonia emissions from fertilizer application at the local scale in
an intensively managed agro-ecosystem and on development of a method to
facilitate connection of the local scale with the regional scale. Sampling is
slated to begin by May 1. latoya.myles@noaa.gov, M.
Heuer, S.Klemenz
17. Global Climate Observing System Reference Upper Air
Network
Dian
Seidel helped to organize and participated in the 6th implementation and
coordination meeting of the Global Climate Observing System-Reference Upper Air
Network (GRUAN) held in Greenbelt, Maryland. The meeting was hosted by
Howard University, which runs a GRUAN site at Beltsville, MD, in partnership
with NOAA/National Weather Service in Sterling, VA. The theme for the meeting
was "maximizing the utility of GRUAN activities and measurements to
benefit the Global Observing System," and significant progress was made toward
that long-term goal. Strong participation by NOAA helped advance NOAA's
involvement with GRUAN; participants included OAR, NWS and NESDIS colleagues,
and NOAA Acting Chief Scientist and OAR Administrative Assistant Robert Detrick
provided a keynote welcoming address to the international GRUAN community,
including GRUAN leaders, managers, site representatives, and scientists. Among
the many issues discussed at the meeting was a GRUAN "launch event", a side
meeting planned for the WMO Congress in June 2015, to formally introduce GRUAN
to Permanent Representatives to WMO. Dian serves
on the Working Group for GRUAN, which provides oversight and leadership for the
network. dian.seidel@noaa.gov
18. Climate-Weather Research and Forecast Model
ARL used the Climate-Weather Research and Forecast (CWRF) model
to perform down-scaling experiments for seasonal climate outlooks produced by
NCEP's operational Climate Forecast System (CFS). The experiments
were performed for the summers of 2011, 2012, and 2013. CFS
forecasts have very limited skill to forecast beyond one month leading time,
especially for precipitation. Summer precipitation forecasting is even more
difficult for global models, such as CFS, since mesoscale atmospheric systems
dominate during the season. Also, the atmospheric system could not be
resolved by the CFS's ~100km scale grid. The CWRF model has a 30-km grid
resolution which can describe the mesoscale systems by improved physics
representation, and it can also resolve heterogeneous terrains including
mountainous and coastal areas. The results demonstrated CWRF improvements
over CFS. With the improved forecasts, there can be more accurate outlooks for
extreme events, such as droughts and floods, heat waves and cold surges.
A manuscript and presentation titled "A Hybrid Approach to
Improve Skills of Seasonal Climate Outlooks" is in preparation. julian.wang@noaa.gov, Shuyan Liu.
19. Changes in Cloudiness
Hyelim Yoo joined ARL staff in
February to work on assessing changes in cloudiness using satellite and
ground-based data. She has obtained and processed several satellite cloud
datasets and done initial comparisons with the weather service and military
weather station dataset of total cloud amount previously created by ARL. melissa.free@noaa.gov, Hyelim Yoo
ATDD
staff made twenty-eight Climate Reference Network annual maintenance site
visits and one unscheduled maintenance visit. mark.e.hall@noaa.gov
21. Tornado and High Wind Climatology- Idaho National
Laboratory (INL)
A tornado and high wind
climatology of the INL and southeastern Idaho was prepared and submitted to the
Department of Energy-Idaho. The climatology was prepared in response to a
tornado design basis inquiry. It was noted that 6 tornadoes have been reported
on the INL since 1950. These have mostly been F0 category tornadoes, with one
F1 tornado. Straight-line wind gusts in excess of 90 mph have been recorded by
the NOAA/INL Mesonet four times since 1994 and were
the result of thunderstorm outflow.Straight-line wind gusts that exceed the EF0 threshold of 65 mph are a
more common occurrence than are tornadoes on the INL. For a beyond design basis
extreme event, a EF4 tornado with a path length of 1.5 miles and a coverage
area of 5.3 square miles can be assumed with a probability of 10-7
yr-1. Jason Rich gave a formal presentation of the tornado
climatology to DOE-ID management on February 5. kirk.clawson@noaa.gov, Jason Rich, and Rick Eckman
ARL 2nd Quarter Publications
Published
Papers:
Gaumont-Guay,D. , T.A. Black, A.G. Barr, T.J. Griffis,
R.S. Jassal, P. Krishnan, N. Grant and Z.
Nesic. (2014). Eight years of forest-floor CO2
exchange in a boreal black spruce forest: spatial integration and
multi-temporal trends, 184 , 25-35, Agricultural and
Forest Meteorology. http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0168192313002177
Lei, H., D. J. Wuebbles,
X.Z. Liang, Z. Tao, S. Olsen, R. Artz, X. Ren, and M. Cohen. (2014). Projections of atmospheric mercury levels and their effect
on air quality in the United States. Atmospheric
Chemistry & Physics. 14(2): 783-795. doi:10.5194/acp-14-783-2014
Lei, H. and J. X. L. Wang (2014). Sensitivities of NOx transformation and
the effects on surface ozone and nitrate. Atmospheric
Chemistry & Physics. 14(3): 1385-1396. doi: 10.5194/acp-14-1385-2014
Seidel, D.J., G. Feingold, A. R. Jacobson, and N. Loeb (2014). "Detection limits of albedo
changes induced by climate engineering." Nature Climate Change 4(2):
93-98. doi:10.1038/nclimate2076.
To help inform discussions of possible climate engineering
proposals that seek to increase the reflectivity of the Earth, this study
provides estimates of the magnitude of changes in albedo that could be detected
using satellite observations of incoming and reflected sunlight. The analysis
was highlighted on the NOAA Research web site, garnered some media attention,
and will be the subject of a planned "featured image" item on NOAA's
climate.gov.
Technical Memos
Dumas, E., R. Dobosy,
D. Senn, B.
Baker, D. Sayres, C. Tuozzolo,
M. Rivero, N. Allen, C. Healy, J. Munster, J.
Anderson, 2014: Airborne measurements of CO2 and CH4
fluxes over the Alaskan North Slope using the Flux Observations of Carbon from
an Airborne Laboratory (FOCAL) system. NOAA
Technical Memorandum OAR ARL-267, Air Resources Laboratory, Atmospheric
Turbulence and Diffusion Division, Oak Ridge, Tennessee, 50 pp, February 2014.
The Tech Memo provides details of the Best Aircraft Turbulence (BAT)
probe instruments and their use in the first ATDD-Harvard-Aurora campaign in
Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, in August, 2013.
Conference Presentations &
Invited Talks
Glenn Rolph
gave a presentation as an invited speaker at a one day conference organized by
the Association pour la prévention de la
contamination de l'air et du sol (APCAS, i.e.
Association for the prevention of contamination of the air and soil), which was
held in Sherbrooke, Quebec, Canada, on March 27,
2014. The APCAS is the Quebec Section of the Air & Waste Management
Association. The title of the conference was the "Environmental Risk Management
of Industrial Origin: Impacts on Air Quality". Glenn gave a presentation on the research activities of ARL, how ARL
supports forecasters of the National Weather Service, and our new collaboration
with NOAA's Office of Response and Restoration for the incorporation of the
ALOHA term source model in the HYSPLIT model.Glenn also paid a visit to the Canadian Meteorological Centre of
Environment Canada to give the same presentation and discuss our common
research interests.
Dian
Seidel participated in the Stratosphere-troposphere Processes And their
Role in Climate (SPARC) 5th General Assembly, 12-17 January 2014 in
Queenstown New Zealand. She presented an invited keynote address on
"Temperature trends: Our evolving understanding" and two posters on climate
engineering studies. She participated in a special function for students and
early-career scientists, a side meeting on sudden stratospheric warmings, and, following the General Assembly, a meeting of
the SPARC Scientific Steering Group meeting, as co-chair of the SPARC
Temperature Trends Activity.
Rick Eckman
gave an oral presentation of "Project Sagebrush: Revisiting Short-range
Dispersion Using Modern Instrumentation" at the 2014 American Meteorological
Society Annual Meeting in Atlanta. Rick provided an overview of the project
together with some preliminary results from Phase 1 of the study conducted in
October 2013.
A poster entitled "A
Probabilistic Method for the Estimation of Surface Roughness and Displacement
Height Using Limited Wind Profile Information" by Rick Eckman,
Dennis Finn, and Kirk Clawson was presented at the 2014 American Meteorological
Society Annual Meeting. It described work stemming from the original Wind
Forecast Improvement Project study in Texas in 2011-2012.
Awards, Honors, Recognition
Dian Seidel has been appointed by the American
Meteorological Society (AMS) Council to serve (with three other colleagues) on
the American Institute of Physics (AIP) Governing Board and to be the AMS
designee to the AIP Executive Committee. The AMS recently became a Member
Society of the AIP. With offices in College Park, Maryland, AIP serves a
federation of ten physical science societies in a common mission to advance,
promote, and serve the physical sciences for the benefit of humanity. AMS is
the first new member society of AIP in 27 years. AIP is currently undertaking a
long-overdue revision of its constitution, by-laws, and governance structure,
as well as a comprehensive analysis of the value it offers to member societies.
Outreach
LaToya Myles and Randy White welcomed an East
Tennessee Girl Scout troop for a tour and air pollution presentation at ATDD.
The tour included a show-and-tell of various instruments in addition to a
discussion of education and career options with NOAA. The troop was
interested in learning more about air pollution in East Tennessee and wanted
project ideas that could be used to earn Science and Technology badges.
With valuable assistance from Will Pendergrass, Barbara Shifflett, and Gabrielle Land, ATDD staff offered to help
the girls design an experiment to measure atmospheric ozone in their local
community. latoya.myles@noaa.gov, R. White
The ATDD Library Committee completed the task
for reducing the number of books and journals in the library.
Several books and the Quarterly
Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society were retained. Thousands
of books and journals were sent to organizations where they will be distributed
to scientific communities worldwide. Darien Book Aid (http://www.darienbookaid.org/),
Books for America (http://www.booksforamerica.org/),
and International Organization for Chemical Sciences in Development - Books for
International Development (http://www.iocd.org/WhatWeDo/books.shtml)
accepted hundreds of books and journals for distribution. These books covered
the subjects of climate and atmospheric change, dry and wet deposition, and
mathematical modeling ranging from 1945 - 2010. gabrielle.land@noaa.gov
The new SORD website "went live." The new website is the result of a couple of years of work and is a
complete rebuild of the entire system from the hardware to the
software/programming and database.Numerous security approvals and testing were required.The site has a Google Maps foundation and the
standard set of Google Map tools can be used.A demo version was tested by a couple of groups of DOE/NNSA/Nevada Field
Office users.Comments received were
noted and some changes were made immediately.Other changes will come down the line.A good deal of planning went into the launch of the new site, and as a
result the launch went smoothly.Feedback to date has been very positive and new ideas continue to be
provided.The initial release contains
all essential information as well as a couple of new features.For example, a new feature allows a user to
click on a lightning strike marker and see location and strength information. kip.smith@noaa.gov, Phil Abbott, Walt Schalk.