| “Climate
data is amazingly important. Much of our economy is directly
driven by weather.” |
| --
Don Potts, Montana Climate Center director |
|
UM
starts state climate center
Weather
impacts all Montanans. From outdoor enthusiasts to
wheat farmers and winter drivers, weather plays a crucial role in
all our lives.
But Big Sky Country is one of only three states without an office
of climatology. To fill this void, UM has stepped forward to start
the new Montana Climate Center. The office will provide detailed information
on weather, climate, snow, fire, agriculture and much more.
“Climate data is amazingly important,” said Don Potts,
the new center’s director and a UM water resources professor.
“Much of our economy is directly driven by weather.”
The Montana Climate Center will be operated by UM’s College
of Forestry and Conservation — specifically the Numerical Terradynamic
Simulation Group, which has designed software for NASA environmental
satellites.
The new center has a Web site at http://climate.ntsg.umt.edu.
Potts said the site provides a gateway to a vast array of information,
including weather alerts, current satellite snapshots of Montana skies
and instant links to weather conditions in communities across the
state.
“We want this site to be one-stop shopping for people,”
Potts said. “It serves as a conduit of information. We don’t
want to replace good, existing information sources, but rather lead
people to them.”
If farmers need information on irrigation, we can take them to it.
If a boater needs to check river levels, we have it. If a skier wants
snow levels, this is the site.”
Of the 47 states that have offices of climatology, all but seven are
housed at universities. Montana previously had an office of climatology
based at Montana State University-Bozeman until the mid-1990s, but
it was discontinued when the state climatologist there retired and
the decision was made to discontinue funding.
NTSG director Steve Running said the UM Montana Climate Center will
operate using existing resources. He said Daniel Dwyer, UM’s
new vice president for research, was instrumental in getting the center
jump-started at UM.
Running’s research group has amassed vast amounts of climate
data on Montana during the past 20 years, and the new center will
provide a practical outlet for this information. He said his office
will generate unique information for the site such as weekly vegetative
productivity of the state to Montana-wide temperature profiles —
all from NASA satellites.
“This is a valuable service we can provide to Montana for little
money using our existing in-house capabilities,” Running said.
“We plan to keep updating and improving the site as much as
possible.”
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