The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration granted $3,370,872 to the University of Oklahoma to fund projects with the Cooperative Institute for Mesoscale Meteorological Studies. NOAA is an agency of the U.S. Department of Commerce.

The grant will finance the implementation of a five-year plan for CIMMS. Projects under this plan include convective weather research, severe weather research, improving hazardous weather detection, warnings, and forecasts, and a workshop on regional climate prediction and application. In addition, CIMMS will investigate the use of phased array radar technology, detection and attribution of climate change using climate indices for the United States, and research warning decision-making.

“Funding from this NOAA grant will provide scientists with the information that they need to make breakthroughs in weather research that will ultimately save lives and protect property” said retired Navy Vice Adm. Conrad C. Lautenbacher, Ph.D., under secretary of commerce for oceans and atmosphere and NOAA administrator. “NOAA and the Bush Administration are working to improve the understanding and forecasting of weather phenomena through cooperative institutes like the Cooperative Institute for Mososcale Meteorological Studies.”

Each year, NOAA awards approximately $900 million in grants to members of the academic, scientific and business communities to assist the agency in fulfilling its mission to study the Earth’s natural systems in order to predict environmental change, manage ocean resources, protect life and property, and provide decision makers with reliable scientific information. NOAA’s goals and programs reflect a commitment to these basic responsibilities of science and service to the nation for the past 34 years.

NOAA is dedicated to enhancing economic security and national safety through the prediction and research of weather and climate-related events and providing environmental stewardship of our nation’s coastal and marine resources. To learn more about NOAA, please visit: http://www.noaa.gov.