Climatologist Dr. Phil Mote To Speak At Climate Change Meeting In Portland
The Oregon chapter of the American Meteorological Society (AMS) is proud to announce that it will co-host Oregon Climatologist Dr. Phil Mote in a counterpoint meeting on global climate change on April 10th from 7pm to 9pm at Portland State University.
This educational meeting will explore humans role in global climate change and is being co-hosted with the Sigma Xi Columbia-Willamette Chapter. This public meeting will take place on Tuesday, April 10th from 7-9pm and is being billed as, “The Scientific Case for Human Influence on Global Climate: What We Learn From Analyzing ALL The Evidence.” Joining Dr. Mote will be Andreas Schmittner, Oregon State University Professor of Oceanic and Atmospheric Sciences and Dr. Christina Hulbe, Professor of Geology at Portland State University.
The panel plans to give a single joint presentation that will educate attendees on the influence humans have on climate, as backed by scientific evidence. The panel may also raise counterpoints to data presented at a similar Oregon AMS meeting last January. In that meeting, the Oregon Chapter of the American Meteorological Society (AMS) hosted a panel of scientists that asked the question, “Is Human Caused Global Warming the Greatest Scientific Myth of Our Generation?” A capacity audience of 500 attended the meeting, which was the single largest in the chapters sixty-five year history. The Oregon AMS chapter is committed to examining all the evidence with regards to climate change. To that end, our mission statement reads, “The purpose of this society shall be to advance professional ideals in the science of meteorology and to promote the development, exchange, and application of meteorological knowledge.” By presenting all sides of this topic we hope the public will become better educated regarding global climate change. There is still a large divide amongst the general public on what is the primary driver behind climate change. We hope our series of meetings this year will dispel some of the long standing climate change myths, while confirming others with solid scientific evidence. No matter what their personal view of climate change was, attendees of our first meeting in January were cordial and an informational meeting ensued. We anticipate the same level of professionalism from our April 10th meeting and encourage all those who are interested to attend. This is the first presentation given by Dr. Mote to the Oregon AMS chapter since the George Taylor / Phil Mote debate at OMSI in January of 2007. We are honored to host Dr. Mote and his colleagues and look forward to a great evening. This meeting is free and open to the general public. Please arrive early for best seating, as a large turnout is expected. Regional media is encouraged to advance as well as cover this event and link directly to our web site for the latest meeting updates.
The Oregon Chapter of the American Meteorological Society is the single largest non-collegiate based state AMS chapter in the country, with more than 180 total members. Membership in this society is open to persons who are interested in the active support of the advance professional ideals in the science of meteorology and the development, exchange, and application of meteorological knowledge. Membership dues are just $7 per year. If you would like to find out more information about the Oregon Chapter of the American Meteorological Society please see: http://www.ametsoc.org/chapters/oregon. For more information on the Sigma Xi Columbia-Willamette Chapter please see: http://sx-cw.org.
Here is the official meeting announcement —
“The Scientific Case for Human Influence on Global Climate: What We Learn From Analyzing ALL The Evidence.”
GUEST SPEAKERS: Dr. Phil Mote, Oregon State Climatologist, Director of the Oregon Climate Change Research Institute and Professor of Oceanic and Atmospheric Sciences at Oregon State University. Andreas Schmittner, Associate Professor of Oceanic and Atmospheric Sciences, Oregon State University. Dr. Christina Hulbe, Professor of Geology, Portland State University.
WHEN: Tuesday, April 10th 2012 7-9pm. Note – A large audience is expected. Please arrive early for the best seating.
WHERE: Portland State University “Grand Ballroom” inside the Smith Memorial Student Union Building. The grand ballroom is located on the third floor, room #355. For a PSU campus map, click: http://tinyurl.com/7a54h5q. For driving directions to PSU click: http://tinyurl.com/zeuhw. Parking is available on Parking Structure #1 (see campus map link above). Access to Smith Memorial Student Union Building from Parking Structure #1 can be had via the sky bridge on level 4 of the parking structure (see campus map link above). Street parking is also available.
AGENDA: Exploring the scientific case for human influence on global climate. Guest speakers may also raise counterpoints to the January 2012 Oregon AMS meeting on climate change seen at: http://tinyurl.com/6vk27km. A Q&A session will be held at the end of the meeting.
COST: Free and open to the general public. This educational meeting is being co-hosted with the Sigma Xi Columbia-Willamette Chapter: http://sx-cw.org
OVERNIGHT ACCOMMODATIONS: For overnight accommodations in downtown Portland, please see: http://tinyurl.com/7boqrsf
CONTACT: Steve Pierce, Oregon AMS President: (503) 504-2075 or stevejpierce@comcast.net Oregon AMS web site: http://www.ametsoc.org/chapters/oregon
Steve Pierce
Steve Pierce is widely known as Oregon and Washington's "go-to-guy" when it comes to fast, accurate historical meteorological research and forecasts. Steve is currently the President of the Oregon Chapter of the American Meteorological Society (AMS). Steve is also recognized as a regional weather commentator and blogger who can be heard on local radio stations and seen in print media outlets across the Pacific Northwest. His Weather Blog is hosted by the Columbian Newspaper in Vancouver. Check it out! He is a third generation resident of Vancouver, Washington and holds a degree in Communications. Both sets of Steve's grandparents migrated to Vancouver during World War II. One set traveled from Lenox, Iowa to work in the Kaiser Shipyards supporting the war effort. The other set came to Vancouver from Olympia, Washington to work as educators for the rapidly expanding Vancouver School District. When the war was over, both sets of grandparents decided to stay in Vancouver and continue raising their families, as did thousands of other families at the time. Those who are most familiar with Steve can attest to the fact that weather is his true passion. His love for "all things weather" began at the age of 7 when Mt. St. Helens erupted in 1980. He was fascinated with which direction the ash plumes were headed. Then came the very powerful windstorm of Friday, November 13, 1981, also referred to as the "Friday the 13th" storm. This was the strongest storm to hit the Portland / Vancouver area since the great Columbus Day Storm of 1962! At age 11, he was asked to publish an extended weather forecast for his elementary school's weekly newsletter. In the 1980's, at age 14, Steve was the youngest of KGW-TV's local "weather watchers" and would phone in his daily Vancouver weather stats to then television meteorologist Jim Little for use on-air. Steve has lived through all of the major Pacific Northwest weather events of the past 30 years, and then some. The most notable events include; the bitterly cold winter of 1978-1979, the record setting snow storms of January 1980, the summer heat wave of August 1981, the windstorms of November 1981 and December 1995, the severe arctic blast of February 1989, the record flood of February 1996, the historic ice storm of January 2004, the Vancouver tornado of January 2008 and the record setting snow storm of Christmas 2008. Not to mention every Mt. St. Helens volcanic eruption in between. With access to the most extensive set of historical weather records available to date, Steve has personally designed and integrated a proprietary system that gives him the ability to quickly locate and manipulate weather data as far back as the 1800's. As one local Meteorologist put it, "Steve has fast access to historical weather data that is needed for media, agriculture, business, personal, historical and other climatological needs. He can quickly manipulate the data in many different ways. His forecasts are also quite accurate, especially at longer lead times." Steve also provides local storm assessments, narratives and weather presentations to the general public, as requested. In his spare time, Steve enjoys spending time with his family, the outdoors, vacationing at his family's coastal cabin and just relaxing! By the way, do you like your weather on the "extreme" side? So does Steve! Whether it is collecting damage assessment data & photos after record setting 125 mph winds at the coast in December 2007, being one of the first on the scene after the January 2008 Vancouver tornado, or feeling (literally) the awesome power of 100 mph wind gusts at Oregon's Crown Point in January 2010, Steve has experienced it all! As Steve says, "don't just love weather, live weather!" Check out Steve's personal weather website at: http://www.piercevideo.com/weather.shtml