NOAA03-134
Contact: Jana Goldman
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
(301) 713-2483
November 10, 2003
NOAA NAMES DIRECTOR OF CLIMATE OFFICE, PROGRAM
Dr. Chet Koblinsky, has been named as the director of the NOAA Climate
Office and NOAA Climate Program. Koblinsky, who has spent his career
working in global ocean and climate issues, started his new position
Nov. 3. NOAA is an agency of the U.S. Department of Commerce.
Chet comes to NOAA with formidable credentials, said retired Navy
Vice Adm. Conrad C. Lautenbacher, Ph.D., under secretary of commerce for
oceans and atmosphere and NOAA administrator. Not the least of these
is his work with global ocean and climate science programs, two major
areas of NOAA's work.
He conducted ocean research at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography
in La Jolla, Calif., and NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in
Greenbelt, Md., authoring more than 60 research papers on oceanographic
and remote sensing studies.
Koblinsky was the project scientist for NASA's Earth Observing System
Altimeter mission, which led to the development of NASA's successful
ICESAT and Jason-1 missions. Over the past decade, he has been head of
the Oceans and Ice Branch at Goddard, receiving Goddard's Outstanding
Management Award and the Outstanding Supervisor Award from the Federal
Executive Board, and NASA's Exceptional Scientific Achievement Award for
his research on ocean circulation with satellite altimeter observations.
He is co-editor of Observing the Ocean in the 21st Century, A Strategy
for Global Ocean Observations, published by the Australian Bureau of
Meteorology in 2001.
For the past year, Koblinsky has worked with Dr. James Mahoney,
assistant secretary of commerce for oceans and atmosphere, on the
strategic plan for the U.S. Climate Change Science Program.
Koblinsky was educated in the Pacific Northwest at Reed College and
received a doctorate degree in oceanography from the Oregon State
University.
The NOAA Climate Office serves as the focal point for climate programs
within NOAA, supporting one of NOAA's primary mission goals: to
understand climate variability and change to enhance society's ability
to plan and respond.
The Commerce Department's National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration (NOAA) Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research is
dedicated to enhancing economic security and national safety through
research to better understand weather and climate-related events and to
manage wisely our nation's coastal and marine resources.
