December 17 , 2009
Company Profile: StormCenter Communications
“Our mandate is to increase the environmental IQ of America,” says Dave Jones, CEO of StormCenter Communications, a new resident of the Incubator and Accelerator. StormCenter is currently engaged in research projects with NASA and NOAA to improve the communication of weather and climate change data in order to enhance preparation for and responses to major storms. The company is developing the Envirocast® Vision™ Touchtable (EVTT), a potential visualization and collaboration tool for the National Weather Service and FEMA that will enable scientists to share information on storm data and make decisions on where to position response crews before storms hit. StormCenter is developing the EVTT as a prototype decision support tool for The Gulf of Mexico Alliance (governors of all Gulf Coast states) and is working with the state of Texas as a model for how the rest of the Gulf Coast States can be more prepared for weather and climate change impacts to the region.
The company’s second major project involves sharing climate change information to the wider world. To that end, the company has built a broadcast studio on the 4th floor of the building, where it plans to transmit presentations on weather and climate change information to classrooms in K-16 schools and universities. Most recently, StormCenter collaborated with NOAA and the U.S. State Department to broadcast a scientific panel discussion on Climate Literacy to the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen via videoconferencing technology.
Jones, a meteorologist who once did on-air weather forecasting for NBC4 in Washington, DC, also sent a crew from his company to Greenland in July to take video of the The North Greenland Eemian Ice Drilling project (NEEM). The footage aired on the Weather Channel and PBS. “We want to leverage the work we’re doing with NOAA and NASA and turn material into original stories for broadcast and use in the classroom,” says Jones.
The company, founded in 2001 and previously located in Howard County, is small - 6 employees - but growing. One reason Jones decided to relocate his company to UMBC this past June was the opportunity to hire student interns, as well as collaborate with faculty on research projects. Jones was also impressed with bwtech@UMBC’s network server capabilities and connection to Internet2 that allows the transmission of large data files. UMBC’s existing collaborations with NASA - the university ranks 2nd nationally in NASA university research grants and cooperative agreements - also convinced Jones that StormCenter Communications would be a natural fit with bwtech@UMBC.