Winds of Change: Fifty Years of Achievements in the CSIRO Division of Atmospheric Research 1946-1996

By John J. Garratt, David D. Angus and Paul P. Holper

This book describes the evolution and development of the Division's research throughout the years and the ways in which scientists responded to the needs of the community. Winds of Change also presents a very human face of science, chronicling the personalities, and the highs and lows of scientific research.

• Language: English
• Publisher: CSIRO PUBLISHING
• Release date: Jan 1, 1998
• ISBN: 9780643102699

Book preview

Winds of Change

Fifty years of achievements in the

CSIRO Division of Atmospheric Research

1946-1996

John Garratt, David Angus & Paul Holper

National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication entry

Garratt, J.R. John Roy)

Winds of change: fifty years of achievements in the

CSIRO Division of Atmospheric Research 1946-1996.

ISBN 0 643 06363 3

1. CSIRO. Division of Atmospheric Research – History.

2. Atmosphere – Research – Australia – History.

I. Angus, D.E. (David Edgar). II. Holper, Paul N.

III. CSIRO. Division of Atmospheric Research. IV. Title.

551.5072094

© CSIRO 1998

This book is available from:

CSIRO PUBLISHING

PO Box 1139

(1 50 Oxford Street)

Collingwood 3066

Australia

Tel: [phone] Int: [phone]

Fax: [phone] Int: [phone]

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Web: http://www.publish.csiro.au

Printed in Australia

FOREWORD

I arrived at Aspendale in 1971, when the Division of Meteorological Physics (as it was called then) was already 25 years old, and Bill Priestley had been its Chief from the day he and his wife stepped ashore in late 1946. Within a year or so of my arrival he retired as Chief, to be replaced by Brian Tucker, who took control of the newly named Division of Atmospheric Physics. This name change reflected the change in emphasis of the research between the 1960s and 1970s. Some 10 years later, changes in the external environment and the growth of research in atmospheric chemistry encouraged a further (and perhaps final) change of name to the Division of Atmospheric Research. Just five years ago in 1992, Brian Tucker retired, to be succeeded by myself as Chief.

I can thus claim to have worked at Aspendale throughout the second half of the Division’s 50 years that are celebrated in the present book. However, we do have one member of the Division, Brian Turner, and one ex-member, and a Divisional fellow for the last 10 years, Eric Webb, who worked at Aspendale for most of these 50 years. They have lived through several Divisional reviews, and have seen the research evolve and diversify as the Division grew from less than 10 members in the late 1940s, to close to 150 by the mid-1990s. To use a cricket analogy, having scored a half-century we now have our heads down looking ahead to converting this into a century, well into the next millennium! It is impossible to predict what the Division might be doing in 2046, just as it would have been impossible for men and women of the fledgling Division back in 1950 to predict where we are today.

This 50th anniversary offering provides an absorbing and visually appealing pictorial history of the Division, interspersed with a narrative that traces the growth in research and the people who contributed to the Division’s successes. The authors are to be congratulated for producing a book that will appeal to a wide spectrum of readers.

Graeme I Pearman

Chief of Division

October 1997

CONTENTS

Foreword

Acknowledgements

Preface

1     The Beginning

Meteorology in CSIR

The first research plans

First appointments

Research begins

2     Consolidation

Cold fronts and sea breezes

Monitoring moisture, fighting frost

Probing the lower atmosphere

Measuring solar and thermal radiation

Measuring ozone in the upper atmosphere

Recorders, radars and radiometers

3     Expansion

Meteorology: from smallest to largest scales

Modelling the atmosphere: computers and water tanks

Ozone: high and low

Tracking radioactive fallout

Carbon dioxide studies begin

The growth of aircraft experiments

The great outdoors

Development of instruments for field experiments

4     Broadened Horizons

The atmosphere and the oceans in a tank of water

Outstanding in the field

What goes up...

Regional meteorology

Theories of atmospheric motion

Climate change: natural and unnatural

Research active and passive: remote sensing

Chemistry of the atmosphere

5     Capitalising on Investments

Meteorology: observations and models

Urban and regional air pollution

Dynamics of the atmosphere

Land, air and space: remote sensing

The changing composition of the atmosphere

Clouds and precipitation

Climate modelling and impacts

Epilogue

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Preparing this book was made easier by the involvement in the early stages of preparation of a planning committee — thanks go to Peter Baines, Liz Davy, Mac Dilley and Barrie Pittock for their input. A number of staff and ex-staff made helpful comments on early drafts, and for this we particularly thank Bill Shepherd, Brian Tucker, David Beardsmore, Derek Reid and Helen Goodman. Other staff provided material that was included in the text — Bob Cechet, Mac Dilley, Ray Langenfelds, Ron McVay, Peter Nelson, Graeme Patterson, Barrie Pittock, Martin Platt, Derek Reid, Brian Ryan, Brian Sawford, Jim Stevenson, Brian Tucker and Stuart Young. Material for the boxes included in the final version was provided by David Beardsmore, Robert Bell, Bill Bourke, Liz Davy, Roger Francey, Helen Goodman, Bruce Hicks, Ron Hill, Barrie Hunt, Ian Mcllroy, Bruce Morton, David Murray, Russell O’Brien, Graham Rutter, Bob Seaman and Brian Turner and we acknowledge their contribution. We thank Tom Beer, Graeme Pearman and Eric Webb for their timely reviews, and are particularly indebted to Willem Bouma for his thorough reviews of several drafts.

Finally, we thank Kate Francis and Mandy Hopkins for their efforts in organising the written material electronically, and for typing many, many drafts of individual chapters and the work as a whole; Geoff Richards and David Whillas for their help in providing photographic material; Mouy Kaing for providing vital facts and figures; and to CSIRO Publishing for overseeing the last leg of the journey.

It is a pleasure to acknowledge the support of Graeme Pearman, whose original idea it was (with Willem Bouma) to celebrate in this form the Division’s 50th anniversary. Any shortcomings in the book are the responsibility of the authors.

PREFACE

In 1945, the then Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) in Australia wrote to David Brunt, Professor of Meteorology at Imperial College, London, expressing its desire to embark on research in the atmospheric sciences. He was asked to recommend someone to head the research group.

Brunt approached a young mathematician in the British Meteorological Office. As a result of these overtures, C.H.B. (‘Bill’) Priestley was appointed to CSIR on 23 September 1946. Accompanied by his wife, Connie, he arrived in Melbourne two days before Christmas 1946 to take up the position of Officer-in-Charge of the new Meteorological Physics Section.

In less than two decades, the embryonic group formed by Priestley became one of the leading research teams in the world dealing with turbulent transfer in the lowest layers of the atmosphere. By the end of the third decade, fundamental contributions were being made in the areas of radiation, geophysical fluid dynamics, mesoscale and synoptic meteorology, and in atmospheric chemistry. Throughout our history, much of our reputation has been built upon the success of carefully conducted field expeditions. The locations ranged from fairly close (the Latrobe Valley in Victoria) to far (the Northern Territory, Western Australia; even New Zealand and New Guinea), and the depths of atmosphere ranged from the micrometeorological (up to 30 metres) through the atmospheric boundary layer (1–2 kilometres), the upper troposphere (5–10 kilometres) to the stratosphere (tens of kilometres).

This book attempts to place on record the major events in the Division’s first 50 years and, hence, is primarily concerned with the Division and its staff. Thus, you will find little reference to our sister Divisions of CSIRO, and the Bureau of Meteorology, with whom we have had significant working relations over the years.

Information on the former Australian Numerical Meteorology Research Centre (joint CSIRO and Bureau of Meteorology) and the CSIRO Division of Cloud Physics is here because they part merged with the CSIRO Division of Atmospheric Physics to form the new Division of Atmospheric Research in 1983 and are an integral part of our story.

For the record, we list seven key achievements that reflect the foresight in atmospheric research common to all three Chiefs — Bill Priestley, Brian Tucker and Graeme Pearman.

1.  Quantification of water loss by evaporation from the Australian continent (1950s–60s)

2.  Comprehensive characterisation of the atmospheric boundary layer (1960s–80s)

3.  Application of strategic atmospheric pollution research into integrated airshed studies and impact assessments (1970s–90s)

4.  Monitoring of greenhouse gases and detection of current and past global atmospheric change (1970s–90s)

5.  Elucidating the role of CFCs and halons, and protection of the stratospheric ozone layer (1970s–90s)

6.  Development and application of a wide range of remote sensing tools (1970s–90s)

7.  Development and application of world-class global climate and limited-area models of the atmosphere (1980s–90s).

Sadly, many of those who could have given authoritative first-hand accounts of hopes and aspirations, fulfilled or otherwise, are no longer with us. And as the activities took place contemporaneously on many fronts, this account may be somewhat of a patchwork, but we feel it reflects the kaleidoscopic nature of environmental research carried out in the Division.

John Garratt, David Angus and Paul Holper

September 1997

Making history: the authors of Winds of Change from left to right: David Angus, Paul Holper and John Garratt.

1 THE BEGINNING

1

THE BEGINN

On 23 September 1946, the Executive Committee (the Executive) of Australia’s Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) appointed Charles Henry Brian (‘Bill’) Priestley to initiate a meteorological research program. The ensuing fifty years produced numerous successful research programs including fundamental contributions to micrometeorology and turbulence, agricultural meteorology, synoptic meteorology, clouds and radiation, atmospheric composition and chemistry, and climate modelling and impacts.

Meteorology in CSIR

Why did the Executive decide to move into meteorological research? Part of the explanation lay in the charter and structure of CSIR itself. In 1926 an Act setting up CSIR was passed by Parliament to promote scientific research for the benefit of primary and secondary industries, and to encourage the pursuit of ‘pure’ research. The Council (and its successor, in 1949, CSIRO) was placed outside the departmental structure of the Public Service so that appointments and promotions of scientists could be made independently and at the highest intellectual level. The Executive’s continuing policy was to appoint the most outstanding person they could find as a Chief of Division, responsible directly to themselves, and to leave the Chief to be fully responsible for the research of that Division. Throughout the 1930s, research activities were divided essentially between animal and plant streams, with a concentration both on application and on accelerating transfer of existing knowledge to suit local conditions. With war looming in Europe, there was a growing sense of urgency to upgrade technological capacity in Australia and to provide a measure of independence from overseas suppliers of defence equipment. The Second World War transformed CSIR extensively and rapidly. Its scientific expertise was increasingly harnessed to address a variety of urgent problems. With it came a greater acceptance of the scientist’s role in society. The nature of the Australian environment, with our harsh and unpredictable climate, and with heavy losses sustained by primary industry due to drought or flood, also played a large part in the Executive’s decision to pursue meteorological research.

In addition to Bill Priestley, two other scientists were crucial to the development of the atmospheric sciences in CSIR and CSIRO. The first, E.G. (Taffy) Bowen, joined CSIR’s Radiophysics Laboratory in 1944 and became Chief of the Division of Radiophysics in 1946. Bowen had been the radar expert on Sir Henry Tizard’s official British mission to the USA in late 1940 and was encouraged by Tizard and others to move to Australia from England. (Tizard had been chairman of an influential committee set up in 1935 to advise the British government on plans for radar development. For the next several years, his position of authority enabled these plans to be argued at the highest levels. Bowen came to know him well.) In the decade following the Second World War, Bowen was instrumental in applying wartime radar techniques in three new fields of research — radio astronomy, radio navigation, and rain and cloud physics.

The second was F.W.G. (Fred) White, whom Bowen had first met in England in the 1930s. White had become Chief of the Division of Radiophysics in 1942 and, at the end of the war, was appointed to the CSIR Executive. He later became Deputy Chairman of CSIRO in 1957 and Chairman from 1959 to 1970. He was involved in virtually every major development in CSIRO, and was particularly involved in the construction of the 64-metre radiotelescope at Parkes, and the establishment of laboratories to do research on wool and wool textiles and on the utilisation of Australian coals.

The first research plans

In November 1945, members of the Council considered a proposal put to them by Fred White ‘that CSIR should take responsibility for the establishment of a Division or Section of Meteorological Physics’. He pointed out that the importance of weather to Australia justified an intensive study of the physics of the atmosphere. Advice had been obtained from an atmospheric physics research committee comprising the Director of Meteorology, H.N. Warren; the subsequent head of the Meteorology Department at Melbourne University, F. Loewe; Sir John Madsen of Sydney University; and White himself. Shortly after, the Minister approved plans to establish a Section, and applications were invited in Australia and overseas for appointment to the position of Officer-in-Charge of a Meteorological Physics Section, but the Executive also approached Professor David Brunt in England for suggestions. He nominated Bill Priestley, then employed at the British Meteorological Office.

In May 1946, at White’s suggestion, the Council decided to form a Consultative Committee on Meteorological Research. The Committee consisted of the Commonwealth Astronomer, R. Woolley; H.N. Warren; the Professor of